JANUARY
On the opening day of the New Year’s Test in Sydney, the AFL announces a new rule to be trialed during the pre-season competition – each club will be required to hold a minimum of six media conferences a week.
Israel Folau will finish 548th in the Lorne Pier to Pub1.
Samantha Stosur will be the only local to make it past the first week of the Australian Open – although Mark Kratzman and Wally Masur will progress to the semi finals of the Men’s Legends tournament.
A prominent and well-renowned sporting commentator will be unable to recall which team won the KFC Big Bash final a week after it was contested.
In the lead-up to his IBF Middleweight World Title, Anthony Mundine will denigrate the memory of Dame Elisabeth Murdoch, comparing himself to Nelson Mandela in the process.
@warne888 will celebrate achieving one million twitter followers by tweeting “what shld I wear 2 Golden Globes with @ElizabethHurley”. He will soon block @craigunderscore after receiving the response “how about a tux you f***wit”. Shortly thereafter his follower count ticks back to 999,999.
FEBRUARY
Collingwood easily fills the new AFL media conference quota after retroactively suspending seven players who were late to training after the Summadayze Festival on New Year’s Day. Caroline Wilson will go into near apoplexy.
Bernard Tomic will celebrate his return to representative tennis with a stunning straight sets win against Chinese Taipei’s Lu Yen-Hsun in the first round of the Davis Cup (Asia/Oceania Zone Group I). The Australian media will unanimously declare that he has turned a corner. He will follow this in the reverse singles with a 6-3 6-2 6-0 loss to the #301 ranked Chen Ti.
Black Caviar will enjoy a successful return to racing, delighting Gerard Whateley who re-releases Black Caviar: The Horse of a Lifetime in paperback with a new afterword.
Australia’s rotation policy will suffer a setback when the ICC rules they cannot take 14 fast bowlers on the tour of India.
MARCH
@warne888 will send what he thinks is a private message to @Renee_Zellweger. The tweet briefly appears on the live feed, sending Twitter and @warne888’s relationship with @ElizabethHurley into meltdown. @ElizabethHurley leaves Brighton for India and a career as a Bollywood B-Grade actress. @warne888 announces himself available for Ashes selection and @Renee_Zelweger looks like she sucked on a lemon.
Desperate for funds, Channel Ten will screen the fully funded, four-part biopic Tom Waterhouse: A Life.
Brendan Goddard will pull a hamstring in the second quarter against the Adelaide Crows. A week later, after intense media speculation, Dean “The Weapon” Robinson will be sacked. Two weeks later the Australian cricket team will employ him.
A week after cutting a program that supported orphans with learning disabilities, the Victorian Government will announce the Melbourne Grand Prix lost $74 million dollars2.
After returning to air on NITV, The Marngrook Footy Show will become the standard bearer for the new network after it’s second episode beats The Footy Show in the ratings. The Footy Show responds by hiring Mel B (Scary Spice). It is a week before they are made aware she is not indigenous.
Clive Palmer will buy West Ham United F.C and commence work on installing a life-size version of the Hindenburg at the Green Street end of Boleyn Ground.
APRIL
Hawthorn will beat Geelong with a goal after the siren from Matthew Spangher.
The Footy Almanac website will be offline for a week due to “maintenance”.
A Canterbury Bulldogs player will be caught naked and confused in the car park of The Good Guys store in Bankstown. He has toy lawnmower, cooking twine, a rolled-up copy of the Sydney Morning Herald, a one-litre carton of Paul’s custard, and a copy of Blake Bailey’s biography Cheever: A Life. The incident will go largely unnoticed, other than Harvey Norman pulling their sponsorship from the NRL.
Collingwood will immediately be installed as ‘Premiership favourites’ after defeating Carlton by 28 points in front of 94,632 people at the MCG. At the press conference following the game, Mick Malthouse will quote Socrates3, Heraclitus4, Edgar Allan Poe5 and Buckaroo Banzai6.
Israel Folau will score the game-winner for the Waratahs after a spectacular mark and try against the Hurricanes in New Zealand. Kevin Sheedy will join the Foxtel coverage at half time in the Port Adelaide v Giants game7 to discuss Folau’s try, noting that Leon Cameron has things in hand.
Israel Folau shocks the Waratahs, saying he will miss the team’s upcoming tour of South Africa to compete in the Australian BMX Championships in Brisbane.
In April, Melbourne Heart will not sign David Beckham, but will sign Teddy Sheringham on his 47th birthday.
MAY
Israel Folau finishes 18th in the Australian BMX Championships in Brisbane, declaring it a mistake8.
Joel Selwood will launch the 2013 Ford Mondeo with a publicity stunt at Kardinia Park. However the stunt backfires when Selwood is seen leaving the car park in a Lexus SUV with the number plate CTTN ON.
The St George-Illawarra Dragons will up their bid for Craig Bellamy to $8 million.
JUNE
Leon Cameron will take the Greater Western Sydney to court for breach of contract after the Giants appoint Craig Bellamy as senior coach for season 2014.
Angus Monfries will take bronze in the Men’s 3-metre at the FINA World Championship diving trials in Brisbane.
During their Round 11 bye, Hawthorn’s Josh Gibson will guest edit the August edition of GQ Australia.
Chris Judd will receive an OA in the Queen’s Birthday Honours list for services to the environment. The AFL releases a statement saying they are looking at ways in which the honour can be included in the salary cap.
Bernard Tomic will upset Andy Murray to win the Queen’s Club Championships. The Australian media will unanimously declare that he has turned a corner.
Kurt Tippett’s long awaited return to the AFL will be over by the third quarter after he suffers a minor concussion and, therefore, becomes An Issue and, therefore, An Argument, as the AFL tries to dismiss the issue of concussions with the wave of a magic PR wand.
A prominent first-class cricketer will come out of the closet.
JULY
It will be revealed that the ‘gay’ cricketer is actually heterosexual and the whole announcement was a marketing stunt to get the media jump on the AFL’s Gay Pride Round. It will later be discovered that this reveal was also part of a broader marketing strategy to draw media attention away from the AFL during the football season.
Bernard Tomic will lose in the first round of Wimbledon in four sets to Spanish wildcard Sergio Gutierrez-Ferrol – 6-2 6-7 3-6 0-6.
On a rest day during the Ashes tour, Phil Hughes will shoot a 76 at Royal Blackheath. His golf handicap will remain higher than his batting average for the Ashes tour.
After Collingwood loses its fifth straight game, Dane Swan will hold a media conference that will go something like this:
DANE SWAN: Thank you all for coming. I’d just like to announce that I am retiring from football, effective immediately.
TONY JONES: What is the reason for your retirement from the game?
DANE SWAN: Can’t be (inaudible)
CAROLINE WILSON: Some say you have links to Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman and are leaving football to take up a position of influence with the Sinaloa drug cartel.
DANE SWAN: Caro, I’m going to run a mixed business in Westmeadows.
AUGUST
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@warne888, now dating Natalie Appleton from the 1990s UK girl band All Saints9, will make an unsuccessful return to test cricket with figures of 0-89 and 0-92 in Australia’s 118 run loss to England in the Third Test at Old Trafford.
Christie Malthouse’s Malthouse: A Football Life will make the Victorian Premier’s Literary Awards Shortlist.
Nathan Coulter-Nile will make his debut for Australia after Josh Hazlewood joined Peter Siddle, Mitchells Johnson and Starc, Jackson Bird and Ben Hilfenhaus in being sent home with a torn hamstring. A week later, after intense media speculation, Dean “The Weapon” Robinson will be sacked.
SEPTEMBER
Hawthorn’s Matt Spangher will create a stir by
a) being invited to the Brownlow Medal.
b) arriving on the blue carpet dressed like a gypsy, telling Rachel Finch his outfit is from the ‘sale’ rack at a second-hand folk costume store. A grateful nation will thank him after it momentarily leaves Hamish McLachlan speechless.
c) causing the biggest boilover in Brownlow history, edging out Trent Cochin to win the 2013 Brownlow Medal. He attributes his success to assistant coach Brett Ratten, and leaving the “corrosive culture” of the Sydney Swans.
The AFL Grand Final will enjoy one of it’s most popular pre-game entertainment line-ups after a last minute cancellation by Gotye sees OMC headlining. How bizarre.
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Carlton will win its 17th Premiership, beating Fremantle by 29 points. At the press conference after the game, Mick Malthouse will cough six times between quoting Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz10, G.W.F. Hegel11 and paraphrasing Winston Churchill12. At a closer listen the coughs will be deciphered in chronological order as: “f***”; “you”; “Eddie”; f***”; “you”; “Bucks”. After Eddie McGuire raises the issue every day the following week on his morning radio program, the AFL will announce an investigation13.
OCTOBER
The West Coast Eagles will be the first club to use DNA to successfully challenge a father-son selection.
Damien Oliver, sporting an unseasonable tan, will win the Caulfield Cup.
Israel Folau will announce that he will make the switch to soccer after an embarrassing performance at the Australian Dressage Championships in Sydney14.
NOVEMBER
The Sydney Sixers will sign the Madden brothers from Good Charlotte as part of a new sponsorship deal with KFC. Michael Slater will also been signed on the proviso he wears a Vodafone watermelon helmet. As a result, Foxtel will have their biggest ratings hit of the year, although not from a Big Bash game, but a telethon to raise funds to lure Shaun Tait out of an early retirement, to play for the Sydney Thunder in the opening game of the Big Bash.
Ricky Ponting will make the cut in the Australian Masters at Royal Melbourne, although a final day 79 sees him finish well down the leaders board.
Sydney F.C will sign Israel Folau.
DECEMBER
Mick Malthouse will be awarded Carlton Life Membership at their 149th Annual General Meeting – a number worth noting as it also represents the number of members on the revamped Carlton Board.
The handicap winner of the Sydney to Hobart will be disqualified after it is revealed four of its crew went to a state school.
Despite David Warner’s 21 off 5 balls in the second innings, Australia will lose the Boxing Day Test inside three days.
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FOOTNOTES
1. His heart wasn’t in it.
2. This is offset by a State Government report stating it had an economic impact of $1.4 billion. When asked what this figure is based on Louise Asher, the Minister for Tourism and Major Events, says they are unable to locate the napkin on which the figures were calculated.
3. The unexamined life is not worth living.
4. One cannot step twice in the same river.
5. Experience has shown, and a true philosophy will always show, that a vast, perhaps the larger portion of truth arises from the seemingly irrelevant.
6. Wherever you go, there you are.
7. The game’s crowd of 4,817 will set an AFL record for attendance… at the bottom end of the scale.
8. His heart wasn’t in it.
9. Given @warne888′s past discretions, the relationship was encouraged by the fact Natalie Appleton doesn’t have a twitter account.
10. We live in the best of all possible worlds.
11. The owl of Minerva spreads its wings only with the falling of the dusk.
12. History will be kind to me for I intend for my daughter to write it.
13. Malthouse will be cleared of any wrongdoing in March 2015.
14. While his heart wasn’t in it, his 100kg+ frame was cited as the main reason for his lack of success
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Litza’s twitter handle is @craigunderscore
Find more of Litza, and others, at www.footyalmanac.com.au
About Craig Little
My heroes are all dead white males, mostly because that seems really attainable for me.
Noice Mr Peoples Elbow and laugh out oud funny, reading it as i am at park in Flinders and probably accurate, especially Warnie predictions.
Cheers
This is brilliant Litza. “Mixed business in Westmeadows”. Gold
As the Almanackers are my witness I hereby declare that I will leave Australia if Carlton/Malthouse win the flag in 2013 and not come back until Malthouse retires. I couldn’t stand it.
Love the Folau thread: the move from BMX to dressage, then on to SFC.
Carlton for premiers?
Extremely presumptive
Litza – If half your predictions come true, I fear the Almanac website will be closed for most of 2013.
Matt Spangher – we taught him everything he knows. Which says a lot about both of us.
Israel Folau will play in the Lingerie Football League before Carlton wins a flag. Maybe 2014.
Looking forward to Tom Waterhouse:A LIfe. Hopefully followed by Jaimee Rogers in “Behind the smile”. Would be a great comeback by OMC given where the singer is. Love The Footy Almanac being offline for “maintenance” line!
Very funny
I’d like to assure all our readers that the Footy Almanac will not be offline for “maintenance” in 2013.
We can win this.
Okay, we can already draw a line through the OMC call. How’d I miss that?
“After returning to air on NITV, The Marngrook Footy Show will become the standard bearer for the new network after it’s second episode beats The Footy Show in the ratings. The Footy Show responds by hiring Mel B (Scary Spice). It is a week before they are made aware she is not indigenous.”
So funny and yet scary because it may well happen.
I am in awe of the talent that walks amongst us.
Like it Litza. Especially the 17th flag. We’re in for interesting times one way or t’other.
Happy New Year Knackers!
I love the quotes from Mick although I doubt that Carlton will win the flag next year. The exchange between Caro and Swannie is brilliant. Bernard Tomic winning the Queen’s Club Championship and then losing in the first round of Wimbledon sounds too likely to be actually funny. Thanks for a good laugh Litza and I hope tha you are still predicting Carlton’s 17th flag this time next year.
Brilliant.
I really don’t see to many of these predictions coming true. Rapidly those pertaining to Bernard Tomic. Tomic is a brilliantly tall poppy who is unfairly derided by the jealous, left-wing, pseudo intellectual, Australian community media clan. Write him off at your own peril.
Champagne stuff, Litza.
Can only take issue with Sam Stosur making it past the first week at the Aus Open. Making it past the water-cooler on the way to her first round encounter might prove insurmountable, given her current mental state.
And of course it didn’t escape me that the whole article was a Trojan horse for your Carlton Premiership/Malthouse Revenge prediction. 2013 aint gunna be dull, that’s for sure.
Has Doyle taken a pseudonym (see above)?
Litza is good, but Doyle is a genius.
A measure of the force and *truth* of these predictions is that I still can’t decide if I am gutted or strangely buoyed by Fremantle’s GF defeat.
Refer to March… you heard it here first!