SYDNEY Swans list manager Kinnear Beatson has urged the AFL to closely govern clubs' involvement in developing academy players before they become eligible to draft them.
The academies have again come under fire recently with Greater Western Sydney's vast NSW region in the spotlight, with the Giants set for another haul of highly rated academy prospects at this year's NAB AFL Draft.
The AFL last month wrote to clubs saying it would be requiring greater documentation about the role of the academies in developing the players, and that clubs would need to pass a set of criteria before being free to select an academy prospect.
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The Swans have drafted emerging stars Isaac Heeney (in 2014) and Callum Mills (2015) in the past two years under the academy rules and Beatson told AFL.com.au's Road to the Draft podcast he believed clubs should need to show they have helped improve a prospect before qualifying to draft him.
"It's a contentious one at the moment. I know it's being discussed almost ad nauseam within the recruiting circles," he said.
"In summary, and this is my personal opinion not so much that of the club, I feel with any academy player – and this goes to the new academies coming with the multicultural and indigenous players – a club needs to be able to justify why they can claim a player through the national draft via their input into their development.
"There has to be a body of work, in my mind, that you can say this constitutes a reasonable amount of work helping that player develop. And if you meet that criteria I don't think anybody can argue against that. I think that's the issue that's getting under the skin of people."
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The Swans paid the highest price for an academy or father-son player in history when they matched Melbourne's bid at pick No.3 for Mills at last year's draft.
They had foreseen an early bid coming for the competitive midfielder, however, and used the trade period to accumulate more draft points under the new system by trading out their early selection for more later-round picks.
The practice of northern clubs trading down the draft board to find more points to pay for academy players riled some clubs during the exchange period, and has left the AFL looking at tweaks to the bidding system to stop the idea.
One option the League is believed to have considered this year would see clubs lose their 20 per cent discount if they don't have a draft pick in the round the bid falls.
Beatson said the League should resist making that change to the system that was introduced last year.
"It would be fraught with danger because I think clubs would pull back on their investment into the academies significantly. We still need to grow our talent pool, it's too small for 18 clubs," he said.
"Anybody who was up at Blacktown at the weekend [watching the under-18 championships] would have been really pleased with the standard of game played between NSW and Queensland. You don't have to go back too far to look at an equivalent game to realise it wasn't played at the same standard as the game on Sunday.
"It's growing the talent pool, and I'm all supportive for these multicultural and indigenous academies as well because we have to grow the game."
The Swans' pick No.14 became a key plank of the trade that saw ex-Bomber Jake Carlisle join St Kilda last year, and Beatson said he was surprised when clubs voiced their concerns about trading down the draft order.
"I was quite shocked when that whole debate came out at the end of the trade period. As far as I know, you can't sell anything unless someone wants to buy it. We went to various clubs that needed to get deals done," he said.
