The Brisbane Lions hosted its first ever Members Forum in Melbourne on Wednesday 12 February, enabling Victorian-based members to direct questions to key Club officials including Chief Executive Malcolm Holmes, GM – Football Operations Dean Warren, and Senior Coach Justin Leppitsch.

A strong showing at Etihad Stadium suggested the initiative was one that was certainly welcomed by the members.

A broad range of subjects were covered, with members not afraid to voice their opinions – both good and bad – to those in charge.

Overall it generated wonderful discussion and feedback, and the Club sincerely hopes those who attended came away satisfied with the process. Hopefully it can become a more regular fixture on the Victorian event calendar in the future.

For those who were unable to attend, please find below a very brief snapshot of some of the questions and responses from the evening.

How have you guys adjusted to the change in the interchange rule?

Justin Leppitsch: Our rotations last year were around 130 – which is what the rules have limited them to now.

It shouldn’t affect us all that much. Adelaide, for example, were around the 150-mark, so it might affect clubs like that a little bit more.

All it means is that (Physical Performance Manager) Brett Burton will have to keep a closer eye on it, because in the past it didn’t matter if we had 132 or 126. But now it does.

It’s a bit pedantic, and is just another thing added to the pressure of game day that we have to look at.

Off the field, what impact has the introduction of the Gold Coast had on the Lions in the last couple of years?

Malcolm Holmes: It’s an interesting question because we’re very supportive of having another team up in Queensland. It means the State can now host AFL football on 23 weekends each year, which is very important.

It’s great for the growth of the game, but in terms of impact on the Club, the data tells us that it has probably cost us 500 members. But, more importantly, there are another 50,000 fans that might have dropped off, and those are the people that come along to games. I know it’s only an hour drive up the motorway, but there are quite a few people not coming to watch the games being played (at the Gabba) a ny more.

So really only 500 members, but 50,000 people who used to call Brisbane their team have now flipped over to the Suns.

But as far as profile of the game, more coverage in the media and the growth of participation in Queensland, it has been very important.

There are 155,000 people now playing AFL in Queensland and the AFL have very ambitious targets, and want that figure to increase to around 350,000 in the next 20 years. To give you a comparison, Rugby Union has 70,000 people playing the game in Queensland.

Dean Warren: From a list establishment point of view, it probably has affected us a little bit.

Gold Coast obviously had first choice of all Queensland kids for a couple of years. Last year’s Draft was the first that we could take a Queenslander out of our Academy.

87% of our list last year was from overseas or interstate, and the Suns had access to the Queensland talent for the three years previously.

While there probably hasn’t been any standout Queensland talent over that period of time, there are quite a number of Queensland players on the Gold Coast list that would have been very handy running around with us.

How bad is Jonathan Brown’s injury and how do you plan to structure the forward line around him in 2014? 

Justin Leppitsch: Our expectation is that Browny probably won’t play 22 games this year, but he’s running around OK and is over his foot injury.

He may start the season, but he may not. It’s not all about him playing Round One, it’s about him playing as many games as he can to service his body and the Club while we transition to our next gun key forward – whoever that might be.

There are obviously a few young guys there, but they have to step up and do their part too.

We ideally want to play a ruck/forward more than a forward/ruck – and that’s why we recruited Trent West from Geelong.

We’ll probably have two key targets and a ruckman. I feel we need more targets to compete for the ball in the air, because we’ve got a really exciting half-forward line with Dayne Zorko and Josh Green, and a number of mids who can run through that half-forward position as well like Sam Mayes, Tom Rockliff, and even Daniel Rich.

Why is there no drop in pitch at the Gabba? How do you manage that from a playing perspective?

Dean Warren: It’s not so much a safety issue as it is an access issue for us and making sure we get appropriate access to the ground.

At the moment the pitch is watered quite a few hours before the senior game and they’ve definitely got it right in terms of the safety of the centre wicket area for our players.

However, it does impact our ability to play curtain raiser games at the Gabba. We talk about it quite regularly, and we’d love the Gabba to have a drop in wicket like most cricket grounds around the country just to give us a bit more flexibility on game day.

Because it’s quite ridiculous that the younger guys on our list don’t get to play a game on the Gabba itself until they debut.

It’s a major issue for us. From a performance perspective, we’d like our players to have already had the chance to play on the Gabba by the time they do debut.

So we’re actually looking at having some ‘curtain closure’ matches in 2014. For instance in Round 2 the senior team plays Geelong at 12:10pm, so we’re looking at trying to play our reserves game against the Sydney Swans after the senior game.

Obviously it’s later in the afternoon and hopefully wouldn’t have dried out as much, but we’re looking at holding a number of these ‘curtain closure’ games.

We’re working through it with Stadiums Queensland to see what we might be able to arrange this year.