Recommendation
MM AFL romance
Three books, 2009 to 2023. One shuts the door, one is explicit and got picked up by a production company inside a year, and one puts the two of them on rival clubs.
All three are about a player who can't be out, which is the realistic part. No man has come out while playing in the AFL. Three novels have managed it and the league still hasn't.
Updated 1 September 2026
What counts as AFL romance here
Three rules, so you know what you're in for:
- Australian rules. Not American football, not rugby union. Rugby league gets a section at the end, because three books won't last you long.
- The footy has to matter. If you can take the couple out of the club and nothing changes, it's a contemporary romance wearing a guernsey.
- Heat and ending stated plainly for every book. You shouldn't have to find out at chapter twenty.
What the heat ratings mean
The five point scale romance readers already use, lowest to highest. Every book below is marked on it.
- Glimpses and kisses a kiss at most, and no sex on or off the page
- Behind closed doors it happens, but the door shuts first
- Open door at least one scene you are in the room for, written without the explicit words
- Explicit open door two or more scenes, explicit, and a range of things happening
- Explicit and plentiful several explicit scenes spread through the book
Is there any MM AFL romance?
Three, properly, and one of them runs to four books if you keep going.
After that, one rugby league short story worth an hour.
It isn't that nobody wants it. Darcy Green has said After the Siren exists because they went looking for AFL romance and couldn't find any.
Every MM AFL romance worth reading
Not ranked, because the choice isn't which is better. One is explicit and recent. The other is closed door, funnier, from 2009, and four books long if it takes.
The third is in its own section below, because what stands between those two is a rival club rather than the closet.
After the Siren
Darcy Green
AboutTheo Bestavros got his game-winning moment, failed at it, and has a second chance at the Falcons he can't afford to waste. Jake Cunningham is the fan favourite with no intention of being the first AFL player to come out. Forced into extra training together, they get as far as friendship and then past it, and neither of them can pay for what comes next.
Read it ifYou want Heated Rivalry but in footy instead of hockey, and you want the footy written by somebody who follows it.
DifferentThe AFL in this book is kinder than the real one, so if you want the version where coming out costs him everything, this isn't it.
SettingMelbourne, the fictional Brunswick Falcons
HeatExplicit open door - Penguin sells it as spicy and the reviews agree
EndingHEA
SeriesFirst of the Brunswick Falcons. Home Ground is due early 2027.
Rating4.19 on Goodreads, from 2,108 ratings
Fun factOptioned for the screen by Mad Ones Films before it had been out a year.
Find After the Siren
Untitled AFL novel
Lorraine H.
Not written yet
Untitled AFL novel
Lorraine H.
AboutTwo Academy prospects meet at their first camp, and neither of them talks about what happens there. The draft splits them up. No club was ever going to take both. Years at different clubs in different cities, one going off the rails and one holding it together, until a trade puts them on the same team.
DifferentIt's about the culture as much as the two of them, and it doesn't go easy on it. What men in that world can say and what they can't, the drinking and what it covers up, and what a club does to protect itself when one of its players turns into a problem.
SettingFictional clubs inside the real league
HeatExplicit and plentiful
Tigers and Devils
Sean Kennedy
AboutSimon Murray runs a film festival and cares about football, friends and film in that order. Declan Tyler is a star forward with a career to protect. First person, Simon only, so you spend the whole book watching Declan from outside and guessing, which is closer to how it would actually feel.
Read it ifYou want to be the bloke dating the footballer rather than the footballer, and you want years of a relationship rather than one season of a rivalry.
DifferentClosed door, and the one to disappoint you if you came for heat. From 2009, so the phones and the media in it have dated.
SettingMelbourne, professional AFL and the press around it
HeatBehind closed doors - 2 of 5 on romance.io
EndingHEA
SeriesFirst of four. Tigerland, Tigers on the Run and Tigers on the Way follow.
Rating4.05 on Goodreads, from 8,401 ratings
Fun factThree sequels follow it: Tigerland, Tigers on the Run and Tigers on the Way. It's the longest-running MM AFL story by a distance, because it's the only one.
Find Tigers and Devils
The one where they play for opposite sides
Both of the others put the closet between the two of them. This one puts a rival club there instead.
Forward Entry
Aurora Crane
AboutNoah Walker plays key forward for the Sydney Swallows and is out. Bryce Monaghan captains the rival Sydney club, thinks he's straight, and asks Noah to be his experiment. Noah says yes, with one rule for himself: don't fall in love.
Read it ifYou want high heat, the two of them on clubs that play each other, and a bi-awakening with no shame in it.
DifferentThey play for opposing clubs, so the football is the obstacle rather than the setting. Sold as low angst, and it mostly is, though there's still a third act break up. Two hundred ratings against two thousand for After the Siren, so there's much less to go on.
SettingThe AFL, and two Sydney clubs that play each other
HeatNot rated - listed on romance.io with no steam rating, and the blurb calls it high steam
EndingHEA, with a third act break up before it.
SeriesFirst of the Sydney Swallows books, and the only one so far.
Rating4.00 on Goodreads, from 199 ratings
Fun factCrane is Australian and writes MM and poly MM+, so this is the only football book on her list.
Find Forward Entry
One for rugby league
One story, and it's honestly a story rather than a novel. Worth the hour anyway.
Ten in the Bin
N.R. Walker
AboutDean Cartwright leaves Sydney with his heart broken, goes home to Newcastle and signs up for a local league side. Darren McAllister, Macca, is the other front row forward. Dean gets knocked out in a match, Macca goes after the bloke who did it and then takes him home, and the whole thing happens across one evening.
Read it ifYou've got an hour and you want no angst at all.
Different12,500 words. Everything happens in one night, which is either the charm or the problem. Nothing about being closeted, nothing about the sport as a career.
SettingNewcastle, New South Wales, local rugby league
HeatNot rated - Goodreads flags it explicit
EndingHEA, with an epilogue twelve months on.
SeriesStandalone.
Rating3.87 on Goodreads, from 2,019 ratings
Fun factThe title is the sin bin: ten minutes off the field, which is what league gives you for the sort of thing Macca does. N.R. Walker is Australian and has published more than ninety books.
Find Ten in the Bin
Frequently asked questions
How many MM AFL romances actually exist?
Three. After the Siren, Tigers and Devils and Forward Entry, and Tigers and Devils is the first of four. You can read the lot in a fortnight, which you can't say about hockey or even about American football.
Which MM AFL romance should I read first?
Decide on the heat and the rest follows. After the Siren is explicit and recent. Tigers and Devils is closed door, funnier, from 2009, and much longer if you keep going through the sequels. Forward Entry is light, high heat, and puts the two of them on clubs that play each other. Readers who pick wrong on heat are the ones who end up annoyed.
Do you need to understand AFL to read these?
No. All three explain themselves as they go, and none of them turns on a rule you would have to look up. Knowing what a mark is will make After the Siren funnier in places, and that's about the extent of it.
Has an AFL player ever come out?
Not while playing. Mitch Brown, who played 94 games for West Coast, came out as bisexual in 2025, the first AFL player past or present to do so. Leigh Ryswyk, who played one senior game before a long career in the SANFL, was the first to say gay. Both had retired. That absence is why all three novels here are about a man who won't say it, and why the league in After the Siren is kinder than the real one.
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