(Simon Townley is a former sports editor of the Melbourne Sun newspaper)

There will be a collective sigh of relief from within the AFL corridors of power now that the footy season is well and truly underway.

No, there has been no huge outbreak of player high jinks during the off-season and neither has there been evidence of binge-fuelled player excesses.

Not that we know about, anyway.

It has been the greyish area of ownership of the brand and intellectual property that will keep the AFL's legal eagles busy for some time.

The AFL's much trumpeted $1.25 billion TV broadcasting rights deal of last year is under threat and, if the integrity of the deal is to be ratified, then the AFL, NRL and Telstra must convince the full bench of the Federal Court that Optus has no right to record or to communicate to the public the whole or a substantial part of any television broadcast of AFL or NRL matches.

But there is another weighty matter that may have little impact this season but threatens a revolution in the coverage of our game in the future.

Back in the 1980s, recently retired Herald Sun football legend, Mike Sheahan, headed a VFL media department of one.

Now it is its own industry and, if you believe the latest reports, is seeking to expand even further so it can control more and more of what the public gets to read and see.

The AFL doesn't want ownership of the code to be a grey area; they want it lock, stock and barrel to be theirs.

Previously, media roles involving the AFL online reporting, images, filming, website control and the Footy Record had been farmed out.

Now they are coming back into the AFL fold, effectively grouping together all the intellectual property under the one roof.

Years ago the then Sun News-Pictorial had robust discussions with Melbourne racing clubs about the role of form guides.

Were the eight pages of form merely advertising for those clubs, or were they a genuine service for the punter provided by the newspaper? Who owned racing, the punters or the race clubs? Sensibly a compromise was reached and, shall we say, a commercial element was introduced into the arrangement and the punters received a bigger and better service.

Similarly around that time, the editor and the sports editor of The Sun were invited to lunch by senior VFL executives.

Halfway through the meal the executives expressed their concern at the emphasis of some of the football reports and they queried whether that emphasis was in the best interests of the game.

Again, the debate about ownership of the game and the public's right to know.

That wasn't an isolated incident.

The VFL/AFL have had many such meetings with newspaper chiefs.

The point is that VFL/AFL advice about its product (brand) is nothing new, but the scope of the latest move to own all matters football is breathtaking.

Respected journalist and author, Charles Happell, queried the AFL's motives in his column on BackPageLead recently.

He queries the independence, balance and motives of such a move.

Would the St Kilda under-age schoolgirl affair have been so thoroughly investigated? Would North Melbourne have been allowed to get away with the recent Majak Daw media conference fiasco? Would the divisive pay deal negotiations with the AFL Players Association been raised if the AFL controlled the media? Club officials have their doubts about the wisdom of the impending move or its effectiveness.

They wonder at the independence of their own online capacity.

They see the club website as complementary to all media, as another way to talk to supporters.

Those accessing the club website logically are the most passionate and invested of all supporters.

They query the AFL's capacity to investigate itself, to report accurately and be balanced.

Clubs want the unique stories about their players out there and they want the right to choose the medium and the journalist they feel can best represent that story.

If the AFL goes ahead with its grand plan - and it must surely face a fight first from News Ltd and Fairfax - then the public and the footy fan will be the loser.

At best we'll get homogenised, one-size-fits-all window dressing.

At its worst, football coverage will be driven by self interest and subjectivity with absolutely no transparency.