Round 15 for the 2024 AFL Premiership Season brings another three-game slate for our Super Saturday as we get through our last bye round for the season. There are a couple of high quality but challenging games from a fantasy perspective with two stingy teams in Port Adelaide and Brisbane playing at the Adelaide Oval. Then we move to the battle of the bridge between GWS and Sydney, which once again will be a tough game fantasy wise, but a huge game football wise with Sydney still only having one loss all season and the Giants caught in the second to seventh log jam. Then at night we get the hammer matchup as Melbourne and North Melbourne face off at the MCG and you can bet your bottom dollar every man and his dog will have game stacks from this one.
Draftstars continue to offer massive prize pools with the Saturday main contest being worth $50,000 along with their usual variety of alternate contests:
- AFL $50,000+ Saturday
- AFL $5,000+ Saturday High Roller ($150 Entry)
- AFL $3,000+ Saturday Mini ($2 Entry)
The AFL Star contest is back for 2024 and Draftstars are offering the biggest prize pool in Australian DFS history with a $1 million guaranteed final with $250,000 top prize! There are qualifiers and satellites running for every AFL match, while there will also be a sprinkling of qualifiers across other sports such as NRL and NBA.
Meanwhile the 1000 AFL Target contests are set to return to Draftstars for the first time since 2018. Enter the contest and hit the 1000-point barrier with your team to scoop the jackpot!
Betting Markets
Port Adelaide ($2.00) vs Brisbane ($1.80)
Points: 174.5
Line: Brisbane -1.5
GWS Giants ($2.88) vs Sydney ($1.40)
Points: 165.5
Line: Sydney -15.5
Melbourne ($1.17) vs North Melbourne ($4.85)
Points: 167.5
Line: Melbourne -30.5
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Additionally, we have a full AFL Round 15 Betting Previews for all three games where we provide our best bet for the game as well as a great value Same Game Multi!
Weather
Adelaide – 15 and partly cloudy
Sydney – 16 and showers, up to 25mm rain
Melbourne – 14 degrees and partly cloudy
Typical winter football weather in Melbourne and Adelaide, but plan for wet weather in the Sydney. Focus on inside midfielders and players who tackle as well as rucks in this contest.
Where to Attack?
North Melbourne have been in their best form of the season this past two weeks, which is not saying much as all it produced was a close win over West Coast and a collapse after building a 10 goal lead against the Magpies. But they have racked up fantasy points through these games and now come into this round against a team that has all but fallen part in the 2024 season. So, do we load up on North stacks?
The Demons have been getting killed up forward and through the midfield this season. They have conceded over 5 points above league average to key forwards (remarkable given their back line) and over 7 points above league average to general forwards. Then through the inside midfield it is once again 7 points above league average, which third most in the league.
Game Script – North Melbourne forwards and inside midfielders
VALUE PLAYS
Nick Larkey ($9,240) is in peak form right now kicking 9 goals from his last two games and returning back-to-back scores of 107 and 80. At his price point he has a real opportunity to offer a huge return in this matchup where we noted at the top the Demons are getting killed by forwards right now. If you are concerned about the matchup against Steven May then you can easily pivot off Larkey to Curtis Taylor ($9,200) who is fresh off a 97 point game, or Cameron Zurhaar ($9,620) who had a monster 120 point game against the Magpies last week.
Jordan Sweet ($9,760) returns for Port as the sole ruck a role that has been positive for him this season averaging 77 points per game with a season high of 96 points. It is a great opportunity to find some salary relief with a player who will be given every opportunity to be around the ball and racking up fantasy points.
That said, it isn’t a favourable matchup against Oscar McInerny, so if you are looking to spend up in the ruck instead my recommendations would be to roster Brodie Grundy ($15,910) who has the best matchup in the league against GWS and should be playing in the wet weather which is usually a gold mine for rucks due to the high number of stoppages.
Sub Watch
There are plenty of the $6K range players to consider on this slate that all bring sub risks. Mid-season draft prospect Logan Evans ($6,000) will make his debut across the backline and the sub role will likely be between him and fellow half backer Josh Sinn ($6,000).
Will Phillips ($6,930) should start on the ground and was certainly around the ball last week after being giving a tagging role against Collingwood. He did get subbed off though and could face that same fate again this week. Liam Shiels ($6,930) could be the other at risk of this treatment.
Kynan Brown ($6,000) and Koltyn Tholstrup ($6,000) can’t both start as sub and will have potential to play some time in their natural midfield role with Christian Petracca out.
MID PRICED PLAYS
Jy Simpkin ($11,770) was back in a midfield role in his last game attending 65% of their centre bounces. This showed he still has fantasy scoring potential in the right role posting a massive 135 point game. Will Phillips being in as a tagger will have potential to prevent Simpkin from being back in the centre for as much time this week but with that ceiling he will be hard to ignore.
Tom Sparrow ($11,110) is the most likely to see an increase in midfield time with Christian Petracca now out. Earlier in the year he was consistently seeing 40-60% centre bounces so the question will be will the utilise Sparrow for a greater role or will they continue to play Kysaiah Pickett in that centre roll? Either way there is going to be an increase in opportunity for someone in the red and blue this week.
PREMIUM PLAYS
Luke Davies-Uniacke ($15,040) after a slow start to the season has now found his form posting four 100+ point games from his last five matches with the five game being a 96. As we noted at the top, this is an elite matchup for inside midfielders against Melbourne who have been getting ripped apart through the middle in recent weeks. My North Melbourne game stacks start here.
Tom Green ($14,590) has been seriously down on form from a fantasy perspective this season, but we all know his upside and this will be a hugely contested matchup and in the wet which will suit his game completely. His price has dropped nicely to the $14k range, which makes this a big upside play that will potentially be a nice point of difference due to recency bias.
Suggested Draftstars Lineup
Cheat Sheets
