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West Coast coach Adam Simpson says the game will change due to shorter quarters in coronavirus-affected 2020

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Mitchell WoodcockThe West Australian
VideoThe AFL has confirmed the interchange bench will remain at four for the 2020 season.

Shorter quarters, the same number of rotations, fitter lists and no crowds.

West Coast Adam Simpson isn’t exactly sure what we are going to see in the next few months, but he is almost certain there is going to be some innovative football on display.

Games in 2020 will look like no other for a number of reasons, but one of the major talking points has been the reduced quarters to just 16 minutes plus time on.

Simpson said teams would need to make decisions on how many ruckmen they pick and what they do with their rotations because of the shorter quarters.

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“I think the clubs will innovate in the early part of the year, whether that’s with how they do their rotations because there is less time so there is more opportunity to rotate,” he said.

“Selection, I suppose it sits around the ruck selection and what you do with (that). Any team in the past that has played two rucks, probably can get away with one. What do we do with someone like Nic (Naitanui)?

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“I am sure there is some stuff there that I haven’t thought about at all that we’ll see over the weekend. We’ll steal and put it into place in round three or four I suppose.”

The premiership coach said he was not sure of the game’s speed and whether it would become more or less contested because of the shorter timeframe, but believed work done in during the shutdown would show on the scoreboard.

“My beliefs on rotations, I don’t really believe in less rotations will increase scoring,” Simpson said.

“I think the fitter you are, the more you might score these days.

“After a month of footy, you’ll know what it’s looking like.”

Simpson said his entire squad will fly over to Queensland on Monday.

“Our guys have come back in good nick, trained well and probably need one more hit-out,” he said.

““We’ve got guys who played round one who were a bit underdone. Hutch (Mark Hutchings) is the only senior player I can think of that is unavailable.

“They’ve had a chance to get a really good training block in. That’s been a benefit.

“We had three or four injuries back then, pretty much got a full list to choose from.”

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