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All Grounds Dimensions - Some surprises

Its Time for Another
Its Time for Another
in Melbourne Demons

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On 6/29/2017 at 1:52 PM, jnrmac said:

Cricket and footy are pretty much the only sports in the world that are played on a pitch or oval where the grounds are not uniform....

 

Baseball doesn't have uniform grounds either. 99% invisible did a podcast on baseball 'ball parks' just a couple of weeks ago: http://99percentinvisible.org/episode/in-the-same-ballpark/

I think it's great: it adds some uniqueness and favours certain players / games styles across the different grounds.

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    • 3 years later...
     
    On 6/29/2017 at 12:12 PM, It's Time said:

    I compiled the list below of all grounds dimensions. I didn't know a lot of them and was quite surprised by some of them. For instance the MCG is virtually the 3rd shortest ground in the comp but the widest. The Gabba is virtually the same dimensions as the SCG. Domain, Blundstone and TIO are virtually the same length which is 20 m's longer than the SCG & Gabba. Simonds is 26m's narrower than the MCG which is more than the difference between the shortest and longest grounds. 

    I've done my best to verify the accuracy of these measurements. I even rang some of the venues. They all might not be 100% accurate. The AFL website has them on there but some are definitely not correct and I verified that with some of the venues. 

    AFL Ground Dimensions

    MCG      160 x 141  

    Etihad    159.5 x 128.8   

    Simonds 170 x 115  

    SCG        155.5 x 136 

    Spotless 164 x 127.5  

    Adelaide 167 x 123  

    Domain   175.6 x 122.4  

    Gabba     156 x 138 

    Metricon 160 x 134 

    Manuka   162.5 x 138.4   

    Aurora     165 x 135   

    Blundstone 175 x 135 

    TIO           175 x 135  

    TIO Traeger 168 x 132  

    Cazaly      172.5 x 149  

     

    OK party time is over! 

    We've played the 2 worst sides at a ground that suits our game style - our zone was clearly working very well against Adelaide and North, you could see their frustration with the ball in their back half.  AO is narrow at 123m and relatively easy to zone.  We played some of our other good football against the Suns and Hawthorn at The Giants' Spotless Stadium which is similarly narrow at 127.5.  This is not a new trend - we've been clearly better at Etihad in recent times at 128.8 and relative to other teams have been generally competitive at Geelong's Simmonds at 115m.

    Now we're playing teams in our quality range at wider grounds Gabba 138m, Metricon 134 and TIO Traeger at 132.  So the challenge is right there in front of us.

    It's not all wine and roses for me with our game style - one of my biggest concerns is that it's not well adapted to the MCG our home ground and where the GF is usually played. And this year's finals are likely to be at Queensland's wider grounds so we better get used to.  Quite frankly I'd prefer to see us play Port at AO than the Gabba.

    It's going to be very interesting to see if we can take a step forward on the bigger dimension grounds.

    Edited by Pollyanna

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    • Like 2
    32 minutes ago, Pollyanna said:

    OK party time is over! 

    We've played the 2 worst sides at a ground that suits our game style - our zone was clearly working very well against Adelaide and North, you could see their frustration with the ball in their back half.  AO is narrow at 123m and relatively easy to zone.  We played some of our other good football against the Suns and Hawthorn at The Giants' Spotless Stadium which is similarly narrow at 127.5.  This is not a new trend - we've been clearly better at Etihad in recent times at 128.8 and relative to other teams have been generally competitive at Geelong's Simmonds at 115m.

    Now we're playing teams in our quality range at wider grounds Gabba 138m, Metricon 134 and TIO Traeger at 132.  So the challenge is right there in front of us.

    It's not all wine and roses for me with our game style - one of my biggest concerns is that it's not well adapted to the MCG our home ground and where the GF is usually played. And this year's finals are likely to be at Queensland's wider grounds so we better get used to.  Quite frankly I'd prefer to see us play Port at AO than the Gabba.

    It's going to be very interesting to see if we can take a step forward on the bigger dimension grounds.

    Damn!  Just when I was thought the party had only just begun...

    '...can't quite compute 'party is over' with 'pollyanna'...?

    You make a valid point about the wider ovals.  Hopefully, Langford and AvB (or whoever is on the other wing) help cover and defend the wider grounds better.

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