Melbourne captain Daisy Pearce has slammed the AFL over their handling of the AFLW fixture, calling it a “gimmicky tournament”.

It was reported in the Herald Sun today that each club in the upcoming AFLW home-and-away season will play just six games, with two weeks of finals. This comes despite the league expanding to 10 clubs.

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“It doesn’t sit well with me or a lot of the players is the temperature that I’m taking,” Pearce told SEN Breakfast.

“I get there is a commercial reality that they want to keep this competition within the little free space, eight-week timeslot where there is no sport.

“I think that was the reason for it in the first two years while it was in its infancy and getting going.

“I thought when those two new teams came in, I was rubbing my hands together thinking, we are going to get a legitimate competition here, will play everyone once and head into a final series, you beauty. It seems not to be the case.

“The reason I guess it annoys me is this is presented as the female elite professional offering by the AFL.

“It has been lauded as that, finally there is an elite women’s competition, but with the AFL presenting it as that, it comes with a level of expectation that everyone within the sport, we wear that expectation that this is going to be a professional, elite competition.

“In reality, this is a gimmicky tournament.

"How about you get the women's competition right before you go into these Chinese frontiers and AFLX."

Geelong and North Melbourne will enter the AFLW this season, joining established clubs Adelaide, Brisbane, Carlton, Collingwood, Fremantle, GWS, Melbourne and Western Bulldogs.

It was also reported the AFLW’s competition committee will meet for the first time next week.

Listen to Daisy Pearce’s passionate defence of the AFLW on SEN Breakfast in the player below

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