In 2021, the AFL Women's competition first introduced its Indigenous Round, also covering two weeks of its home-and-away season.

Since 2007, different clubs have had deals in place to play one or two games per year in the Northern Territory, either at Marrara Oval in Darwin, or Traeger Park in Alice Springs.

The demographic proportion and Australian rules football participation rates of Indigenous people in the Northern Territory are higher than any of the states,[27] and it has thus been common, although not universal, for some of these games to be held during the Sir Doug Nicholls Round.

In 2020, Marrara Oval hosted the Dreamtime at the 'G match, when the city of Melbourne was unable to due to a COVID-19 pandemic lockdown;[28] and the 2024 AFLW Dreamtime match was fixtured for Marrara Oval, with the league in discussions to make this a permanent fixture.

[5] Regular painted ground markings, sometimes including advertisements, are replaced with Indigenous symbols and flags throughout the round.

[29] In 2017, to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the 1967 Australian Aboriginal referendum, ten indigenous players changed their guernsey numbers to either 50 or 67 during the Sir Doug Nicholls Round.

The 67s were worn by Lance Franklin, Cedric Cox, Daniel Wells, Steven May, Zac Williams, Shaun Burgoyne and Shane Edwards.