AFL Fixtures: Ranking the difficulty of your AFL team's fixture for the 2020 season

Lachlan McKirdy

AFL Fixtures: Ranking the difficulty of your AFL team's fixture for the 2020 season image

The 2020 AFL fixtures have been released with some mouth-watering matches getting fans excited for the year ahead. 

Richmond will take on Carlton in the opening game of the season, while Sydney will host Essendon and Joe Daniher in round two. 

Every year fans ask the same question, how good is my team's draw?

Well this year, Sporting News has you covered with a formula to evaluate the strength of your team's draw. 

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Take a look at how we make our calculations down below. 

How we calculate the strength of the fixtures?

Points will be awarded to teams the more difficult their fixture is, so the team with the most points at the end will have the most difficult draw.

We've broken the draw into three different categories to base our calculations on. 

First, points are awarded based on the team you are playing and where they finished in the 2019 home & away season. 

2018 Ladder PositionPoints Awarded
1st - 4th4
5th - 8th3
9th - 14th2
15th - 18th1

Second, points will be awarded based on the number of short or long turnarounds they have. 

Length of TurnaroundPoints Awarded
Five-Day3
Six-Day1
Eight-Day-1
9+ Day-2

Finally, teams will be given points or have points taken away if they have extended stretch of games at home or away.

These are only given if teams would have otherwise had to have flown interstate for that game.

For example, Collingwood having to play Carlton away at the MCG doesn't count as an 'away game'.

Length of Home Games StretchPoints Awarded
Three Games-3
Two Games-1

 

Length of Away Games StretchPoints Awarded
Three Games3
Two Games1

The final influencer on the overall difficulty is whether the team has to play top four clubs back-to-back or in some cases, three weeks in a row.

Top Four ClashesPoints Awarded
Two in a row2
Three in a row3

POINTS TABLE JUST ON HOME AND AWAY FIXTURES

TeamPoints
West Coast57
Collingwood56
GWS GIANTS56
Carlton55
Hawthorn55
Adelaide Crows54
Essendon54
Geelong54
Melbourne 54
Brisbane53
Gold Coast 53
North Melbourne53
Port Adelaide53
Richmond53
Sydney Swans53
Fremantle52
St Kilda51
Western Bulldogs51

Based on just the draw, West Coast have been handed the toughest draw purely based on the teams they face based on their 2019 finishing position. 

West Coast play seven out of a possible eight matches against top four finishers from 2019.

Collingwood and the GIANTS have also been handed a relatively tough draw while Carlton could consider themselves unlucky. 

Down the other end of the table, the Western Bulldogs, St Kilda and Fremantle have what could be considered the easiest draw. 

The 2019 Premiers have also lucked out with a relatively favourable draw. 

 

ADJUSTING THE TABLE FOR VARIABLES

Now we take those numbers and adjust them for things like short or long turnarounds, stretches of home/away games and back-to-back top-four clashes that can be harder to bounce back from. 

Here is a table of the combined total for all those adjustments. 

TeamPoints
West Coast2
Collingwood0
GIANTS1
Carlton-3
Hawthorn5
Adelaide3
Essendon-3
Geelong1
Melbourne0
Brisbane6
Gold Coast1
North Melbourne4
Port Adelaide-3
Richmond1
Sydney1
Fremantle0
St Kilda0
Western Bulldogs-1

The biggest points influence here is for Brisbane, mainly because of their number of short turnarounds and back-to-back top four fixtures. 

The Lions play Geelong and Richmond in rounds seven and eight and Collingwood and Geelong in rounds 16 and 17. They also have one five-day turnaround and six six-day turnarounds. 

Hawthorn have five points to add to their difficulty, facing Collingwood and Geelong in rounds three and four. They also face Brisbane in round one in a horror opening month of footy. 

On the other end of the spectrum, Carlton, Essendon and Port Adelaide come out more favourably thanks to some longer turnarounds and more home games. 

Port Adelaide, in particular, have a stretch of three straight games in Adelaide from rounds 13 to 15, including a showdown against the Crows. 

FINAL TABLE OF FIXTURE DIFFICULTY

No.TeamPoints
1Hawthorn60
2West Coast59
2Brisbane Lions59
4GWS GIANTS57
4Adelaide57
4North Melbourne57
7Collingwood56
8Geelong55
9Melbourne54
9Gold Coast54
9Richmond54
9Sydney Swans54
13Carlton52
13Fremantle52
15Essendon51
15St Kilda51
17Port Adelaide50
18Western Bulldogs49

The Hawks have been handed the toughest draw according to our calculations, as previously mentioned due to the number of their back-to-back matches against top four opponents. 

West Coast follow not far behind thanks to their seven six-day turnarounds and having to play seven out of eight possible matches against the 2019 top four.

Western Bulldogs have been given what can be seen as the easiest draw, with only playing each of last year's top four once. For a team that finished inside the top eight, that is great news for Bulldogs fans. 

Port Adelaide closely follow thanks to a number of back-to-back games at Adelaide Oval and thanks to the fact they also only play each of last year's top four once. 

TOUGHEST START TO 2020

TEAMPOINTS
Hawthorn14
Collingwood13
Adelaide11
Carlton11
North Melbourne11
GIANTS11
St Kilda10
Western Bulldogs10
Brisbane Lions10
Melbourne10
West Coast9
Richmond9
Geelong9
Gold Coast9
Port Adelaide8
Sydney Swans7
Essendon7
Fremantle7

Based purely on who they are playing, Hawthorn has the toughest opening month. They come up against Brisbane, Fremantle, Collingwood and Geelong. 

Down the other end, the Swans, Bombers and Dockers have a good start to the year, avoiding all the top four sides and each playing bottom four sides at least twice. 

TOUGHEST END TO 2020

TeamPoints
West Coast13
GWS GIANTS12
Adelaide12
Essendon12
Port Adelaide12
Gold Coast11
Western Bulldogs11
Geelong10
Brisbane10
Fremantle10
Collingwood9
Carlton9
Hawthorn9
St Kilda9
Melbourne8
North Melbourne7
Richmond7
Sydney Swans7

The Sydney Swans also have a very good end to the year with a run that includes the Demons and the Suns.

The 2019 Premiers will also love their back-end of 2020, with games against Adelaide, Carlton and Fremantle to look forward to. 

While West Coast will hope they have a top-eight spot wrapped up, with games against the Lions (A), Collingwood (H) and Western Bulldogs (A).

These stats are obviously not meant to be an accurate representation of what will happen next season, it's a fair indication of what your side can look forward to in 2020. 

Lachlan McKirdy