Ode to the Natural Footballer

This article was published on www.thebigtip.com.au on 31 March, 2010

Detective Jimmy McNulty lies on the felt at his own wake and listens to a stream of derision delivered by his wise cracking and massively obese Sergeant Jay Landsman. Insubordinate, underhanded, over-confident and a gaping asshole that he is, Jimmy’s finished life as a cop is redeemed by one beautiful and undeniable truth. He was, agree his many enemies and few friends in the department, a ‘natural po-lice’, and if you were shot down in a Baltimore street you could do worse than have Jimmy on the case.

Just like, when a game gets close, you want the ball in the hands of the natural footballer. The best teams have a few, the worst teams may have none. They are the players that win games and flags and they play football in all parts of Australia, not just the AFL. Some of them are overweight and injured and apathetic, some are young and arrogant and drink too much and most of them don’t find there way into the ‘system’ and never reach their potential. Some of them don’t give a shit about footy but when they are on the field they have an instinct that no one else does.

The natural footballer rises when the game is at its most important and vital stage. James Hird did it many times, most memorably when he stole the ball from the ruck and kicked the winning goal after a week in media hell. In Gary Ablett and Joel Selwood, Geelong have got the two ultimate natural footballers. Ablett reserves his most menacing efforts for when his team needs him most. When the game is to be won, he always imposes himself. Selwood thrives on the hard ball, bows to no one, yearns for constant physical contact, makes the instinctual decisions one million training sessions cannot teach. When Geelong picked him no one in their wildest dreams could imagine he would become this good.

And by all accounts Fremantle has got a natural footballer in 33 possession first gamer Michael Barlow. How refreshing that a ‘mature age’ player (he is 22) gets drafted and slips straight into the AFL with instant impact. Obsessions with drafting teenagers and ‘developing’ them to fit the AFL mould means overlooking significant amounts of natural footballers. For every 17 year old boring super fit footy jock making the most of his limited ability to strive through the AFL system, there is a natural footballer kicking bananas from the boundary line before training, underrated and overlooked because he is a late developer or hasn't yet the required attitude or maturity to play AFL at 19. Many players develop late, both mentally and physically, and to assess the whole football population and their potential at 18 years of age is folly. The human interest stories of mature age players given a chance by gracious clubs are much too rare.

God knows that some teams need natural footballers, even if they debut at 22. Like Melbourne. These pages called into question the wisdom (or lack thereof) of re-signing coach Dean Bailey just a fortnight ago. (Note that the Melbourne football media has followed my lead) Melbourne’s performance on the weekend, comprehensive in its patheticness, has vindicated those doubts. There is simply no positivity to be found in such an astoundingly poor showing. After watching the Collingwood-Bulldogs game one could justifiably wonder if Melbourne belongs in the same league as the other 14 teams (sorry Richmond). As one journalist so skillfully summed up, there is a ‘ danger of creating a climate so completely geared towards a still-distant future that it forgives too easily the insipid dross’ of the present. The insipid dross is served up by a small group of high draft pick pimply teenagers, a significant portion of wanna be 22-25 year olds (Bate, Dunn, McDonald, Frawley, Jones, Petterd, Rivers, Warnock, Sylvia, Bartram, Bell) and senior players who have played finals under Daniher. Nearly all of the above mentioned have served under Bailey for more than 2 years, and have shown almost no improvement. (Note the age of a large amount of the Bulldogs best players are 22-25: eg. Cooney, Griffen, Higgins, Hill, Harbrow, Minson, Williams). Bailey will do well to talk himself out of the scrutiny he is about to face over the next few weeks. The only thing that will save him is a few decent performances over 4 quarters or a monstrous Richmond capitulation on the weekend. Note that winning the final quarter when the team is already 12 goals down does not count as a decent performance.

About the only performance as bad as that of the mighty Dees was that of the umpires. Accuse me of being an umpire hater if you wish but some of the decisions on the weekend were quite ridiculous. Most notable was the new sheperding rule. A player is not allowed to block another players run at the ball when the two are going for a mark. Imagine that a player makes a lead and his teammate kicks it too far and over his head. The leading player then backs backwards and his opponent crudely jumps on his shoulders. According to this new rule, the leading player has given away a free kick, as he obstructed his opponents run at the ball. There was a number of examples of this rule where every person watching and playing the game thought that the free had gone to one player but the umpire gave it to his opponent. Actually this happened a number of times in round one and will surely happen throughout the year. The insistence on paying free kicks at ruck duels is just as frustrating, as usually neither ruckman knows who will get the free kick as both of them have infringed equally. The enforcement of certain rules is much too pedantic and gives the players no leeway whatsoever. Paying a 50 metre penalty because one player is simply in the vicinity of the player who received the free kick is much too harsh (see the Gary Ablett Jr example). Umpires are winning no friends by acting like school teachers and yelling at players to constantly do what they are told (turn the microphones off!). Shaking hands with coaches pre-game (and having commentators make mention of it, obviously under AFL instructions) will not make much impact either.