Essendon coach Matthew Knights was also speaking for the silent majority of AFL fans on Thursday when he urged the league to say no to a push for a twilight grand final, which could happen as early as next year.

While the AFL has constantly resisted the push from the television networks for a night grand final, chief executive Andrew Demetriou has raised the possibility of a twilight decider starting at possibly 5pm in future years.

Demetriou said a 'trial' twilight grand final could be held prior to the beginning of negotiations for the next television rights agreement, which will occur in 2011 and then kick in from 2012.

AFL broadcasters Channels Seven and Ten have long pushed for a night or at least twilight grand final to maximise television ratings and advertising revenue.

But Knights said the long-standing tradition of a day grand final should always be retained.

"I think the modern game is always evolving but that is one piece of the puzzle - the tradition of an AFL grand final during the day - that I would like to keep in place as is," he said.

"The evolution of the modern day (game) is continually moving forward but the grand final I would love to keep on during the day."

A twilight or night grand final would make it much harder for children and older people to attend and would also cause a major disruption to other grand final traditions such as the post grand final celebratory dinners and various breakfasts and lunches that are also held around the last Saturday in September.

Knights said some traditions were worth upholding no matter how great the financial incentive to change them.

"I would have thought so - tradition plays a part and one of our big values here at the Essendon Football Club is tradition," he said.

However, Collingwood assistant coach Guy McKenna took a different view when asked his thoughts on Thursday - harking back to his days as a player with West Coast.

"Being an interstate club we used to get a lot of night games and ended up playing pretty well in those ones, so a night game (grand final) wouldn't faze me," he said.

And while Melbourne coach Dean Bailey said he would just love to see the Demons get the chance to play in a grand final, he said fans outraged at the thought of a push away from a day grand final had to understand the economics of the modern-day game.

"The decision will be made purely on an economic basis from the television networks, who put a lot of money into football and keep us all employed," he said.

"If they say this is the time you play, then so be it."

"It would be nice to play during the day but that's not a decision that I'm going to be making."

"A day Grand Final has been a tradition - I'm not sure what a night final would do or bring but until you experience it, you don't know."