Good rule, bad timing

Collingwood coach Mick Malthouse has welcomed the new interchange procedures as a 'common sense' solution to a situation that was getting out of hand.

But he was less understanding about the timing of the changes, declaring he was amazed by their introduction mid-season.

"This is just another rule that I think had to happen because of the mad rush to get players on and off the ground and numbers (of interchanges) increasing dramatically so something had to be done," Malthouse told the media at the Lexus Centre on Thursday.

"It's a pity though that on last year's evidence it wasn't done by Round 1."

"I'm just amazed that we're told that rules won't change and then the rules do change, but I am quite satisfied that it's the right procedure because, all things that you can take advantage of, clubs, coaches, players will take advantage of."

Under the amended procedures announced by the AFL on Tuesday and which take effect immediately, a player may not enter the field until the AFL's interchange steward has been handed a note from the club specifying which player will be coming on and which player will be coming off.

If a player encroaches onto the field before his teammate is officially off the field, their team will be free-kicked with a 50-metre penalty thrown in.

The new rules are expected to make it more difficult for clubs to maintain the pace of interchange rotations which are now routinely pushing towards 100 per game.

Malthouse said he recalled a conversation with a leading AFL official two years ago where he canvassed the prospect of a rule change, only to be told, 'we do not change rules or procedures during the football season'.

"If you administer it well, it'll work. It's only if a player chooses to break it," he said.

"It will slow things down because it won't be a matter of tagging hands and getting across the line from a set position."

"I'm not against that, I just wish that we had've had 12 months to think about things."

The new procedures were prompted by the 19th man fiasco during Sydney's Round 6 clash with North Melbourne when Swans youngster Jesse White ran onto the field before the team-mate he was supposed to replace, Darren Jolly, had left the field.

As a result, Sydney had 19 players on the field for an estimated 30 seconds during the critical closing moments of a tight contest that ended in a draw.