Such a scenario has already heavily impacted elite competitions like cricket's Big Bash League, with a number of matches rescheduled after teams were hit by COVID outbreaks.

AFL NSW-ACT's community football manager, for regional NSW and ACT, Marc Geppert, said it's important an official policy for such situations is put in place to ensure teams, particularly in first grade competitions, aren't heavily disadvantaged by pure bad luck.

"From a statewide perspective we're starting to look at some statewide rules if teams are impacted with numbers of players forced into isolation," he said.

"We've only just got back on deck as of Tuesday. Probably the first thing we're going to do is look at any statewide rules to put in place that probably won't fix the problem, but will help clubs if they find themselves in one of those situations.

"We know that's probably going to happen at some point, a team might be impacted by a number of players forced into isolation. We just need to have measures in place that can assist teams and clubs to get a team on the paddock, and if they can't they're not disadvantaged."

"It's more around if a club is eligible for a match postponement, and it's not deemed a forfeit if a club is affected by a mass isolation of players."

Geppert said black and white guidelines should make it a fairer process.

"Last year we didn't have any of those rules in place, which makes it a case by case basis. It makes it hard to get any consistency in your decision making if we don't have those rules in place," he said.

"We haven't spoken through specifics, but there would be some sort of ratio or number. And not just two or three players, otherwise every game, every week will be impacted.

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"But if we're talking a whole team or half a team forced into isolation, we need to be able to treat that fairly and make sure the clubs aren't disadvantaged, especially in our first grade competitions."

Geppert confirmed competitions would follow state government public health orders, which at this stage has no proof of vaccination requirements for participants.

"The AFL's approach, which we confirmed at the end of last year is we'll follow state regulations and restrictions for community sport," he said.

"We're not experts at putting in extra measures and rules. It keeps it really simple for us and we'll just follow what the state government put in place. At the moment it's vaccinated and unvaccinated (can participate), and no COVID safety plans for less than 1000 (spectators).

"We're preparing to play a normal season, but we know based on the last two years that the chances of a normal season are very slim."

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