A shorter season means fewer weekends of travel and commitment overall. A longer season with more rest weekends spreads the load and may reduce injury/burnout risk, but extends the season further into the year.

Assuming there are no other byes at all, what is the ideal number of club-wide or competition-wide rest weekends?

The number of rest weekends can spread the load over the season, but the overall load is determined by the total number of matches played.

Irrespective of byes, what is the ideal number of games per season? Answer only for the grade(s) you are involved in.

The draw can focus on 'block fixtures' where a club's teams all play the same opponent on the same day. Occasionally, this means a specific grade has no game that week, if the opponent doesn't field a team in it.

If the draw focuses on guaranteeing games for each team using a stand-alone competition in each grade, different grades from the same club might end up at different venues on the same weekend.

Which matters to you more?

In 2026, 108 separate 'grade byes' occurred across the season (i.e. weeks where a team had no opponent in a specific grade, even though other grades were playing that day). Mismatched grade nominations between clubs were a contributing factor to this.

One way to reduce this is to require clubs to nominate grades without gaps. i.e. nominating 1st Grade & 2nd Grade, or 2nd Grade and 3rd Grade (or 1st, 2nd, 3rd Grades).

Which matters to you more?

If 3rd Grade ends up with only a small number of teams, it can maintain the 'block fixture' schedule, but will have fewer official fixtures overall (clubs will be free to arrange informal "friendly" games to fill the gaps).

Alternatively, 3rd Grade can run on its own schedule (with as many block fixtures as possible), where the same small group of teams play each other 3-4 times across the season.

Which matters to you more?

The Women's competition can match the men's grades' travel, so families and clubs travel together (block fixtures). However, due to club/grade misalignment this increases the number of 'grade byes' per season by roughly 56 across the competition.

Alternatively, it could run on its own schedule (with as many block fixtures as possible), which would reduce 'grade byes' in the W10s and the whole competition, but would affect travel logistics.

Which matters to you more?

If the committee can't fully satisfy all of the above at once, rank these from most important (1) to least important (6) to you personally: