Silver balls have been given the boot for the rest of the AFLX experiment.
The AFL has benched the silver footballs used in Thursday night's debut of the short-format in Adelaide.
Television broadcasters demanded the silver footy be changed midway through the debut tournament on Thursday night.
Broadcasters found the silver ball difficult to sight on television - and so did players on-field - so the silver footy was replaced by yellow balls traditionally used in night games.
Yellow footballs will now be used in AFLX round-robin events in Melbourne on Friday night and in Sydney on Saturday night.
AFLX players including Geelong's Mitch Duncan found the silver balls troublesome
"During the daylight the colour of the ball was not too bad but I think it was a great idea to change it to yellow for the night-time footy," Duncan said.
"They made the right call there."
West Coast's Liam Duggan said the silver ball was "a little bit hard to see".
"It was a little bit of a different shape as well, just a little bit smaller," Duggan said.
"It was new to everyone but the yellow footy at the end was much better.
"A couple of boys said it (the silver ball) was swinging a bit more than usual - I'm not sure if that is an excuse for poor kicking or not but the yellow footy was an improvement."
Like Duggan, players noted the silver footy felt smaller though AFL hierarchy say it's exactly the same size as red and yellow balls used in the season proper.
"It felt a different size," Geelong's Duncan said.
"It's just a new Sherrin, you need to kick them in a couple of times for them to get a good shape.
"But a good tradesman never blames their tools."
Adelaide's Kyle Cheney found the silver ball "a little bit difficult to kick".
And Port Adelaide's Dan Houston also felt the ball was "different".
"I didn't think it was like a normal footy, ... if you kicked it well, it was a normal footy and if you didn't quite get it, it was a bit odd shaped in the air," he said.
Share
