Saturday, June 5, 2010

Blight on the game, tampering to blame

The following article was published on thebigtip.com.au on 27 May 2010

When I was 14 a friend of mine asked if I wanted to become an umpire. We could play football on Saturday and umpire junior games on Sundays. And earn some extra pocket money. The next Friday night I was down at ‘umpire training’, a collection of outcast nerds seriously practicing positioning, bouncing and backwards running. The following Sunday I was umpiring an under 11’s practice match, more nervous than I’d ever been before a football game. It didn’t occur to me then, but now it is obvious that the league needed umpires. Quickly.

My father drove me to the ground bemused. Having watched over 100 games of me playing, he was not particularly keen on spending a few hours at a suburban ground watching his son umpire. ‘Good holding the ball decision in the last quarter’ was not a comment he really wanted to make. And how would he respond if he ran into someone he knew? ‘Yes, I’m watching my son umpire’. ‘Oh but yes he still plays’. Originally, umpiring junior games was quite a rewarding experience. It was enlightening to see a game from a different viewpoint, to restrain myself from going for the ball and from turning my head to the umpire when I saw an infringement. And after I realised that I was that umpire, I found the job quite easy. Most players with significant football experience have a natural reaction to an obvious infringement. As an umpire, you simply have to blow the whistle and pay the free kick. There is no reason to think. The free kick is very obvious.


The Curse of the instant society

The following article was published on thebigtip.com.au on 20 May 2010

Round 20, 2008. Hawthorn sits second on the ladder and has a full strength team, one remarkably similar to the group that received premiership medals over a month later. In fact their starting 18 consisted of 18 soon to be premiership players. As a tune up for the finals, the Hawks took on 10 th placed Richmond. The Tigers were surging, again, towards an inevitable 9th place, giving their hungry fans a short look at the finals and another number 8 draft pick. Incredibly, then coach Terry Wallace was even fending off questions about a possible contract extension, such was the momentum the tiges were building. At such an important part of the season, the Hawks should have comfortably beaten Richmond, stamping their authority on the competition. Instead, the Tigers led at every change, and ran out comfortable 29 point winners. Exactly 41 days later Hawthorn fans were celebrating an unlikely flag. Richmond supporters were speculating (foolishly) on how their team’s late season form would lead into glory in 2009.

The concept that a team’s round 22 form can lead into good round one form 6 months later is complete folly, as proven by Richmond. In the same way, the idea that Collingwood’s sparkling round 8 form improves their chances of a premiership later in the year is naive. The best thing about Collingwood’s form right now is that the team can maybe afford to lose games later in the year and still finish top four. A football season is much like a football game. Momentum swings are inevitable, and the pies will no doubt lose some of their current form before the finals, be it due to injuries or top players simply losing from. Whether they can regain it is the most important thing. As Geelong found out in 2008, and StKilda in 2009, maintaining brilliant form for the whole year, culminating in a flag, is practically impossible.


Lies, Damn Lies, AFL commentary

The following article was published on thebigtip.com.au on 13 May 2010

It was about 30 years ago that a visionary dad approached the quarter time huddle at his kid’s country under 15 game. To the slightly bemused crowd he said: “I’ve taken two types of statistics. Kicks… And shit kicks”. He was way ahead of his time.

It’s a tough business recruiting, and it’s only going to get tougher. With two new teams coming, all the talk is of recruiters searching far and wide for decent players. Country leagues. Amateur leagues. New Zealand. China. And of course in other codes. Kevin Sheedy’s comments that code swapping will become common place in the next decade are ill-conceived. His comparison to ordinary people changing industries and jobs over their career is also rather naive. He overlooks the fact that professional footballers are trained in very specific skills, have relatively short careers, and do not generally have a long time to acqure the new skills. Players who have played football for long periods during their childhood have inherent decision making skills that are not easy for a mature age player to attain. As clubs and their coaches emphasise relentless pressure on opposition as the first step to winning games, decision making skills are all-important. Turnovers, the result of such pressure, often result in goals, so ball handling and even more importantly kicking skills, are of extreme importance. To suggest that a rugby player, who has barely spent any of his adult life kicking an Australian football, can pick up these kicking skills to reach AFL standard is something of an insult to those who have spent their lives perfecting (or trying to perfect) the art. Other skills such as judging a high ball in flight and bending at full speed to pick up an oval ball are also very hard to learn, even for an elite athlete.

Paying a rugby player huge money to change to AFL is a similar insult and also quite short-sighted. I challenge the idea that paying this money is worth it in sheer marketing terms. Saturation news coverage may be beneficial at the beginning. But if this player turns out not to reach the standard required to successfully play AFL and moves back to rugby after two years, the supporters of the club will be justifiably annoyed that the cash was not spent on a player with an AFL background. The negative coverage that this will generate could be quite damaging to the club and it’s ‘brand’. If any publicity is good publicity clubs can easily contrive a booze cruise scandal and let the media go on a typical feeding frenzy. If this marketing coup is supposed to attract rugby fans to Aussie Rules, simply imagine if an AFL player switched to rugby. Would real AFL supporters follow a player and begin watching another code? Emphatically no. Finally, the recruitment of a player from another code on an inflated salary may also anger players who feel that the recruit has not yet earnt his large pay packet. This disgruntlement could influence player performance and morale.


Slap on the right wrist, palm grease on the left

The following article was published on thebigtip.com.au on 7 May 2010

“Gambling is an issue for sport worldwide, and that is why we take it so seriously.” Adrian Anderson

We bloody well should. Where government, church and community fails, there is our great social leader, the AFL. The moral compass of good and bad. Brutal judge of anti-social behaviour and shameless self promoter of goodness all around. The AFL has done some great things for social progress over the years and should be commended. This Friday’s field of women is a good example. The leagues extremely harsh reaction to AFL or club staff betting on games is also reasonable, considering what betting has done to other sports. Gambling is poisonous when done by players and people who can influence games. But gambling done by fans for their own enjoyment is totally legal, despite how it affects the lives of the gamblers. The AFL stands on a pedastal on a number of issues and does its best to promote what is best for society. One example is the leagues condmenation of the binge drinking culture that prevails in many of Australia’s football clubs. Getting extremely drunk is not a crime, but doing it sometimes leads to a negative impact on ones life. The AFL felt the need to address this issue, though it has no parliamentary obligation to do so. So if the AFL is determined to improve the lives of people involved in football by reducing extreme drunkeness, where does it stand on another of society’s acknowledged ills, gambling?

Setanta O'hAilpin, Carlton Blues, vs Collingwood, Sportsbetting advertisingThe promotion of gambling in AFL related television, radio, and other media outlets has grown markedly this season, so that even non-gamblers must be aware of the pervasive influence sports betting now has on AFL. The worst website in the world, afl.com.au has a sporadically openable feature called gameday, which displays live betting odds for viewers, encouraging betting. Radio stations often throw to betting agency people for live reports on odds fluctuations before and during games. Even so-called journalists investigating Jonothan Brown’s mysterious stomach ailment got their quotes from a betting agency spokesman who questioned Brown’s integrity should his comments prove to be wrong. Betting agency logos are even presented on the most sacred AFL symbol, the mighty Sherrin football.


Those sweet nights, those perfect games

The following article was published on thebigtip.com.au on April 30, 2010

He sat deep in the stands on a late winter night as waves of emotion overcame him. The field below, the scene of something scarcely believable just a few minutes earlier, was now devoid of life. Lights shining on emptiness. As families around him shuffled towards the exits, he finally sat down. The last few bars of the club song had drained his every last drop of energy. For a moment, suddenly, he needed to be alone, to block it all out. So he buried his head in his hands and cried. A few seconds later he lifted his head up, eyes red and tired. This was the line between pleasure and pain and it was all blurry. Around him people were confused. What happened? Isn’t this what you wanted? Was this not a scene of famous victory? The sort of victory you will remember for a lifetime but others will forget within weeks. Wasn’t being at games like this the reason you bought your membership? These weren’t tears of joy or pain but something unexplainable. Tears of pure emotion, pure exhaustion. They’d played their final series a month too early. Taken their supporters high then low then through sheer will dragged them back to the top again for a final glimpse. And that was it. Even heading into the finals everyone was exhausted. And they were gone the next week, and no one really remembers it.

HE sat in an internet cafe deep in a southern Chinese province and ate KFC and inhaled the smoke of cheap Chinese cigarettes. For 25 minutes he watched a slow line sneak across a screen symbolising events taking place half a world away. Finally the radio kicked in and a voice could give human life to something that didn’t feel quite real. They stayed with them for the first half, selling false hope to people who would never buy it again. Well maybe just a little bit. Half time was a reality check. This wasn’t gonna happen. Why would it? But he went back inside anyway and a kid nearly spat on his foot and it was on. They stayed with them in the third and the crowd lifted a little. Only the real supporters were still there during those dark times. The rest had their excuses. And the commentators sensed something. He could feel it too. Things were happening that didn’t usually happen. But someone so versed in disappointment didn’t fall in that easy. When they were still up with less than 10 minutes to go he reassessed, and hoped silently, treachorously, for some equilibrium. This didn’t need to happen. It wasn’t going to happen. The enemy kicked two in a minute and it was over. He threw the headphones at the screen. It was lacklustre rage at best like a poor actor in a poor movie. He just couldn’t summon it anymore. Not after this long. It even felt like relief. Then he picked up the headphones and listened again because he never left early, home or away. They had one last crack. Went forward. Marked. Goaled. The other team burst from the centre to snatch it back, but the backline was a flood. They held their nerve. Won it. He roared. Turned every head. Got up and walked back into those strange streets and it felt like it never happened because nobody else understood. And no one really remembers it.

Brad Green, Joel MacDonald, Melbourne Demons, celebrate, win, victoryIT was still warm in April and they took the train to the ‘g thinking, unbelievably, about 3 in a row. And it’s what they got. It was just one of those nights when every tackle sticks, when players are constanly bombing goals from 50 and umpires are paying easy frees. You lead at every change but the other team still has a sniff at three quarter time. Rather than shattering every nerve in every supporters body like before, this time you put the visitors to the torch and win by 8 goals. You don’t have a bad player on the field and the next day you can finally read the newspaper without avoiding your teams match report. Flags or finals or years of nothing these are the games you have to hold onto. You have to enjoy it. Or you’ll get nothing at all. Those sweet nights. Those perfect games.

In the bad times, those memories are what you have. What you have to remember, and what you have to look forward to. Essendon fans calling for Matthew Knights’ head might look back to last year and think about giving the guy a break. They did win a number of big games as underdogs against despised local rivals. Same gameplan, similar players. For clubs that are somehow living the opposite of Knights’ horror run (you know who I mean!), it’s time to enjoy the good times. Viewing a game and actually expecting, no demanding, to win is a wholly foreign concept and getting used to it should be one of life’s great pleasures. Ask Geelong supporters. Oh well not anymore.