Footy Irrelevant, or, Assholes Classified


With AFL coverage reaching saturation point, you’d think genuine football fans might be able to find some interesting coverage, some fresh points of view or some genuine insight into what makes our game tick. And so it was that I tuned in to Channel 9’s Footy Classified, hoping for an insightful and intelligent analysis of the week’s games.

It’s not an unprecedented TV format, with Talking Footy being the original Monday night discussion of the weekend’s events. Featuring an in-form Bruce McAvaney as host and Mike ‘what-do-you-think’ Sheanan, it’s relaxed, informal approach made for an interesting counterpoint to the more straight forward match-review style Sunday morning shows that had been running since Lou Richards was coherent. It also brought together, for the first time, print journalists and ex-players and coaches, often leading to various incarnations of the inevitable, defence mechanism argument, “you never played the game”. It had a few other things going for it as well, including a catchy theme song, a period with Blighty as a panellist and a distinct lack of Robert Walls. Well, that is until it dropped the song, moved to Foxtel, changed its name to On the Couch and anchored the show with Robert Walls.

Note: Speaking of theme songs, does anyone remember the Channel 7 footy panel show whose theme song was made up entirely of football clichés in acronym form? The singer awkwardly got through the acronym and then a chorus of back-up singers would expand it to its full form. I know, it was as ridiculous as it sounds. For example: We’ll get BTB (back-to-basics), TLTB (Thank you linesman, thank you ball-boys), have an RHG (Red Hot Go)… Please tell me someone else remembers this song.

I had such high hopes for Footy Classified and I have watched from episode one. It was an interesting mix of personalities; host, fence-sitter and Nick Riewoldt cheer-leader Garry Lyon; news-breaker and annoying ferret Craig Hutchinson; one W. Carey, making his first real foray into television after a career as an all-time great on-field and all-time prick off it; and Caroline Wilson, she of the invented “sources”, or, “thourthes”.

I thought perhaps the high-brow title, coupled with the “adult” time slot, would ensure the show remained truly about football and not descend into the locker-room insult and dick-joke territory frequently mined by the other Channel 9 Footy Show (although that has its place as well, yours truly being guilty of plenty of cheap shots before). And in its early episodes it looked encouraging. Garry discussed tactics and hung shit on Hutchy; Hutchy broke news and sucked up to Wayne; Wayne took the “you didn’t play the game” argument to new levels in directing regular vitriol at Caro; and Caro, well…

The reason I started watching Footy Classified was that I was hoping it would help me understand the game, that it could help explain why the Cats can belt everyone except Collingwood, or that it would clear up Hawthorn’s zone defence tactics, or point out how Daniel Cross has quietly become so good that the Dogs don’t miss Scott West at all. But what do I get instead? We get lead stories about club presidents, about teams selling games interstate, about the fixture, about the interchange, about resigning board members or new board members or proposed new board members; basically everything but the game. I mean, who gives a shit about board members, seriously? It’s like a music writer reviewing the new Flaming Lips album by discussing Warner Bros, their record label. Yes, but what about the music, the fucking music!!! Complete and utter madness. And I don’t want to point the finger, but most of this is generated from The Age’s chief football writer, Caroline Wilson.

Just have a look at her last month of articles for The Age: Canberra’s lack of AFL games, Dick Pratt, a potential Twilight GF, the Gold Coast team, the West Sydney team, Jeff Kennett’s presidency and a thrilling story about Andrew Demetriou not attending a fucking Scotch College match. On Footy Classified she’s exactly the same; there are currently three teams playing out of their skin, having lost 5 games between them, and what is she banging on about? Greg fucking Miller stepping down from the Richmond board but remaining in the football operations department! Oh, wait, that’s right, did I mention that she’s a Richmond supporter, meaning half the show is exclusively devoted to Joel Bowden, Kayne Pettifer and 150 other faceless people who work in the RFC administration. And guess who tonight’s guest is? Terry terrific! What a surprise, Mr Media turns up to field lolly-pops (“Personally, I hope you stay the club for a few more years, and I’m not a critic of your coaching”) from his chief football writer (CFW) girlfriend. And they kicked Sam Newman off TV?!?

(Seriously, how slimy is Terry Wallace? The guy gets hired on his “5-year game-plan”, in which he intends to turn the list over and develop a batch of young players for the long-term. So what does he do? He signs Mark Graham, Kent Kingsley, Graham Polak, trades pick 19 for Jordan McMahon and finally gives Richo a try a bit further up the ground in year 4. Asked on the show how he thinks he’s gone, here is his actual response: Well, if you could take out one year completely… What, you’d have 2 and half shit years instead of 3 and a half? Weren’t you supposed to be competing for a premiership, Terry? If we’re just making shit up why stop there? Why don’t we take out one whole year and in its place put in a season where you don’t spend 3 days a week in a solarium? Jesus Christ, the guy is full of more shit than a McDonalds ad.)

Footy Classified has been reduced to Caro and Hutchy, two of TV’s most unlikeable characters since Mad About You was on the air, trying to out do each other with irrelevant rubbish, while Garry pretends to be interested and Archer pretends to be awake (do they even turn his microphone on anymore? I miss The Duck). On Saturday I saw the best demolition job by an AFL team since, well, The Cats belted Richmond in Round 6 last year. On Monday I stayed up to watch ‘the serious’ Footy Show and heard about the changes to Carlton’s board, Anthony Rocca’s ankle, Jeff Kennett talking about North Melbourne’s injury procedures and more lies from Terry Terrific. Not one word about the Cats except a 5 second montage that featured Lips scratching himself and eating a sandwich. And before you all start, I know I haven’t said anything the Cats either, but at least you didn’t have to sit through an hour of SeaPatrol for this.

Exorcising our Gold Coast Demons, or, Get Blighty

With a new team planned for the Gold Coast, the AFL desperately needs it’s too succeed to continue its Darth Vader like effort to crush the NRL and advance unchallenged throughout the land. But who will this team be? Where will they come from? What will they be called? The club needs to connect with the locals, with the landscape, the history and the culture of the region as well as making a statement of intent. Let’s play some word association: Gold Coast. Beaches. Sharks. Surfers. Tourists. Schoolies… Hmm. How about the Gold Coast Assholes? The jumper would feature white sand, blue-green ocean and a giant asshole right in the middle, staring at you like a speed-crazed local in the seconds before he glasses you.

Although I like it, it’d be a hard sell for the AFL. And I can’t see too many players getting fired up to ‘pull on the big asshole’. That’s why Big League Little League is here, to offer a total solution package. We recognize that a football club is a fragile microcosm, a delicate balancing act where everything must tie into everything else, off-field success must feed on-field success and all of this must fill mine and Mrs Watson’s pockets. That’s right, say hello to the Gold Coast football club’s new co-presidents.

First of all, there are too many bloody teams in Victoria. Every year it’s someone else begging to be bailed out; Hawthorn, Melbourne, the Bulldogs, North Melbourne… enough! We’re just spreading the failure around. Well no more. And we’re not starting from scratch, oh no, if we have to move to this sunshiny Hell we’re taking someone with us. Here’s our relocation checklist: No fans, no facilities, off-field instability, deep financial shit and a rubbish playing list. Check, check, check and check; Melbourne Football club, come on down!

Our first order of business is to end the Dean Bailey experiment. I don’t like a coach who doesn’t react to anything. It’s like he doesn’t realises he’s the coach sometimes. I’m sure sometimes he’s watching the game, thinking, ‘Cameron Bruce is getting cut up out there, someone should do something about that’, before realising 20 minutes later that he is that person. Maybe he and Sean Wellman are in the box passing a joint around; “Dude, Garry Lyon looks thin!”

So, Bailey out, and in comes… Malcolm Blight: premiership coach, flawed genius, part-time commentator, part-time nut job and Gold Coast resident. We’re bringing Blighty back. We need to think outside the square, and Malcolm lives outside square. He’s very aware of what’s happening outside the square. You see, the problem with Blighty’s appointment to St. Kilda was they felt he wasn’t committed enough, that he didn’t embrace the club and its culture. We say, let’s turn that on its head, let’s embrace Blighty, let’s adopt his culture and let’s give him a free reign to come and go from the club and training and matches as he sees fit.

Blighty isn’t a traditional coach, so his role won’t be either. Malcolm will be a ‘Special Consultant’. Basically, hiring Blighty is like having an ‘open relationship’ with a swimsuit model; sometimes you’re not sure where she is or what she’s doing, but on the other hand you’re dating a freaking swimsuit model. For example, he might come to training one day and have the players practise only torps. Or he might take a session out at Parkwood International, so he can squeeze in 9 holes as the players run up and down the sand traps. Then he might disappear for four weeks, only to reappear at 2pm match day, in full playing kit, and run through the banner with the boys, just to inspire them. Of course, immediately after that he’ll probably head straight to the car park and piss off home, so, we need a more permanent fixture as well.

But before we go any further, let us make clear that whilst Mrs Watson and I will be co-presidents of an opposing club, our loyalty will always remain with the Cats. Therefore, our unwritten policy will be to prepare this club to finish second; to build them to a point where they can reach a Grand Final and then lose said Grand Final to Geelong. This also precludes us from poaching current Geelong senior players: There is nothing, however, to stop us targeting ex-Cats.

Enter Brent Maloney. He will be appointed as captain/ playing-coach, and his intense, no-nonsense approach is the perfect compliment to Blighty’s off-the-wall methods. While Malcolm might send players on a peyote-fuelled vision quest, Maloney will send them to never-ending wind sprints, and although both normally end in vomiting, Maloney’s hardline approach will instil some much needed toughness in this team.

This appointment will coincide with a wide-ranging and ruthless cull of the current Melbourne list. There is definitely some good young talent there, (Morton, Frawley, Bartram, Dunn, Wonaeamirri) and some veterans that can assist the Gold Coast rebuild (Green, Miller, McDonald, McLean) but heads will have to roll. Cameron Bruce will immediately be traded, to Geelong, for Trent West and Nathan Djerkurra, giving the Cats another wildcard for their premiership run and the new Gold Coast team a young ruckman and some much needed pace. Incumbent ruckman Jeff White will also be traded, to an over-rated, wannabe contender, who thinks they just need ruck support to put them over the top, so St Kilda it is. We will take back only draft picks or young promising talent who pass the ‘booze’ testing (more on this soon) and we will also sign former Geelong VFL player Todd Grima.

Continuing the Geelong blueprint, we need a lynchpin defender in the Scarlett mould. As such, Russell Robertson will be sent to North Melbourne for another ex-cat and Scarlett clone, Scott Thompson. Any other ‘deadwood’ players (Ben Holland and Adem Yze I’m looking at you) will be delisted, with the newly created salary cap room coming in handy for our next coup.

We show up to Matthew Pavlich’s house with a dump-truck full of money and an offer to remove him from the cruel purgatory of Fremantle. Meanwhile, we’ll have his brother hog-tied in the backseat as insurance, but not before first establishing whether or not the younger Pav can play. We throw everything at Pav, including any number of shady, under-the-counter deals that don’t count against the salary cap, and seeing as though we propose to bring back the pie night, (tying in nicely with our newly found Beaumont’s sponsorship) don’t be surprised if Pav’s girlfriend ends up working at the club canteen on around 250K p.a.

During draft time we take advantage of our location and “schoolies week” as Blighty and Maloney put the best U/18 prospects through rigorous drinking/fitness tests designed to gauge a prospect’s endurance, mental strength and likelihood of future sexual assault charges. Then we can head to the draft armed with our many extra picks, confident that no potential Stephen Milne will be taken.

With unprecedented interest in the club and our quirky methods, Mrs Watson and I will use the publicity to court some of the many high-level Gold Coast personalities such as Greg Evans, and one of the ‘very available’ Daddo Brothers to help target the tourist dollar. Our promotions will also be geared this way, with game tickets tied into theme park packages and holiday deals, (ensuring a large, but mostly uneducated football crowd, just like Sydney) or even better, we build a new home ground inside the SeaWorld complex, so that guests can take the mono-rail direct to games.

So, with our new additions, some positional changes, and Blighty’s crazy, can-do attitude, we’ve transformed the Melbourne Demons from this structure-less collection of hacks and has-beens as they appeared on the Queens Birthday game:

B: J.McDonald, C.Garland, J.Frawley
HB: B.Green, M.Warnock, P.Wheatley
C: C.Morton, B.McLean, C.Bruce
HF: M.Bate, B.Miller, L.Dunn
F: P.Johnson, C.Sylvia, A.Wonaeamirri
Followers: J.White, B.Moloney, N.Jones
Interchange from: C.Bartram, J.Bode, J.Rivers, A.Yze

To this powerhouse of talent, potential and intent:

B: J.McDonald, S. Thompson, J.Frawley
HB: C. Garland, B. Miller, L. Dunn
C: C. Morton, B. McLean, N. Djerkurra
HF: A. Davey, M Pavlich, T. Grima
F: C. Sylvia, B. Green, A. Wonaeamirri
Followers: T. West, B. Moloney (captain/coach), N. Jones
Interchange: C.Bartram, R. Petterd, A Maric, M Warnock

Whaddya think? Not that far fetched, is it? I mean, if Mark Harvey gets to run an AFL team, why can’t we?