Crikey Sports

Our balls and all sports blog

UFC Australia vs. The Moral Minority: Let’s get it on, c’mon!*

October 20, 2009 – 4:50 pm, by Ruth Brown

Next year, one of the biggest sporting organisations in the US is coming to Australia, and it’s going to make a lot of people very angry.

It’s the UFC, or Ultimate Fighting Championships — the world’s largest Mixed Martial Arts (MMA) promotion — where the best fighters in the world battle it out for squillions of dollars, and millions around the world pay to watch on PPV.

MMA is already a favourite target of Australia’s mainstream media, who trot out a lazy WON’T SOMEBODY THINK OF THE CHILDREN!?! article every few months on a slow news day.

Combat sports have always made easy fodder for the pundits (the old “Boxing harms your brain!” dead horse still gets pulled out for a flogging at least once a year, and it’s been an Olympic sport for over 100 years), so a multi-million-dollar outfit like the UFC hitting our shores was always going to attract more than its fair share of fist waving and moral indignation.

But I didn’t expect it to start so early. Yet here it is in last weekend’s SMH: Cage rage coming here! ZOMG, lock up your children: cage rage is coming!

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Family ties: the curse of sports fans

October 19, 2009 – 8:23 am, by Neil Walker

A few weeks ago, I did something far worse to my four-year-old son than hitting him with a wooden spoon. I took him to his first football match.

Striking him with a kitchen implement probably wouldn’t cause as much long term mental trauma as introducing him to a world where people agonise about ‘their’ sports team’s results despite having absolutely no input or control over the outcome. In my defence – like most fathers – I did it with the best of intentions.

It was an A-League match between Melbourne Victory and Wellington Phoenix. But it could have been any game, featuring any teams, in any sport, anywhere in the world. Taking your kids to their first sporting event is a modern rite of passage. The likes of the Cherokee Indians had it easy. Legend has it that their sons were taken into the forest by their fathers; blindfolded, and left alone for a whole night under strict instruction not to call out for help, thereby proving the sons were now men. A night of deerskin loin cloth wetting terror often seems preferable to the lifetime of angst and disappointment that can result from emotionally investing in a sports team’s fortunes season after season.

It all seemed so nice when we arrived at the stadium. This would be a memory to treasure. A special, shared father-son occasion to recall fondly in years to come. My son was excited to be there, marvelling at the crowd and its shared reaction to the on field action. He leapt out of his seat and cheered, copying his newly found fellow supporters when Melbourne scored an early goal. It was as good as it got. Wellington quickly equalised and, after the initial excitement, a turgid non-event of a match eventuated. Mini-me wondered why Melbourne Victory hadn’t scored another goal. Honesty is the best policy. I advised him it was because they were playing rubbish. If he’d lost interest in proceedings at this point, I can’t say I’d have blamed him. However, he keenly watched and hoped ‘our’ team could win. It finished 1-1. Not a disastrous result for a first game. Things can only get better and worse for him from hereon in.

He now frequently chants “Melbourne Victory” unprompted at home and I feel guilty that he’s sad when I have to tell him they lost (that honesty again). What have I done? Why have I passed on this curse? The curse of caring about something as ridiculous and ultimately meaningless as sports results. But then I smile, remembering his declaration towards the end of his first football match as he mimicked my earlier astute tactical analysis of proceedings. “They’re playing rubbish!” he shouted. Those nearby laughed and agreed. In an increasingly isolationist and fractured society, sport is one of the few remaining communal experiences left.

We’re all in this together.

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News to quit NRL? Is this good for the game?

October 8, 2009 – 12:06 pm, by Leigh Josey

According to the SMH’s Roy Masters this morning, News Ltd is considering exiting its part ownership of the game.

News’ interest in League has been a source of much debate over the years. Its Super League ventures had tragic consequences (I still have my Western Red jersey — sob) but the support (via News’ media empire) is of course a massive boon to the game.

C’mon NRL fans (I’m asking you John Ryan :) ) — what are your thoughts? Would the NRL thrive without the influence of News Ltd?

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Do sports journos actually watch sport?

October 7, 2009 – 8:50 am, by Leigh Josey

This post was triggered by an email to Crikey last night from reader Graham Hand. Graham wrote:

I attended the Sydney FC v Central Coast Mariners game on Monday afternoon, and it was a splendid, entertaining game. The Herald report this morning confirms Sydney’s 1-0 win was “a performance full of style and class”, which was obviously written by someone who attended the game and knew what they were watching.

But on Monday night, the Channel Seven News reported on the game using the heading “Dour Win”, no doubt based solely on the 1-0 score and taking a feed from another station. Poor quality journalism playing out that hackneyed belief that any game with a low score must be dour. In fact, low scores are often part of the thrill of the game.

Graham has a point. A good point.

It happens quite often with every sport — and every fan  can remember calling bullshit on a story they’ve seen, heard or read, when it must have seemed that they were at a different game that said journalist.

For instance, I’ve lost count of the amount of times I’ve read/heard journos talking about Fremantle games without clearly haven’t seen them. Like the good old days when every Aboriginal player playing for Freo was Scott Chisholm.

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The Saints who didn’t quite reach heaven

October 2, 2009 – 4:40 pm, by Amber Jamieson

You only have to look at a copy of the Herald Sun during AFL grand final week to know that some people are crazy footy fans.

This week, it’s NRL fans’ turn to change from normal, professional people with an illogical and undying devotion to a football club, who could end up all smiles and cheers and celebratory beers – or crying over a football team.

Last week, the team that hadn’t won the final for 43 years lost to the team that’d won the cup just two years ago. The next day in the newspapers, a few snaps of devastated Saints supporters made it in amongst the shininess of Gary Ablett’s head and Geelong holding up its Premiership Cup. And, that was it. A few words of “we’ll be back!” from Nick Reiwoldt and supporters are left to their personal heartbreak.

But it’s not over when the media loses interest. So what is it like for fans who get so close then fall so far? Nearly one week on, we thought we’d ask two Saints fans to put their continuing grief into words.

Beth: I was hooked on St Kilda from birth. I was brought home from the hospital wearing little black, white and red booties. I started going to the football in a sling on my fathers chest, just a few months old. It was always Dads rule that if we wanted to barrack for another team thats fine, just find somewhere else to live. Despite years of heartache and pain Dad was hell bent on us having the same experience. I am eternally thankful for this.

St Kilda is our family tradition, our church, our religion.

At the Grand Final my feet were numb, the rain was cold but sprits were high. I never had a second thought that we weren’t going to win.

Then, black. Empty. Pain.

After Dad found me crying outside the MCG he held my hand to the station, on the train. He was strong but I was broken. I lay in bed for hours crying. My head hurt but nothing like the pain in my chest. I took strong pain relief that night for a dreamless sleep.

I felt like we had had a death in the family. As I felt like it was a death then I needed to go to the wake. The St Kilda family day was at the Telstra dome, the scene of many fantastic wins this year, but this time I walked in crying. The crowd was sombre, we all hurt. As the boys walked out we held our scarfs up to show them we still believed and we were still with them. They cried, we cried.

Now almost a week later I still tear up. But the pain has lifted a bit. I look toward to 2010. The thing about St Kilda supporters is despite the many many loses we always believe in the next game, the next year. Our time is coming.

Saints fan Rafiq was in the UK for the game: The Saints have made the Grand Final two times in my life, and they have been the only two years I have spent the whole season out of the country. Blessing or curse? Given we have lost both times, I think it would be worse to be at home, but I still wish I was.

We watched the Grand Final in an Aussie pub in London with a thousand or so other Australians. Two hours sleep didn’t help the stress. I think everyone was having a great time except the Saints and Cats supporters. I hated every moment of it.

I started crying when Chappy kicked that goal, but I stayed until the siren went. I knew we were going to lose, but I wanted to see the Saints players after the game. I knew they would be devastated but I wanted to see it on their faces. Shared grief or something? I couldn’t handle watching the Cats celebrate though, so after a few seconds I went out into the London morning and sat by myself in the gutter for a while. Most of the other Saints supporters at the pub were doing something similar, but unlike during the game none said anything to each other. One guy I knew from back home just walked off and never came back.

I think Saints supporters are kind of used to failure, if anything it is how successful we have been this year that made the loss so hard to handle. I have been joking about how I preferred it when we won all those wooden spoons a few years back because I was less stressed. Its only half a joke. I don’t know how supporters of more successful clubs do it. Collingwood are close all the time and never win, it would be agony. Being so emotionally involved with something you have absolutely zero control of is a hard position to put yourself in. I don’t know why we do it to ourselves.

If I think about the game I reckon I’ll always feel like I’m like sitting in that gutter alone outside the pub in London at 8.30 on Saturday morning.

I’m going to need a strong preseason to prepare myself to go through it all again next year.

Get ready Melbourne Storm and Parramatta Eels fans. While one team is destined for happiness, the other is destined for sobbing uncontrollably in public places.

• Disclosure. I am a Saints supporter. And yes, I cried.

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A Crikey Sports NRL Grand Final Preview

October 1, 2009 – 12:42 pm, by Leigh Josey

Crikey Sports is delighted to have a guest post by Brendon Meynell, editor and publisher of Sports Force.

Seven months, 26 rounds of Rugby League, and come Sunday evening it all comes down to to eighty minutes of football in front of a Sold Out ANZ Stadium crowd at the Homebush Olympic District in Sydney to see who will be crowned the 2009 National Rugby League Premiers.

The Parramatta Eels, who were written off by round 12 of the 26 round competition when they were just three points off the bottom the table, have been the in-form team of the competition in the later part of the season and have become the first team under the controversial McIntyre Finals System to reach the Grand Final.

After beating the minor premiers, the St George Illawarra Dragons, 25-12 in the opening week of the 2009 Finals Series images of the New Zealand Warriors feat in 2008 came to the minds of Rugby League fans. The Parramatta Eels went on to beat the third placed finishing Gold Coast Titans 27-2, and the second placed finishing Bulldogs 22-12 to book their position in the deciding match of the season.

With star full-back and Dally M Medal winner Jarryd Hayne leading the way looking somewhat untouchable throughout the backend of the season, most will say he has single-handedly seen the Parramatta Eels secure their position in the 2009 Grand Final, however coach Daniel Anderson is quick to point out that Hayne was supported the whole time by the team, whether it was a pass to put him in the open, or backing him up after making a break.

Nathan Hindmarsh has made a remarkable 1055 tackles for the 2009 Telstra Premiership season, and has been on the front foot for the Eels throughout the entire season, by his side inspirational skipper Nathan Cayless leading by example making sure their somewhat younger forward pack do their job and continue to push forward and make the metres required for the backs to play their game.

Jarryd Hayne has been the benchmark of the team there is no denying it, however without the likes of youngster Daniel Mortimer – playing his first season in first grade – and Luke Burt, Krisnan Inu and the remainder of the backline Hayne may not have found himself in the positions he has been in when earning the player of the year award for his form.

Despite Hayne shown as the Hero week in week out anyone who watches the matches either live at the ground or at home on the television screens will see that while teams are busy shutting down Hayne it helps the Parramatta Eels create an over-lap somewhere on the pitch and the likes of those mentioned above are good at exploiting that over-lap which can trouble their opposition.

For the Melbourne Storm, Grand Finals week is nothing new for the squad as they enter their fourth straight decider – three times they have entered the match as Minor Premiers however this year they have had to work harder to earn their position but were helped in week one of the Finals series with both the Dragons and Gold Coast Titans losing meaning the Melbourne based club enjoyed a week off come week two of the finals.

Their Grand Final qualifier match against the Brisbane Broncos looked one sided, and was enough for bookies to set the Storm as favorites to take out the 2009 crown, with their 40-10 victory – at Ethihad Stadium last weekend.

However no matter what spin anyone tries to put on it the Melbourne Storm do not have the best record when it comes to Grand Final Deciders, especially in recent times, winning one of their last three appearances in the games showpiece event, and two out of five appearances in the clubs history.

Although one may look at statistics for this season, which clearly favors the Melbourne based side, when it comes down to Grand Finals most open minded rugby league fans will tell you to print them all out look at them and then rip them up into little strips of paper as when it comes the last game of football for the season they mean nothing.

Both clubs have nothing to lose, there is no second chance, and both will be celebrating mad monday just hours after the full time siren is sounded. Both coaches have been here before and know what to expect and how to prepare for the biggest game on the calendar.

The big matchups will see Billy Slater try to hold onto his number one Kangaroo’s jumper face off against the Dally M Player of the Year Jarryd Hayne, both fullbacks are in brilliant form and are dangerous around the ruck, and in open space.

The pair can devestate their opposition from kick-returns, and can both create something from nothing if the defence does not shut them down quickley.

The halves will also play an important part in the decider with Brett Finch, a former Parramatta Eels player, facing off against Daniel Mortimer his former under-study at the Western Sydney based club. Both players have the result of the match resting on their shoulders if they bring their “A” game they can half the defence baffled and the attack eating out of the palm of their hands.

Teams:
Parramatta Eels: 1 Jarryd Hayne, 2 Luke Burt, 3 Krisnan Inu, 4 Joel Reddy, 5 Eric Grothe, 6 Daniel Mortimer, 7 Jeff Robson, 8 Nathan Cayless [c], 9 Matthew Keating, 10 Fuifui Moimoi, 11 Nathan Hindmarsh, 12 Ben Smith, 13 Todd Lowrie. Subs: 14 Kevin Kingston, 15 Feleti Mateo, 17 Tim Mannah, 19 Joe Galuvao. Coach: Daniel Anderson.

Melbourne Storm: 1. Billy Slater, 2 Steve Turner, 3 Will Chambers, 4 Greg Inglis, 5 Dane Nielsen, 6 Brett Finch, 7 Cooper Cronk, 8 Aiden Tolman, 9 Cam Smith [c], 10 Brett White, 11 Adam Blair, 12 Ryan Hoffman, 13 Dallas Johnson. Subs: 14 Ryan Hinchcliffe, 15 Jeff Lima, 16 Ryan Tandy, 17 Scott Anderson, 18 Wairangi Koopu (one to be omitted). Coach: Craig Bellamy.

The Wests Tigers will take on the Storm in the NYC Grand Final after defeating St George Illawarra in the preliminary final whereas one of their feeder teams Balmain Tigers will do battle against the Bulldogs second grade side Bankstown City in the NSW Cup Grand Final.

Balmain defeated the luckless North Sydney 21-20 in Golden Point extra time whilst Bankstown City knocked off Parramatta’s feeder side Wentworthville 40-14.

All matches will be played at ANZ Stadium on Sunday 4th October with live coverage beginning on the Nine network from 12:00pm in NSW and ACT and 11:00am in QLD.

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Hitler’s reaction to the AFL grand final

September 29, 2009 – 11:15 pm, by Scott Shepherd

As Leigh said, Downfall parodies are the gift that keeps on giving.

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1966 is a long time for this Saints supporter

September 24, 2009 – 8:36 am, by Leigh Josey

Crikey Sports today has a guest post by Crikey reader and long time Saints fanatic Kevin Rennie. This first appeared on Kevin’s blog, Labor View from Bayside.

Ever since St.Kilda was certain of a finals berth this year, I’ve had to reassure my extended family: we only have to win our last game of the year to be Premiers.

But it’s been a character building experience since attending the Saints’ 1961 first semi-final loss against Footscray. One glittering prize from five starts: 1913, 1965, 1966, 1971, 1997. Believe me, I was at the last four. St.Kilda’s score of 60 points was the same as Friday night’s but the Dogs managed 69. Ruckman Alan Morrow, titan of 1966, limped from start to finish.

In 1965 St.Kilda was clearly the stand-out of the competition. Graham Kennedy jumped the infamous Bay 13 fence before the game and planted the red, white and black flag in the centre. These days he’d face a $6000 fine. Perhaps it was an omen that Nick Riewoldt was one of the footballers who acted as pallbearers at the King’s funeral in 2005. What kind of omen will be clearer by 5pm Saturday.

Essendon buried our hopes in’65 before half-time and twelve months seemed too long to wait for an impatient 18 year old. Not long after, we had to register for National Service. That conscription lottery was one that none of us wanted to win. My ball didn’t come up so the only lines I had to stand in were the overnight queues at the G for finals tickets.

Thirty years later we camped at Rod Laver arena for tickets to the ill-fated ’97 loss to the Adelaide Crows. When Elsternwick brothel The Daily Planet was decorated in St.Kilda colours, it was another omen, every saint a superman. However, we had so many injuries in the preceding month that I couldn’t name our first ruck that day even if you offered me a free seat to this year’s judgment day as prize.

On form the ’65 team would have beaten the ’66 mob in a canter. The desperation factor that made Darrel Baldock’s men legends kicked hard again in the latest victory over Footscray.

At the last public training session on Tuesday, we stood opposite the now-bulldozed terraces of the outer where we spent many heart-wrenching hours during our dark ages. We always stayed to the end, no mean feat given the Moorabbin weather.

Saints fans have had to be stoic. We’ve snatched the proverbial cliché from the jaws of victory too often. But like another recent long shot, “Yes We CAN!”

It’s been along time carrying the flag.

P.S. Still desperately looking for a Grand Final ticket.

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Dilshan: better than your imagination

September 24, 2009 – 1:09 am, by Jarrod Kimber

You know when you have that dream that you are the most Awesomest thing alive.

Either you are a rockstar with men throwing their boxer shorts on stage, a boxer with old white Jewish writers saying you are better than Ali or some politician that fixes the world and also fights off evil aliens.

Everyone has the dream where they are that cool.

Well channel that, are you there yet, are you awesome in your imagination.

Good.

Now think of Dilshan’s batting of late.

Be honest, is your imaginary character as cool as he is.

No, ofcourse not.

How could it be?

Dilshan is some sort of Steve McQueen/Angela Davis/Bruce Lee/Ned Kelly hybrid at the moment.

Cooler than Ice, Harder than Nails, tastier than a quick burger.

He is like some sort of souped-up super-pimp crime-fighting freedom-fighting bastard straight from hell.

And now he has a beard, how can your imagination beat this?

The dilscoop starfish thing.

The wearing a hat while batting.

The open chest surrounded by bling.

And everything else that he brings to the game of cricket.

All he needs is a Rolls Royce made of Gold, an ivory walking stick and cricket would have to crown him the grand poobah of batting.

What happened?

Not that long ago he was a middle order struggler who never really did enough and had a pretty ordinary record.

Now he is the dog’s bollocks, the cat’s pyjamas, the moose’s caboose.

On one level I want to know how this struggling dude made it to the top of the mountain.

But on the other hand, fuck it.

Let us just enjoy this gift of awesomeness that has surely been delivered by our God of Sehwagology.

Amen, Dilshan, Amen.

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There will be blood: Wednesday’s twist

September 23, 2009 – 8:54 am, by Matt Gagger
The SFS - similar to 'any suburban park'

The SFS - similar to 'any suburban park'

If yesterday was round 1 to the ARU (via Grumbles Growden) then today is Demo and the players’ turn to strike back. However, I’m not sure they’ve helped their cause much at all, potentially the reverse.

At the bottom of this post is the RUPA’s official reply to Grumbles’ expose yesterday. It’s goal appears to be to cast the ‘money-grubbing’ spotlight back onto the ARU, saying that the players only wanted paying if the match was to be a commercial venture. On the face of it that would sound ‘fair enough’ to many.

However, there are some important details in the RUPA statement. Read More »

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