2027 Fixture and AFL Fantasy

The 2027 fixture was released during the week and we have some Fantasy implications to consider. The biggest thing – and a massive positive – is that Opening Round is dead. This was announced during the year and all Fantasy coaches should agree that not having our cheat code round and therefore no early byes is a good thing for the game. We also have a little bit of a later start to the season due to the centenary test at the MCG.

Season starts on 17 March, so my guess would be the weekend before will be a footy-free weekend and the more organised – and televised – praccy games will happen across the March long weekend (approx. 4-8 March). Origin is the week before on the 27 February. Do the match simulations happen across that weekend or do we see them staggered in the lead up?

Here are a few quick takeaways before we really get stuck into looking at it all in the new year.

ROUND ONE

No Opening Round is a good thing! What we have in its place is a ‘normal’ round one, but with a Wednesday night start. That means five days of locking our initial teams in. Swans and Cats first up could see us settling on a Rowan Marshall starting ruck set up if Mitch Edwards isn’t there, but it will make for interesting talking points leading up if they’re named together.

We will gets teams for Swans v Cats on Tuesday evening, then Freo v Dogs on Wednesday evening. Friday and Saturday 23s will be named on Thursday evening with squads for Sunday games. These will be trimmed to 23s, as per usual, on Friday at 5pm.

Keep an eye out on content that week as we will keep you across everything via our platforms. Whether that is the regular stuff we usually pump out or some bonus things to help you get started for an epic season via Patreon.

Wednesday 17 March
Sydney Swans vs Geelong Cats, 7:30pm, SCG (SEVEN)

Thursday 18 March
Fremantle vs Western Bulldogs, 5:10pm, Optus Stadium (SEVEN)

Friday 19 March
Hawthorn vs Brisbane Lions, 7:40pm, MCG (SEVEN)

Saturday 20 March
Richmond vs Carlton, 12:35pm, MCG (KAYO)
Adelaide Crows vs GWS GIANTS, 3:45pm, Adelaide Oval (KAYO)
St Kilda vs Collingwood, 7:40pm, MCG (KAYO)

Sunday 21 March
North Melbourne vs Port Adelaide, 1:10pm, Marvel Stadium (KAYO)
Melbourne vs Essendon, 3:15pm, MCG (SEVEN)
West Coast Eagles vs Gold Coast SUNS, 3:10pm, Optus Stadium (KAYO)
*All times local

 

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BYE ROUNDS

No early byes! Excellent. Still a five-week run of mid-season byes. Not excellent.

These are a week earlier than we have had in recent seasons, starting at round 11 and finishing up in round 15. That means we have 10 weeks of regular Fantasy programming and then the 5 weeks of byes (assuming that’ll still be best 18 and 3 trades) before the last 9 rounds to finish the year.

We get the 4-4-2-4-4 split of teams. Symetrical! But what it also means is that we are still without rounds that really decimate teams. Gone are the days of those 6-team bye rounds that we had a few years ago.

Personally speaking, the last couple of years with early byes means I didn’t really put much time into planning for the mid-season byes until after the season had started. Could we be back to considering these a lot more and working towards who we choose to start/fade based on the byes. For example, aiming for some upgrade from Crows, Lions, Suns and Tigers can be great strategy as they have the first bye. Does that make Will Ashcroft someone to use as an upgrade target? Although, looking at his draw, you might be missing some epic early games.

The round 13 bye is the ‘easy’ one where Freo and North players can have a bit more value as selections because they are the only two teams on that bye.

LOOPHOLING

If you’re keen to start with a red dot to help with loopholing, then the Saints are the team that has copped it massively as they only play Saturday or Sunday across the first 16 rounds. First 10 rounds are below (next five are pointless as they are bye rounds, so you are likely to have a ‘blue dot’ to use for a loophole captain).

Rucks are the best and safest place to use the loop. Could this be Alex Dodson? It is an interesting one. He will be basement priced but with Rowan Marshall now out, he would be 2IC to TDK. Does that mean he is likely to get games at some point? Maybe. Glass half-full, if he does play, he might make some cash?

We’ll know the lay of the land a bit more when it comes to team selection in the near year, but I like to go with a full squad of 30 green dots to make the most out of cash generation.

SCALE OF HARDNESS

Woah, woah, woah. Sorry, Calvin. You should be happy. I’ve got the schedule into spreadsheet and you’ve now got your template to go to work on. Make sure you are part of our Patreon for Cal’s extra analysis that goes with the red/green tables… but below is some basic overall data that I’ve put together based on the 2026 season.

Remember, all of this changes in the new year. Some teams can change their Fantasy game to be an easy team to being restrictive, and vice versa, very quickly. Even in season this happens.

The easy teams to play against are the Dogs (gave up the most points overall last year), Dons and Tigers as most would have predicted. Saints, Dees, Eagles and Pies were also on the easier side of things.

Grand Final combatants, Freo and Lions, were the most restrictive.

Saints and Swans have the best first month with Port knocking on the door. Getting players off to a nice start is something we should be looking for in this trading game. Could this make Connor Rozee a must-start at his discounted price? Maybe Errol Gulden is a premium worth paying up for if he can avoid the Mullin tag in round one?

Positional Scale info will be analysed in the new year.

DOUBLE UPS

Every team plays six clubs twice. These are based on ladder positioning (but has the flag of those rivalries making it not so pure). While points against in Fantasy isn’t exactly a science on who is a good team, there are some similarities.

The Tigers finished 17th and get four green teams based on the data from last year.

This shouldn’t dictate too much, except in Draft possibly, as usually the double up game is in the back half of the season and the new and evolving Scale of Hardness data should be what you’re concentrating on for Classic.

The fixture in the header image and below was created by @calculon559. It is very cool and takes me back to getting these in the 90s from the corner store or a pub and whacking it on the fridge. I would do my tips on them and keep a running total on the right hand side of each round. Click image of full-size copy.

Warnie

Co-captain of DT Talk since we started this thing in 2007. Best finish was 13th in 2009... that was a long time ago. Follow on Twitter: @WarnieDT and follow on Instagram: @warnedawgs.