AFL Victoria this week announced it was working on establishing new national clearance windows in a bid to head off a growing number of players signing with a club before clearances open only to later change their mind and commit to  another team.

The issue was put on AFL Victoria’s agenda after The Standard earlier this year highlighted former Maskell Medal winner Rhys Raymond’s high-profile defection from major league football to district league club Merrivale.

Raymond, who played with Geelong league club Geelong West-St Peters in 2013, signed a contract to return to Warrnambool last November for the 2014 season. But he subsequently signed with Merrivale and when clearances opened on February 1 this year, he was cleared to the Tigers. Warrnambool had no hold on him despite having his signature first because it had been unable to lodge a clearance until February.

Less than a week later, Robbie Hare, who had committed to play with South Warrnambool, lodged a clearance application to Port Fairy. Because Hare had not yet been registered as a South Warrnambool player, he was free to play with the Seagulls.

AFL Western District region general manager Lachy Patterson said yesterday after the precedent was highlighted in the Hampden league, it emerged the practice was far more prevalent than originally believed.

He said a working party set up to tackle spiralling player payments had received significant feedback about the practice, believing it was contributing to higher player payments.

Patterson said AFL Victoria was “seriously” working to introduce new national clearance rules, which would come into effect at the end of next season.

“It (the practice) probably plays a big part in that whole bigger picture of player payments,” Patterson said.

“No one had really heard about it until what happened here and then stories started emerging from Geelong, Bendigo and Ballarat and other places.”

Traditionally the transfer window was restricted to February 1 in a bid to ensure grassroots footy did not become a year-round business and in turn, burn out volunteers.

“I think they might look at starting at the beginning of November and running for three or four weeks and then shutting down until the 1st of February,” Patterson said.

Patterson said there was an understanding the clearance window needed to better reflect the timing of player movements, which traditionally happened in October and November.

The development came during AFL Victoria’s community leagues conference in Healesville this week, where it was announced a salary cap would be part of a three-pronged approach to tackling player payments and introduce equalisation measures in all leagues in 2016.