Group Nine have returned the gala event to a midweek timeslot, with this year's event pencilled in for Wednesday night, September 1, at the Wagga RSL Club.

COVID-19 restrictions have cast a shadow of doubt over the presentation night and the subject was a hot topic of conversation at a board meeting on Monday night.

AFL Riverina is considering holding online presentations this year, with COVID-19 restrictions capping how many people can attend the events.

Group Nine chairman Andrew Hinchcliffe said back-up plans were being formulated but the preference was still to push ahead with a scaled back event.

"It is something that we're looking at at the moment," Hinchcliffe said.

"Yes, we've got the ok at the moment, under the current COVID health guidelines, we know that we could stand up 120 at the venue that we've got secured for our event.

"But we're strongly considering what Plan B might look like and we've started conversations about some sort of online system to get that out to the masses.

"At this stage, we're just going to go with Plan A, minimal people attending and having the face-to-face event with restricted numbers but Plan B to flip it to an online medium if required.

"The only caveat on that would be how late changes were made from a health guidelines perspective, if it was late in the piece, we might not have the time to stand that up which it might mean our event could be impacted."

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Hinchcliffe hoped the shift to the Wednesday night timeslot would be a winner with clubs.

"We have played with it a few times, between midweek and Friday nights. It's hard to get the right day of the week to ensure that you're not impacting those teams that are still continuing deep into the final series," he siad.

"We picked Wednesday as we know that's a day that most teams don't train."

Hinchcliffe said preparations were already underway for a COVID-impacted grand final, which will again feature pre-sale ticketing.

He added that the other area of concern was how to hold the finals series, which is likely to feature two Albury teams, with the current border bubble restrictions.

"The only thing we did discuss is COVID rules are really good outcome during the competition but what does that look like in semi-finals," he said.

"So that's something we're going to seek additional guidance from NSWRL, what will happen if that impacts how things are played out in the finals. It is really tough."

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