AGB Footy

POST LACKS MOZZ

Right then - West Coast to win by 32 points.

PULL YOUR HEADS IN!
Last year's TV coverage contained waaay too many crowd shots; there were 145,329 during the last quarter alone. By my count, anyway. Now this year, despite Ten employees at SEN, 927 Sport and 3AW on hand to hose down any spot fires, there has been an gentle undertow critical of Ten's fixation with boofheads in the stands. Nothing outright sledgey, mind, just the odd comment here and there. Now, I could be wrong, but it strikes me most people watch football telecasts to see football. Let's hope Ten have heard this criticism and have decided to concentrate on the action that matters. Especially, when it's tight.

ABANDON HOPE ALL YE WHO ARE "ENTERTAINED" HERE
Ok, so we know the grand final entertainment stinks and there has never been a worthwhile preformance, but that won't stop us caning it. Hopefully one day, the AFL will oil the punters squeaky wheel and fork out for someone good, or even just barely OK. Andrew Murfett sums up the situation pretty well in today's Age EG. (Not online.) "At the biggest game in town, the AFL has a lot to answer for. The game deserves better than Vanessa Amorosi, or, God help us, The Seekers. There's an unmistakable whiff of stinginess that pervades the incessant motorcades, crappy fireworks displays, the RAAF Roulettes and the umpteenth rendition of Up There Cazaly." In fact, up until the point he called for the inclusion of rubbish like Powderfinger, Dallas Crane, The Living End and Eskimo Joe, I had an eerie sensation I was reading my own posts. And when Leaping Larry L opens with "Now that’s I’ve given up smoking and no longer have a rock-solid reason/need/excuse to leave the stadium for quarter of an hour, there’s only one reason to have entertainment with sport - i.e. to augment it and make it feel like a bigger deal than it already is" you know he's about to nail it.

I LIED!
"Blah, blah ... when we win." ~~ Ashley Hansen at the Grand Final Parade

POST LACKS VIZARD APING LETTERMAN

Last night Rove did something that really shits me. Really shits me! He claimed sole ownership to Fremantle Docker tragicdom.

Rove barracks for the Dockers, see, and his brother, cousin, pet monkey, whatever plays for Freo. What you didn't know, was that he was the only Freo fan at Telstra Stadium last Friday night. Well, according to Rove, he was.

This is a patently dishonest claim. Patently. Matt Price and his family were there. I assume Kim Beazley was, too, not to mention various Freo officials and hangers-on and, for that matter, the Freo cheer squad and assorted fans sprinkled about the stadium. That's at least a hundred.

What made his try-hard monologue move from "humerous" exaggeration to outright deceit was the claim his lone cheers were met by howls of derision from hoards of feral Pinks fans. That we were meant to believe Rove at Telstra was akin to the likes of a Liverpool fan stuck terrified at the Stretford End. What he should have realised was that they were not mocking him for being on the FREO speedwagon, they were mocking him for his lame television program. If Rove was the genuine article he would have known this - Sydney Sydney fans mock no visiting fan, certainly not en masse. Trust me, I've tried many times to rile them, but they are immune to rilement, all they do is shrug.

One can only conclude that Rove was trying to garner himself some footy-oaf cred, what with Zoo, Ralph, Alpha, etc being the prevailing thing. But while he may have fooled the white trash who watch Channel Ten or the imbeciles who make up studio audiences and who need to be told when to laugh, he wouldn't have fooled proper footy fans.

POST LACKS VISIBLE PANTY LINE

The Brownlow. Night of Nights. Who'll take Charlie home? Pantheon of greatness. 

1. Travis Johnston - MVP (Most Visible Pisshead). How did he find time to lick the face of every person at his table as well as smooch Melbourne chairman Paul Gardiner? If there's one person I didn't want to see pie-eyed and playing up, it's Trav.

2. The woman sitting between Steve McBurney and Darren Goldspink. Buxom. Was she ever an extra in The Sopranos or Goodfellas?

3. WC Fields would have been appalled. Channel 10 target fifteen year olds and cretins with Big Brother; ten year olds and cretins with Australian Idol; and now 5 year olds and cretins with Sons of Guns. Worse, though, is how this Brownlow will be remembered. "The year Goodes won his second AND Hirdy's and Vossy's kids stole the show. Awww."

4. Two pairs should be flushed. Christian and Walls or Lane and Hudson? Surely, one pair's enough to explain proceedings. Doubtless Ten were fulfilling contractual obligations.

5. Sandra Sully, the face that launched 1000 search requests. Is she now officially bigger than Channel Ten?

6. Comrade Demetriou. How many dramatic pauses are too many?

7. Goodes grief. Gavin Wanganeen, Simon Black and Jason Akermanis have won Brownlows and the following Saturday's grand final. Malcolm Blight, Peter Moore, John Platten, Paul Couch, Robert Harvey, Shane Woewodin, Nathan Buckley and Ben Cousins have won the Brownlow then LOST the following Saturday's grand final. Are the numbers bad for Goodes?

8. Seven. Next year (or the year after, depending on the toss) Seven will be hosting the Brownlow. Who knows, they may just do it better than Nine or Ten, and they may not. It will be interesting to see whether they try anything new. New? Well, even when Channel Seven do something new, it still seems like a cliché.

See anything I didn't? Sexism is disencouraged.

POST LACKS HOME GROUND ADVANTAGE

1. Is Paul Roos The Best Ever coach? I can't think of one who has so consistently gotten the best out of such a mediocre list. By mediocre, I mean, where are the jets? Hall and Goodes, sure. Ay-Mon Buchanan, Brett Kirk and Jude Bolton are tigers. Ryan O'Keefe has a rock solid pair of Dukes, Brian! Craig Bolton is a glove. Tadger has pace. (And a shitey, shitey, shite accent.) Mick O'Loughlin has plenty of natural talent, but if the S'Syddey Pinks had been beaten in last year's grand final he would have been strung up beside Luke Ablett to have the soles of their feet beaten purple with SCG fence palings. Ablett can play, though. That Roos has turned these Pinks into a genuine, regular contender is nothing short of miraculous. (Just how much influence has Rodney Eade had on their development?)

2. Compare The Pinks with Wet Toast. The Toast have a superb backline, possibly the best on-ball brigade in the history of the game, and really only lack a class crumbing forward. It was also mildly surprising they didn't go hard after Virus Fevola at the end of last year. Wonder, too, how they'd go with Roos in charge instead of Woosher. You'd have to think they'd be unbackable favourites this Saturday. Of course, they don't, and they won't.

3. Who'll win this week? Well, it sticks in my craw that Barry Hall was allowed to play in last year's decider. Do the AFL and the judiciary take us for idiots? Sorry, do they take us for enormous idiots? Forget that his punch to the guts of McGuire was in or out of play; that should never have entered the equation. More pertinent was why the punch wasn't deemed intentional. Reckless? Negligent? Bull. Shit. Karma, luck, fate, destiny, whatever goes around comes around, call it what you like, says the Swans deserve to lose. I hope they do. Trouble is, I also hope West Coast lose, and by more. Who doesn't love a good choke story?

(Balls to The Cycle! It's a monotonous refrain from the mouths of shills. Not "we're taking it one week at a time" nor "injuries give us a chance to blood youngsters" but "West Coast being strong is just part of the cycle". Rubbish. Melbourne have been shit to average for years, so too Aint Kilda, Gee Long and The Scray. In the late eighties and early nineties West Coast got gifted a premiership side, made the finals every year until 1999, missed for two years, TWO YEARS!, had the player of the generation fall into their lap, and are straight back into contention. If that's a cycle, it's the wonky-wheel sort they use at the circus. The upside, mind, is that because WC are such a strong outfit who have only won two flags, I get to label them a bunch of underacheivers.)

4. The verdict. For Monday, at least. If Daniel Kerr hadn't been hurt early in last year's GF, I reckon WC would have won. They certainly would have if Hall had been outed, like he should. This year Kerr and the rest of the on-ball brigade are firing, although Chad Fletcher is struggling, and Hansen and Lynch are playing well. From the side that lost to the Pinks in week one of these finals, they get back Hansen, Embley and ... umm ... whatsisface. From the side that lost last year's grand final, they have a reasonably functional forward line. I think, at the moment, West Coast will win comfortably. With or without Wirrpanda. Who knows, The Panda looks great on song, but would WC be better off without him? Afterall, he doesn't appear to like it hard, unlike the Pinks, who love it tough. But who do I want to win? Go Storm!

PS: Rubbish!

BLX POPULI

In the Herald Sun Footy Fans Survey - "football's original and most comprehensive test of supporter sentiment" - footy fans have been asked to rate the Grand Final entertainment. (Paradox populi - intelligent footballer, Great Britain and bagpipe music. Good grief!)

Proving Hun readers aren't complete cretins, as some of you may suspect, only 28% said it was good, whereas 52% said it was rubbish and 12% said it was not even worth watching.

Not cited is the other 8%, which is a pity. The chances are it's there you'd get the best responses. Ranging from the sensible - my pick has always been AC/DC - to the gibberish of lunatics - Boynton wants the Seekers.

Failing an AFL infusion of common sense and/or cash, the grand final needs NO extra entertainment. An opinion shared by the two punters actually quoted in the article, John Cosstick of ... yes ... Rowville and Michael Wheeler of ... wait for it ... Wheeler's Hill.

Anyway, proving the AFL are unlikely to take any notice of the fans, this year's acts include Sherbet and John Paul Young. And with Channel Ten as the broadcaster you'd suspect the rest of the "entertainment" will be made up of Strayan Idol tripe.

HORSE WHISPERINGS

Rumour, anyone? Of course. Who can resist hot, juicy dish?

Apparently - Or is that allegedly? - a high profile football person is into the bookies, as they say, to the tune of several hundred grand.

BOUNDARY DERIDER

Boundary riders are a dag on the arse of football coverage. But! That doesn't mean they don't offer up the odd pearler. I mean, bloopers ARE funny. The bloopier, the better.

This from SEN's radio coverage of last Saturday's Sandringham vs Gee-Long game:

B. Rider: "Paul Koulouritis has a bad cork and won't play any further part in today's match."

L. Pickering: "Koulouritis grabs the ball and kicks it to Kent Kingsley who marks in the goal square."