AFL renews airline sponsorship deal with Virgin Australia

The AFL has announced that Virgin Australia will remain as the sport's official airline sponsor under a new five-year partnership.

Announced yesterday at Melbourne Airport, the deal was agreed by AFL Chief Executive Gillon McLachlan and Virgin Australia Chief Executive John Borghetti.

The deal includes the AFLW competition for the first time.

With Virgin beating off rival Qantas to secure the deal, the package gives AFL players and officials extra baggage allowances and access to the lounge.

The agreement also allows Virgin Australia to continue bundling flight and ticket packages for fans to travel to games across the country.

The announcement comes during a week when Melbourne Demons fans are having to pay high prices for flights to Perth to see their team play in tomorrow’s AFL preliminary finals.

Some fans have been forced to pay upwards of $1500 one-way to fly to back their team at Perth's Optus Stadium.

Defending the dynamic pricing that sees in-demand fares rise, Borghetti advised "we have to understand its peak period for travel, and it’s not just peak period for travel for the AFL but it’s also school holidays next week.

“People also forget that when you put on extra flights because they are additional flights they’re inevitably empty on the way over, so there’s a lot of fuel to be burned etc.

“Having said all that, we still try and maintain fares as low as possible.”

This is the third time an agreement between Virgin Australia and the AFL has been signed, since Virgin replaced Qantas as the sport’s official airline partner in 2010.