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Pre-season Invective - Part III
As the ball is about to bounce for Season 2006, enthusiasts of our great game can rejoice that the year promises to provide many highlights that will warm the hearts of footy fans throughout Australia – Wayne Carey continues to provide us with plenty of summer amusement; Eddie has vacated the commentary box; Leigh Colbert has retired; Sheeds is into his 26th year; and, best of all, Carlton is down on its knees begging the AFL to save it from imminent financial ruin.
But there is still more work to be done to improve the game. Football fans, and least of all the AFL, cannot rest on their laurels. So, in the spirit of contributing constructive ideas to improve the game. Footballinvecitve.com hereby presents its manifesto to transform the game in 2006.
The 5 Point Plan to Regenerate and Revitalise football:
1. Regime Change
First and foremost, change is needed at the very top echelon of football officialdom. Having told him to take a good hard look at himself on numerous occasions throughout 2005, footballinvective.com has now decreed that enough is enough and Andrew Demetriou must now vacate the highest office in the AFL. When even Caroline Wilson has written him off, there can be no doubt that the game is up. As Gough Whitlam would say, “It’s Time”.
It’s time for the people to rise up and overthrow the regime of Comrade Demetriou, who might be more gainfully employed as a Greens campaign manager instead. Just like Nicolai Caucescu being put up against the wall in 1989, its time for this rich socialist despot to be swept from office by the winds of freedom. Such a purge is, however, merely one half of the plan for regeneration at the top. The more important half is concerned with finding a suitable replacement for the Comrade.
His replacement should be of the people, by the people and for the people. A man who is not some latte-sipping, politically correct Bob Brown wannabe, but a man who inspires respect, loyalty and above all else PASSION. We speak, of course, of the footballinvective.com plan to install big Slammin' Sam Kekovich into the top job. We need a bloke who loves his red meat, who isn’t afraid to use the term “un-Australian”, and who willingly has a go at Aussie cricketers for getting it on with pommy sheilas, when there are clean-living Aussie lasses would love to handle their gear.
The respective merits of Demetriou and Kekovich should be clear for all to see. First, consider Demetriou’s appalling 2005 Australia Day address (a speech previously lampooned on footballinvective.com). Now, compare the Comrade’s effort to Kekka’s inspirational 2005 Australia Day address (click below):
And, if you happen to require any further convincing, now consider Sam’s equally impressive 2006 speech.
A comparison of their respective oratorical abilities and capacity to inspire is like comparing the leadership qualities of Winston Churchill to Senator Stephen Conroy, Margaret Thatcher to Joan Kirner, Arnold Schwarzenegger to Dan Quayle (well, maybe not quite). Clearly, a new leader has emerged. A man who has put a light on the hill. Now, as a matter of the utmost urgency, this man must be installed as CEO of the AFL, in order to take the Great Game and its millions of dedicated followers into the sunlit uplands of the 21st century.
Following the installation of a real leader with real vision, the AFL will then be able to pursue its true historical destiny. Which leads us to….
2. Expansion
The mix of unrestrained biffo on the field combined with the rampant, yet harmless (take note Greg Baum) jingoism in the stands at the International Rules series against Ireland last October once again made this web site lament that Aussie Rules has never developed into an international sport.
If ever there is one thing that should justify the adoption of a “black armband” view of Australia’s history, it is our failure as a people to export out indigenous game to the rest of the world during the 19th century. If the Mother Country could export cricket to her dominions during that time, then surely we could have exported the Greatest Game in the World to the same lands during the age of empire.
But it’s not too late. As part of its Kekovich-led manifesto to transform the game in 2006, footballinvective.com proposes to implement a new policy of compulsory football imperialism. If the American neo-cons can export democracy to tin-pot states who probably don’t want it, then footballinvective.com can export football to the rest of the world. In Year 1 of the 5 Year Plan we will start by exporting the game to all cricket-playing nations, who already have plenty of big grounds suitable for footy, and a pre-existing sporting affinity with Australia. The possibilities are endless - Imagine all those giant West Indian fast bowlers who would surely make outstanding mobile ruckmen. Just imagine 100,000 rabid Indian fans at Eden Gardens for the traditional Anzac Day clash between the Mumbai Magpies and the Bengal Bombers (coached by that wily old veteran Madonnacant Singh). Or if you thought last year’s Mega Showdown between Port Power and the Crows was a grudge match, just wait to you see the annual “Nuclear Showdown” between India and Pakistan, with obligatory homicidal riot afterwards. But most of all, think of all those scrawny, under-fed pommy lads who are clearly physically unsuited to the demands of Australian Rules Football, and who will be repeatedly thrashed and brutalised by Australia’s finest, thus guaranteeing another era of sporting dominance over the Old Enemy, and enabling the Barmy Army to once again feel what it’s like to live under the Australian sporting jackboot.
The AFL has wasted too much time looking like idiots by trying to turn Queensland and NSW into football states. In so doing they have lost sight of the Big Picture – World Domination.
Let the World War Begin.
Eden Gardens – Home of Football
3. Pre-Season
Let's have an end to this circus we call pre-season competition, with the coloured clothing and all those 'innovative' rules to soften up the game, which we fear are ultimately headed towards incorporating females into the pre-season comp. Then there are all those meaningless “community camps” and practice matches that teams are forced to conduct in obscure rural locations such as Krakkatinni and Bringdagrogalong.
If we must have a pre-season comp and if we must come up with some pointless new rule to trial each year then why not do something exciting, like possibly relaxing the rule pertaining to melees or, better still, abolishing it altogether. Or changing the rules to award 9 point goals for goals kicked inside 50 but with a requisite degree of lairising and crowd pleasing – you know, check-sides, blind turns, torpedoes, ignoring 4 opportunities to handball (Bartlett-style) or playing on after taking a hanger, like the Birdman last weekend. Do we really care if a full-back can kick in before the goal ump has finished waving his flags? Of course not. But we do want to see some genuine entertainment. So why not encourage it.
4. Theme Rounds
On a slightly related matter, let’s forget about all the silly "theme rounds" that the AFL now has - Rivalry Round, Heritage Round, Mothers Day Round (I kid you not). When will we see the “Biffo Round” or the “Revenge on Colberters Round”? Now THAT will get the punters through the gates. Or, alternatively (just this once) why not follow the lead of the NRL (National Rapist League) who last year implemented a highly successful “70s Round”, where the old-style footy jumpers were brought back, players willingly donned headbands, afros and tashes, and the fans were able to re-discover their roots. How about a full 1970s theme round featuring: · All games to be played at the old suburban grounds (Vic Park, Moorabbin, Windy Hill, Western Oval, etc, etc); · Full-strength beer in tins on sale at all gates (no 2 can limit); · Compulsory skivvies and duffle coats with player’s numbers; · All interstate teams to be generously given a bye for that week; and · Classic 70s cultural productions, such as “The Club” and “The Great Macarthy” to be compulsory components of the curriculum in all Victorian and South Australian schools:
5. Finally, and most importantly – Football Terminology:
The growing professionalisation of football over the past decade (and the force-fed diet of Magadon consumed by the lesser football media) has meant the game has lost a lot of its character. Clubs no longer tolerate individualism amongst the players but, worse still, the lesser football media do not encourage it either. In fact, they positively repudiate it. What football needs to truly survive and prosper in future years is more colourful characters. The decline of nicknames in football is the most obvious symptom of the lack of real characters in the modern game. As a small sample, consider the following great characters with great nicknames who graced the game in the 70s and 80s:
So where have all the characters gone? Despite the gallant attempts of Rex Hunt to coin new nicknames and breathe some colour into the game, his efforts has regrettably fallen on deaf ears. Consider the lamentable number of nicknames in the current era of football:
1. Fraser “The G Train” Gehrig 2. Brett “The Birdman” Burton 3. “Big Bad” Barry Hall 4. “Leaping” Leo Barry 5. Peter “Spider” Everitt 6. Trent “The Athlete” Croad 7. “Diamond” Joe Gutnick 8. Chris “The Juddernaut” Judd (aka “That Red Dress Shiela” Judd) 9. Brendan “The F Train” Fevola 10. Michael “Goodfella” Gardiner 11. Ben “Corleone” Cousins 12. Ryan “Princess Mary” O’Keefe
Of these 12 names, one belongs to a club president and five were coined by footballinvective.com, leaving only 6 fair dinkum nicknames in almost a decade of football.
To remedy this insidious malaise, footballinvective.com hereby decrees that every future television rights deal must include a clause providing for compulsory use of nicknames by TV commentators, and a guaranteed return to the commentary box by Lou Richards, who is probably responsible for inventing half of the list set out above. What the lesser football media needs in 2006 is less of those uncreative types like Mike Sheahan, Rohan Connolly and (of course) Bruce, and more of the Rex Hunts and Dennis Commettis. In an ideal world, the AFL could genetically engineer a football commentator who combined the wit and dulcet tones of Commetti, the passion and volatility of Rex, and the old-style witticisms and wordsmithery of Lou Richards and Jack Dyer. Commentators who can bring back the colour. Bring back the controversy. And bring back the passion.
Let the War Begin.
Louey the Lip: Wordsmith
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Demetriou: Time's Up
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