OH NO, some pommy backpackers think our game is silly & complicated, after watching one game, that's the end of Aussie Rules.
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Culina: AFL supporters who dont embrace football are "insecure in their code"
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OH NO, some pommy backpackers think our game is silly & complicated, after watching one game, that's the end of Aussie Rules.
- Banned
- #327
Australian Football is the national game of Australia and Noumea ,was the national game of NZ and PNG, returning quickly to PNG .
Governments are get involved in introducing AR to RAS , China , UK , USA and Canada , whilst the recent spread of AR internationally can be seen in the growth in numbers and skill level of the AR International Cup .
AFL is full of sponsorship from overseas multi-nationals .
AFL clubs now have lhigh level inks to Japan , China and South Africa .
The draft and salary cap ensure an exiting competition of Australian players
no longer can a businessman walk in and buy a premiership .
No longer do the rich clubs sit annually at the top of the leader board impervous to the efforts of the local players .
Oval ball makes it easier to kick the ball skillfully over long distances
and easier to catch whilst demanding higher grounds skills.
AFL is tougher physically and requires multi-skilled tasks and focus .
AFL attracts lager FTA payments because of it's popularity .
Soccer bandwagonners don't support australian teams .
Australia is full of WC bandwagoners especially if Oz has chance of a win .
As an AFL player you get a lot more money than a soccer player .
- Banned
- #328
OH NO, some pommy backpackers think our game is silly & complicated, after watching one game, that's the end of Aussie Rules.
Well they will think it's strange if they have been indoctrinated with sports that have too numerous restrictions to mention .
The fact is if you were going to design a sport that is fast , open , spectactular to watch , easy to play and understand then you'd come up with something like AR . Why because it is aproduct of evoultion by design .
.
- Mar 2, 2007
- 43,271
- 62,179
- AFL Club
- Fremantle
- Other Teams
- Liverpool, Cowboys, Packers, Scorchers
I get the feeling we've been through this before Vinnie, but here we go.
The game is growing slowly overseas. We haven't had the advantage of an empire to convert like England or a massive media empire like the US to force our culture down other peoples throats. Who cares what the rest of the world thinks anyway? Do you live your life worrying about what other people think of you?
We have one of the highest attended leagues in the world. The game is practically a religion here. Doesn't sound like a game that means nothing.
Plenty of teams are sponsored by global multinational companies. Collingwood with Emirates, Freo with LG, etc
People are attached to their team, who cares if there are no new teams every year? That's how true rivalries are formed. Ask a Man U fan if they get excited about getting to play Sheff U one year and Wigan the next. No, it's the sustained rivalries with Man City, Liverpool etc that are the big games.
Work for the ball? You mean like putting your body on the line, busting packs, tackling, smothering, etc. AFL players work far harder for the ball than soccer players.
There's also hundreds or even thousands of professional soccer teams around the world. Only 16 AFL clubs.
AFL gets free to air coverage because it's popular. Not vice versa. If the A-League rated the same it would get the same opportunities.
Sydney's FC's crowds have fallen from their first season too. Every team in every sport has a bandwagon element.
Plenty of Liverpool fans are complaining that they couldn't get tickets for Athens tonight because they were sold off to the corporate sector. Happens for every big event in every sport.
So the worth of a sport is all about the money now is it? Baseball must be the best game on Earth then.
And chicks look even better again naked, what's your point? Sounds like you should be supporting a fashion label, not a football team.
I bet he wishes no-one in Victoria was watching now. The press in Melbourne has mauled the Hawks v Saints match for being boring, uncontested, defensive crap, which it was. This game was 100x worse.
Sydney needed to win to stay in the ACL and what do they do? Pass the ball around in their defensive 3rd for most of the game. The last 20 minutes they couldn't even be bothered having a shot until stoppage time.
I can't believe I passed on the opportunity to watch the State of Origin for this.
vanders
Brownlow Medallist
Yeah, playing rugby or aussie rules is real work ethic, that 1 game a week
The best soccer teams in the world, like Man United, play 3 games a week sometimes, so your work ethic argument is a load of crap.
You can't just go off the ground for a rest, you don't have someone running you a drink when you're a little puffed either.
I think a lot of you underestimate how tough soccer actually is.
I love it myself
i supported queensland tonight, am I bad?
Yes! You should have embraced Sydney F.C. like I did, I shouldn't be the only person who had to sit through that snooze fest.
Also, according to Branco, you're insescure in your code, and un-Australian. I on the otherhand was just bored out of my mind
Sydney doesn't encompass all of Australia, so why are we un-Australian for not supporting a club in Sydney. If Melbourne Victory was playing is it un-Australian for a Sydney FC fan to barrack for Melbourne Victory to loose every game? If anything he is showing his insecurity by raising the issue that nobody will be watching the soccer and will be watching rugby league. Just a left field question, isn't the term un-Australian an oxymoron? Is his showing his stupidity and his insecurity all in the one sentence?
based on that it would mean that Manchester United, Everton, Arsenal fans must support Liverpool tomorrow or they are unbritish
or Juve, Inter, Roma etc fans supporting Milan or they are unitalian
http://blogs.foxsports.com.au/football/index.php/foxsports/comments/wake_up_australia1/piece
Wake up, Australia
20 Comments | 0 Trackbacks | Permalink
By Jesse Fink
Wednesday, May 23, 2007 at 03:09pm
Half-Time Orange is a proud Balmain boy, and I will never forget the NSWRL grand finals of 1988 and 1989, the sight of Junior Pearce staring into his kneecaps as the final siren went in the latter one of the most poignant images I have seen anywhere, before or since. I am a New South Welshman, a league supporter, a Swans supporter, a cricket fan and a father to a beautiful daughter who I hope grows up to appreciate the pleasure of watching and playing sport.
I simply don’t have time for people who “don’t get” sport. If you don’t get sport, frankly, you don’t get what it means to live. (How’s that for big statements on a Wednesday afternoon?)
So it has always been a mystery to me why football, the world sport, an unparalleled pageant of heroes, villains, skills, beauty, politics, emotions and sins, has fought so hard for acceptance in this mighty country of sport lovers.
The 2006 FIFA World Cup changed everything, of course, as we all revelled in the achievement of the Socceroos on the biggest stage of them all. That was a year ago now, and the game has come on in leaps and bounds, with the odd setback, but we shouldn’t kid ourselves that football, “soccer”, has totally converted the masses.
Tonight, for instance, two showpiece events are taking place: the first State of Origin rugby league match for 2007 and Sydney FC vs Urawa Reds in Saitama, Japan, a do-or-die assignment for the Australian side in its inaugural Asian Champions League campaign.
But, bugger me, you wouldn’t know the latter was on given the saturation coverage given to the former.
Like I said before, I’ve got no bone to pick with league - Ellery Hanley and Garry Jack are two of my all-time sporting heroes. But for spectacle, entertainment and sheer significance, the Sydney-Urawa game totally eclipses the State of Origin opener. If you’re a fair dinkum Aussie sports fan, you’d be mad to miss it, but chances are, like 99 per cent of the country, you probably will.
Now, before a lot of you jump up in your seat and scream “But it’s not on free-to-air!”, think about the alternative to Fox – which, when all is said and done, is SBS. The Special Broadcasting Service is my favourite free-to-air channel, always has been, but there are a lot of people around Australia who still regard that fine broadcaster as an ethnic enclave or, to borrow a line from the great Johnny Warren, a home for “sheilas, wogs and ****ters”.
Whatever your views on the free-to-air vs pay-TV debate, one thing Orange can say without any caveat is Fox has been an outstanding broadcaster for football since securing its lucrative deal with the FFA some time ago.
No bias coming into play here; I’m a freelancer who works for News Digital Media, a completely separate division from the TV arm and no-one vets what I say or do. In fact, I’m just an average football supporter: a bloke just trying to make ends meet with a subscription I can scarcely afford but one I consider delivers me the best football coverage currently available.
IMO, Fox’s commitment to football has been second to none, especially the Asian Champions League, and we can all look forward to its comprehensive coverage of the forthcoming Asian Cup. I don’t necessarily agree with everything Simon Hill, Robbie Slater or Andy Harper say, but in that troika Fox’s producers have nabbed just about the best on-air football talent going around. They’ve also given opportunities to blokes like Michael Cockerill and Paul Trimboli, which is something SBS never did.
So I have no complaint paying Fox for what I regard as quality football coverage. Especially so when I believe the network, far more than SBS, has the long-term potential to reach sectors of the Australian market that have hitherto ignored football. It’s a big mountain to climb, but Fox is getting there.
No, this is an issue bigger than just TV programming.
During the week, in a piece by AAP’s Cameron Tomarchio, Sydney’s coach Branko Culina, speaking about public interest or lack thereof in the Asian Champions League, almost nailed it when he said: “I don’t think the Australian media had any idea what the World Cup was all about until Australia got there and, even then, the real interest still wasn’t generated until we beat Japan.
“Then you saw the Channel Nines and the Channel Sevens and everyone else send additional crews… but until we got there it was just, ‘Yeah, yeah, Australia’s competing, so what?’.
“We’re locked into rugby league and the AFL over here. We think we’re the best in the world, but not even 20 million people follow AFL or rugby league.
“I’m a big fan of rugby league and AFL, don’t get me wrong, but football - our football - is played in places like China with a population of 1.3 billion people, Indonesia with 245 million people and Japan with 130 million or something.
“These people within other codes - not all of them, but a few - they’re very insecure because they know that it is only football that is global…
“…Let’s face it, when Australia played at the World Cup and got all that publicity, what football was doing was promoting our country. It was a greater promotion than any tourism company or politician ever could have hoped to achieve.’’
Bravo, Branko. It’s an argument I make in my book and it’s refreshing to see more prominent football identities than yours truly taking up the cudgel.
The painful truth is Australians only really care about sport when we know we’re a very good chance of winning. That’s why we care about “World Cups” where only a handful of countries participate, like rugby, cricket, netball. The kind of World Cups where we’re a very good chance, even on a bad day, of taking home a trophy.
But in football, winning anything largely remains a pipedream. It’s been the lot of the Australian football fan to drown his or her sorrows in a beer at a lonely bar on Misery Street while the rest of the country explodes into feigned celebrations over sporting events that, in the big schemes of things, don’t really matter at all. Like State of Origin.
Football also remains a sport that confounds the vast majority of Australians.
Why?
Brought up watching homegrown sports where a try gets you four points and a goal gets you six, a lot of people just can’t tolerate the concept of a single point for a goal - and god forbid the scoreless game.
Put simply, the nuances and subtlety of football, part-ballet, part-chess, is simply too much to process for some. Of course, if those same people deigned to wake up tomorrow morning to watch the final of the UEFA Champions League on SBS, they might get blown away by the beauty of football at its finest. But the likelihood is more Australians will be watching Good Morning America on Nine than Kaka dance around Athens’ Olympic Stadium. And we are much the lesser for it.
Closer to home, in Japan tonight Sydney FC are turning out before their own audience of millions.
They’re not just playing for their club and the chance to make the final eight of the Asian Champions League, a massive achievement in itself, but, like Culina said, “promoting our country”.
The question is: What should that image be?
Do we want that massive Asian TV audience, probably the biggest ever for a contest featuring an Australian football side outside a World Cup, to believe we’re a sophisticated 21st-century nation that simply can’t get enough of Steve Corica (pictured above) and David Carney, skilled artisans in the world’s most important sport who can just about do anything with a ball at their feet?
Or is the reality palatable enough? That we’re a country living in the past that’d prefer watching Petero Civinoceva and Nathan Hindmarsh bash each other into submission for bragging rights in a provincial game that the rest of the world couldn’t give a toss about?
I’ve made my choice. Have you?
Wake up, Australia
20 Comments | 0 Trackbacks | Permalink 
By Jesse Fink
Wednesday, May 23, 2007 at 03:09pm
Half-Time Orange is a proud Balmain boy, and I will never forget the NSWRL grand finals of 1988 and 1989, the sight of Junior Pearce staring into his kneecaps as the final siren went in the latter one of the most poignant images I have seen anywhere, before or since. I am a New South Welshman, a league supporter, a Swans supporter, a cricket fan and a father to a beautiful daughter who I hope grows up to appreciate the pleasure of watching and playing sport.
I simply don’t have time for people who “don’t get” sport. If you don’t get sport, frankly, you don’t get what it means to live. (How’s that for big statements on a Wednesday afternoon?)
So it has always been a mystery to me why football, the world sport, an unparalleled pageant of heroes, villains, skills, beauty, politics, emotions and sins, has fought so hard for acceptance in this mighty country of sport lovers.
The 2006 FIFA World Cup changed everything, of course, as we all revelled in the achievement of the Socceroos on the biggest stage of them all. That was a year ago now, and the game has come on in leaps and bounds, with the odd setback, but we shouldn’t kid ourselves that football, “soccer”, has totally converted the masses.
Tonight, for instance, two showpiece events are taking place: the first State of Origin rugby league match for 2007 and Sydney FC vs Urawa Reds in Saitama, Japan, a do-or-die assignment for the Australian side in its inaugural Asian Champions League campaign.
But, bugger me, you wouldn’t know the latter was on given the saturation coverage given to the former.
Like I said before, I’ve got no bone to pick with league - Ellery Hanley and Garry Jack are two of my all-time sporting heroes. But for spectacle, entertainment and sheer significance, the Sydney-Urawa game totally eclipses the State of Origin opener. If you’re a fair dinkum Aussie sports fan, you’d be mad to miss it, but chances are, like 99 per cent of the country, you probably will.
Now, before a lot of you jump up in your seat and scream “But it’s not on free-to-air!”, think about the alternative to Fox – which, when all is said and done, is SBS. The Special Broadcasting Service is my favourite free-to-air channel, always has been, but there are a lot of people around Australia who still regard that fine broadcaster as an ethnic enclave or, to borrow a line from the great Johnny Warren, a home for “sheilas, wogs and ****ters”.
Whatever your views on the free-to-air vs pay-TV debate, one thing Orange can say without any caveat is Fox has been an outstanding broadcaster for football since securing its lucrative deal with the FFA some time ago.
No bias coming into play here; I’m a freelancer who works for News Digital Media, a completely separate division from the TV arm and no-one vets what I say or do. In fact, I’m just an average football supporter: a bloke just trying to make ends meet with a subscription I can scarcely afford but one I consider delivers me the best football coverage currently available.
IMO, Fox’s commitment to football has been second to none, especially the Asian Champions League, and we can all look forward to its comprehensive coverage of the forthcoming Asian Cup. I don’t necessarily agree with everything Simon Hill, Robbie Slater or Andy Harper say, but in that troika Fox’s producers have nabbed just about the best on-air football talent going around. They’ve also given opportunities to blokes like Michael Cockerill and Paul Trimboli, which is something SBS never did.
So I have no complaint paying Fox for what I regard as quality football coverage. Especially so when I believe the network, far more than SBS, has the long-term potential to reach sectors of the Australian market that have hitherto ignored football. It’s a big mountain to climb, but Fox is getting there.
No, this is an issue bigger than just TV programming.
During the week, in a piece by AAP’s Cameron Tomarchio, Sydney’s coach Branko Culina, speaking about public interest or lack thereof in the Asian Champions League, almost nailed it when he said: “I don’t think the Australian media had any idea what the World Cup was all about until Australia got there and, even then, the real interest still wasn’t generated until we beat Japan.
“Then you saw the Channel Nines and the Channel Sevens and everyone else send additional crews… but until we got there it was just, ‘Yeah, yeah, Australia’s competing, so what?’.
“We’re locked into rugby league and the AFL over here. We think we’re the best in the world, but not even 20 million people follow AFL or rugby league.
“I’m a big fan of rugby league and AFL, don’t get me wrong, but football - our football - is played in places like China with a population of 1.3 billion people, Indonesia with 245 million people and Japan with 130 million or something.
“These people within other codes - not all of them, but a few - they’re very insecure because they know that it is only football that is global…
“…Let’s face it, when Australia played at the World Cup and got all that publicity, what football was doing was promoting our country. It was a greater promotion than any tourism company or politician ever could have hoped to achieve.’’
Bravo, Branko. It’s an argument I make in my book and it’s refreshing to see more prominent football identities than yours truly taking up the cudgel.
The painful truth is Australians only really care about sport when we know we’re a very good chance of winning. That’s why we care about “World Cups” where only a handful of countries participate, like rugby, cricket, netball. The kind of World Cups where we’re a very good chance, even on a bad day, of taking home a trophy.
But in football, winning anything largely remains a pipedream. It’s been the lot of the Australian football fan to drown his or her sorrows in a beer at a lonely bar on Misery Street while the rest of the country explodes into feigned celebrations over sporting events that, in the big schemes of things, don’t really matter at all. Like State of Origin.
Football also remains a sport that confounds the vast majority of Australians.
Why?
Brought up watching homegrown sports where a try gets you four points and a goal gets you six, a lot of people just can’t tolerate the concept of a single point for a goal - and god forbid the scoreless game.
Put simply, the nuances and subtlety of football, part-ballet, part-chess, is simply too much to process for some. Of course, if those same people deigned to wake up tomorrow morning to watch the final of the UEFA Champions League on SBS, they might get blown away by the beauty of football at its finest. But the likelihood is more Australians will be watching Good Morning America on Nine than Kaka dance around Athens’ Olympic Stadium. And we are much the lesser for it.
Closer to home, in Japan tonight Sydney FC are turning out before their own audience of millions.
They’re not just playing for their club and the chance to make the final eight of the Asian Champions League, a massive achievement in itself, but, like Culina said, “promoting our country”.
The question is: What should that image be?
Do we want that massive Asian TV audience, probably the biggest ever for a contest featuring an Australian football side outside a World Cup, to believe we’re a sophisticated 21st-century nation that simply can’t get enough of Steve Corica (pictured above) and David Carney, skilled artisans in the world’s most important sport who can just about do anything with a ball at their feet?
Or is the reality palatable enough? That we’re a country living in the past that’d prefer watching Petero Civinoceva and Nathan Hindmarsh bash each other into submission for bragging rights in a provincial game that the rest of the world couldn’t give a toss about?
I’ve made my choice. Have you?
Hmm, Sydney v Urawa, wasn't that a great blockbuster, nil all ofcourse. Yep, the " world game ' has won me over. Two fantastic games in a week the FA cup and Sydney / Urawa, what more could you want.
But then I have always been a yokel, bogan, racist, red neck. All that has changed now.
But then I have always been a yokel, bogan, racist, red neck. All that has changed now.
Certainly was the greatest day in Australian club soccer history. Nil all and knocked out. How dare I watch a fluctuating and exciting game of rugby league. I am a disgrace
vinnie
Team Captain
Enough of sarcasm. What do you want?
DO you want soccer never to grow in this country?
Do you want Australia to never make the world cup again?
Do you want all the youngsters that play soccer to stop and play footy?
Couldn't care less
Couldn't care less
No, I think diving skills and faking injuries are an important skills to learn for children. Continue on, by all means, kids.
- Banned
- #342
In a word ,yes.
Are you scared of soccer? Surely all of the youngsters will gravitate towards the most exciting high scoring code so soccer shouldn't be a threat. Why would you be worried about a code that is boring?
vinnie
Team Captain
The essence of Culina's point (and that is what this thread is supposed to be about) was that not wishing Australian sporting success is unAustralian. I think this is a valid point, whether you follow soccer or not.
If you wish Australia to fail in the world game and never beat any international opposition, Culina considers that to be unAustralian.
Where's the controversy in this?
If you wish Australia to fail in the world game and never beat any international opposition, Culina considers that to be unAustralian.
Where's the controversy in this?
- Banned
- #345
Not at all. Looked at the new Asian league on foxtel. Couldn't believe it when I watched a game against some Indonesian team. They cut to their bench and there was a guy sitting next to the coach smoking! That's real class.
vinnie
Team Captain
No class. Was he snorting ice or just smoking a cigarette?
What's wrong with people preferring to watch State of Origin instead of Sydney FC in Japan?
- Banned
- #349
Not against it at all. (Just like synchronised swimming.) But I must admit the smoking shot was the highlight of the game. Wonder if the players had a drag on the ciggie as they walked past.
OK, I don't mind at all if soccer grows in this country, I would like the socceroos to make the next world cup, and good luck to the kids who play soccer, in fact good luck to kids who play any sport.
What pisses me off no end, is that many soccer fans want to shove their game down my throat, they tell me that it is the World game and that I'm a red neck ,yokel etc. etc. if I dont embrace it and drop my love of Aussie Rules. That their game will take over because more people in the rest of the world like it, that my game is not known world wide and therefore is ****all.
I usecd to play both five a side and 11 a side for years, also Gaelic and of course Aussie Rules. I enjoyed them all, they are great games. But please, enough of the bullshit about " the world game ' and that every other game in the world should doff their hats to the almighty soccer.
And while I'm raving on, it would also please me no end if soccer lovers would talk about soccer on their board and let Aussie rules fans talk about Aussie Rules on this board.
