The inaugural round, borrowing from the NRL’s Magic Round concept, had all 18 teams playing in Adelaide and the Adelaide Hills over four days.

It succeeded beyond all expectations, prompting the AFL to strike the three-year deal with SA.

“Having time for us to prepare allows us to look at other venues that might not have worked this year,” said SA Premier Peter Malinauskas.

Two of the keys to the round’s success were inner-suburban Norwood Oval and Mt Barker, in the Adelaide Hills, which were used alongside Adelaide Oval.

Norwood and Mt Barker received significant upgrades to bring them up to AFL standard.

The Mt Barker oval was a paddock only a couple of years ago and the local council built the venue as part of a new sports park.

The council then out-bid the Barossa Valley to be the Gather Round venue outside Adelaide.

Grandstands and other temporary infrastructure were trucked in from the Adelaide V8 Supercars race, but the ground also had permanent improvements as part of hosting the Brisbane-North Melbourne game.

The Barossa Valley and other regional areas such as McLaren Vale will have noted Mt Barker’s success with interest.

A big win for Norwood and Mt Barker was that their playing surfaces had major work over the last few months.

There were rave reviews for the two venues, with Mt Barker making the most of its country footy feel.

Norwood was a throwback to the AFL’s inner-suburban roots, with the fans feeling closer to the action.

Mt Barker and Norwood had capacity crowds, while Norwood also lucked in with the two best games of the round.

Fremantle beat Gold Coast by 10 points and GWS won a two-point thriller against Hawthorn at the ground.

Speaking at Sunday’s announcement of the three-year deal, AFL chief executive Gillon McLachlan said there had been preliminary talks about how Norwood Parade can be utilised more should the Norwood venue be used again.

“I was talking to the Mayor of Norwood … and what we can do with Norwood Parade. We’ve been talking to the premier with what we can do there,” McLachlan said.

“(We) now have time to have those discussions. The government will have their views about where it should be.”

McLachlan also said the round would be taken outside of SA “at some point”.

But he was buzzing at Adelaide’s reception, just as the city itself was abuzz during the round.

Adelaide experienced record accommodation rates and roaring hospitality and tourism trade over a four-day festival of footy which, on initial estimates, plunged $85 million into state coffers.

The return is a boon for the SA government, which declined to detail its monetary incentive to the AFL for hosting rights though the figure was reportedly in the vicinity of $14m.

SA won Gather Round initially ahead of NSW.

The results were sell-out crowds at all nine games, total attendance topping 220,000, with 60,000 tickets sold to people from outside of SA.

-AAP