There are various individual skills and team tactics that are required to play Australian rules football effectively. These are dictated by tradition and the sport's laws.
Individual skills and tactics
Ball handling and general athleticism The most generic skill for a player is ball handling – being familiar with the shape and weight of the football, how to securely grip and hold it, and how to predict its movement on the ground and through the air.
Additionally, there is a strong emphasis on individual athleticism for players. Physical fitness is desirable because play sees few breaks, takes place across a field 150–180 metres long, and has few restrictions on player position on the ground.
Possession skills
Possession of the football is required to score so a core group of skills relate to possessing the football. These include: Marking – e.g. arm or chest mark, overhead mark, spectacular mark Bouncing the ball – e.g. running bounce Pick-up – e.g. collecting an unclaimed ball while it is loose on the ground
Disposal skills
In order to progress the football across the field of play in order to gain advantage or score, the football must be disposed of legally by the controlling player. This can be done by:
Kicking – e.g. drop punt, torpedo punt, snap, banana kick; or Handball
In specific situations where a pause in play has occurred (e.g. a stoppage or ball-up from the umpire), the ball may be contested in a specific way:
Hitting out
Checking skills
While not in possession of the football, a player will still need to work to gain possession of the football, force an error from the opposing player, or to provide an advantage to a team-mate.
Smothering Tackling Bumping Spoiling Kicking Shepherding
One percenters These skills get their name from the minor advantage they gain for a team.
Spoil Drawing a free kick Intercept marks Smother
Styles of play
Player-on-player defence
The player-on-player (sometimes referred to as "man-on-man") defence is a traditional style of play which is commonly used in juniors and grassroots to learn the game, but it is sometimes used professionally as a rigid defensive structure, especially in the late game, or to disrupt play. It involves players starting in designated set positions and playing alongside their opponent for as long as possible. This style of play results in maximum contests and provides very few opportunities for tactics. Coaches sometimes utilise one or more players that specialise in sticking with their opponents to negate their play; this is called "tagging" or "run-with" players.
Direct Direct football, often referred to as playing up the guts, contested footy or corridor footy, requires moving the ball on the shortest possible path from goal to goal; i.e., without going to the boundary of the field. This puts the ball into areas crowded with players. Direct football can result in frequent physical contests, and forwards are not always able to mark the ball. As a result, crumbers (small players at the fall of the ball) become more important and are often instructed to run to pick up the loose ball.
In direct football, the role of ruckmen and midfield centre clearances become critical.
Possession Modern professional football has seen the advent of possession football, making the game similar to Association football. In Australian football it is often referred to as playing keepings off. The aim of possession football is to avoid kicking the ball to a player under pressure, denying the opposition of opportunities to take possession. A good way to counter this tactic is to use the aforementioned player-on-player defence.
There are generally two ways that teams execute possession football in the modern game: marking short kicks (or longer kicks to an unmanned player) and by handball.
Kicking The rules governing catching a kicked ball allow for "possession football". A player who catches the ball (called taking a mark) gets a short time period where they can kick the ball without being tackled or interfered with. Teams will sometimes kick backwards to allow a teammate to take a mark. This typically prevents the team losing possession. The AFL has experimented with rules in the NAB Cup to prevent this anti-competitive play.
Handball Although the rules have allowed for the handball since the Geelong rules were first codified in 1859, most Australian rules leagues viewed handball as a largely secondary skill to the kick. However, by the 1960s, more than a century later, the handball became a far more widely used skill in the modern game. Legendary coach Ron Barassi Jr credited Len Smith (coach at between 1958 and 1962) as being the first coach to encourage attacking use of handball in Victoria. Inside midfielders are known for often having more handballs than kicks, using it as a powerful means of ball distribution around contests where traffic is heavy. As an example, the Brownlow medallist of 2014, Matt Priddis, had a disposal percentage that consisted of 60.7% handballs over his 240-game career. Former Fremantle ruckman Aaron Sandilands holds the AFL record for the most handballs in a game without a kick, handballing 17 times without a kick against Collingwood in Round 13, 2015.
Tempo football The term Tempo football was coined by commentators to describe the tactic of controlling the tempo of the game. Australian rules is a game in which teams can score very quickly and gain a psychological advantage to overwhelm their opponents. When a team looks like getting a run on, opposition sides sometimes play tempo football to deliberately slow down the game and temper momentum. This may include forcing a bounce (either through scrimmages or forcing the ball out of bounds, flooding, or through playing possession football and timewasting). Once in possession, they may then speed up the game with direct or running football. Commentators labelled the Sydney Swans 2005 premiership team masters at tempo football, though they were also widely criticized for it, most notably by then-AFL CEO Andrew Demetriou and commentators Stephen Quartermain, Tim Lane and Robert Walls, following a match against St Kilda early that season.
Environmental conditions and playing styles
Kicking with the wind Kicking with the wind is one style of direct play in which the team would use strong winds to advantage. Teams place emphasis on the direction of play and determine defensive strategies and long kicking and run-on football to gain extra distance in attack. Captains that win the coin toss will usually kick with the wind. Strong winds can assist teams in the final quarter of each term when players are tiring, leading to some captains to occasionally elect to kick into the wind, although this is a risky gambit, since winds can change direction over time or have a lessened effect as the game goes on. They can alternatively assist them in the first and third quarters. They can also assist in scoring and provide better opportunities for long-distance after-the-siren attempts during close matches. In some grounds, the wind will swirl, which teams can use to advantage by compensating their kicks for the prevailing wind or tactically attacking or defending along a boundary the ground that the wind favours.Stadium puts the wind up Bombers Sydney Morning Herald May 22, 2002
Wet-Weather Footy Wet-weather football involves a different style of play in which teams may deliberately kick to contests, as it results in the ball more often going to ground. Teams that play most in wet or cold climates, either light rain in temperate climates (such as Melbourne and Adelaide), and/or heavy rain tropical/subtropical conditions (Brisbane, Darwin), often have an advantage with the slipperiness of the ball and ground. Coaches may instruct players to knock the ball on instead of take possession. Coaches may advise players not to kick or handball short, as the ball may be more easily dropped, fumbled or the player tackled due to reduced foot speed. Wet weather often makes drop punts less effective, and teams with torpedo punt specialists use it to cut through the conditions more easily and gain attacking distance. Coaches may advise players to drop into the square in defence, as the heavy ball drops short of the goal line. Defensively, coaches may advise to cause stoppages as often as possible to lock up the ball and to try to rush behinds or force the ball out of bounds if possible. Wet weather can also help attacking teams to more easily break tackles and run the ball into attack; however, coaches will almost always advise run-and- carry players to touch the ball on the ground rather than bounce in wet conditions. Coaches may advise players to make use of the wet ground to enable the ball to skid and gain extra distance.Kings of the rain: Richmond revealed as AFL’s best wet weather team in Reddit research Fox Sports from Fox Sports In the AFL, extreme wet conditions can prevent matches from proceeding;National Extreme Weather Policy however, grassroots matches have been played in rain, hail and snow—on rare occasions the latter has happened even at AFL level, although this exceedingly rare. A lack of wet conditions can also either advantage or disadvantage professional teams based in covered stadiums such as the Docklands Stadium. If possible, clubs will often tweak their starting line-up with shorter and more agile players to compensate for the conditions.
Set plays
Kick-in Tactics After a behind has been scored, a designated kicker must return the ball to play from the goal square. Kick-ins are one of the most strategic set plays in the game of Australian football.
7-point play The term "7-point play" was coined by fans of the Glenelg Football Club in South Australia and was subsequently picked up by broadcast commentators to describe the situation where a team has been able to convert a missed goal (behind) into 7 points by stealing the ball directly from a kick-in and scoring a goal.
Zone The zone defence at kick ins was popularised by Kevin Sheedy and brought from basketball. The opposition forwards will disperse approximately 20 metres apart in the defensive 50-metre arc.
The main methods were used to penetrate the zone:
Long kicking (such as the torpedo punt), typically with the target being a ruckman or other tall player Short kicking (typically to a fast running back pocket player), although this can be risky as it is closer to goal Full-back play-on – this requires the fullback to perform a solo move to leave the goal square and run on, gaining enough distance to break the zone
Cluster The cluster involves players from the team kicking the ball in congregating at the top of the 50-metre arc and breaking in different directions. The player kicking in will typically have a designated spot or target player to kick to. The opposition team will often resort to a zone defence to successfully counter this tactic, and hence it is rarely used, although it's a common strategy at junior levels.
Bounces and throw-in Tactics
Bounces and throw-ins are critical set plays in Australian football, and the rucks and midfielders will often use these opportunities to execute specific set-play strategies.
Defensive tactics
Rushed behinds A strategy for defenders was to deliberately concede a point (behind) to regain possession of the ball. Some spectacular examples of this include Mal Michael's controversial "own goal" from 30 metres. Under coach Alastair Clarkson, Hawthorn used this tactic in the 2008 AFL Grand Final, conceding 11 rushed behinds. It caused the AFL to review the laws and award a free kick for deliberate rushed behinds where there is "no pressure".
Flooding