THE OPTIMIST’S GUIDE TO SEASON 2012. PART TEN. By Alex Wadelton WHY GWS WILL WIN THE PREMIERSHIP The Greater Western Sydney coaching staff are the most experienced in the league. Kevin Sheedy has four flags as coach, Mark Williams has one. That equals five. So, they are also the team with the coaches who have [Read more]
History starts somewhere
March 19, 2012 by 21 Comments
We’re about to hit the footy season and for a writer that means lots of footy writing. When I’m at my desk, immediately to my left on the bookshelves sit a number of reference books. These include the two volumes of The Shorter Oxford Dictionary (surely one of the great publications), Roget’s, various books of [Read more]
Practice? Are we talking about practice?
March 19, 2012 by 3 Comments
It’s been an extremely slow news week, we don’t give a stuff about the NAB Cup grand final or the Herald Sun are putting all their important stories behind the pay wall. The back page of today’s (Thursday) Herald Sun features a story announcing that Jack Watts isn’t playing in the VFL this week and [Read more]
Almanac Rugby League – A Parramatta Nightmare
March 19, 2012 by Leave a Comment
Match ReportNorth Queensland Cowboys v Parramatta Eels Saturday, 17th March, 7.30pm Right from the kickoff you should know that I am an Eels’ supporter who is still wallowing in the wonder years of the 1980s. In fact, if I could choose my Groundhog Year it would unquestionably be 1986 when the ‘decade-dominating’ Eels won both [Read more]
Keeping Up Appearances
March 19, 2012 by 4 Comments
Scene 1: A group of Club Recruiters are meeting with an AFL Manager to discuss emerging issues and trends in the game. Recruiter 1: It’s always been as much an art as a science this recruiting business. You look at what’s available in the local comps. Look at your clubs place on the ladder. No [Read more]
A Good Time To Reflect
March 19, 2012 by 25 Comments
Football is a pretty reliable mirror. The many ways we express our passion for the game reveal us. The industry that has grown around the game also tells us much by the way it chooses to operate. All manner of issues regarding indigenous footballers have arisen lately. In the case of Liam Jurrah, the [Read more]
crio’s Q(uandary)?
March 19, 2012 by 1 Comment
The first game of the season is next Saturday. That’s crept under my guard. I still thought the Tiges and the Blues had cornered the right to the first bounce. So far I have watched neither practice matches nor any of the babble on FoxFooty or elsewhere. Usually I reckon the year starts when they [Read more]
Giant Break
March 18, 2012 by 4 Comments
It’s been my lucky week. I work as a casual relief teacher in NSW and the ACT and I’ve endured my fair share of visiting speakers and sports clinics. This week I happened to be in a school that the GWS Giants were coming to and I had a grade that was attending their talk. [Read more]
Traralgon and District Art Society and wondering about the future.
March 18, 2012 by 2 Comments
On the Friday of the last pre-season game of St.Kilda and Collingwood, I found myself journeying again with my Art Society. We had Heather, a Collingwood supporter and our organisational inspiration, a retired lawyer, life model and Rotary organiser extraordinaire, Lilian, our Glen Eira Artists Society President, designer, painter and life drawing organiser, our Treasurer [Read more]
Media critique, the Grand Prix, and other bathroom renovations
March 17, 2012 by 11 Comments
It’s been a fortnight that has seen as much political manoeuvring in sport than anything seen on the hill in recent times. The annual squabble of the F1 has taken the usual argumentative pathways. Residents of Albert Park aggrieved at having to walk the Labradoodles at another location, up against Ron Walker who believes the [Read more]
Almanac Rugby League – Chosen Ones
March 17, 2012 by 2 Comments
Jack Straw is a recluse but not completely. The house he bought on Jubilee Avenue in the early fifties sits dilapidated but now he rarely leaves the comfort of it. He walks down to his beloved oval, Jubilee Oval five or six times a year to watch the “mighties” go round, as he calls them. [Read more]
Gambling Review
March 16, 2012 by 10 Comments
The Footy Show is a WYSIWYG affair. It’s jocular and jovial, often irreverent, and sometimes controversial. It also has segments and moments, however, where it takes on a serious air. I don’t watch it religiously anymore, but decided to tune in last night to see what I thought would be one of those serious moments: [Read more]
Premier Cricket: Quarter Final Preview
March 16, 2012 by 6 Comments
It’s quarter finals time in Premier Cricket for season 2011/12. Matches will be played over both days of the upcoming weekend (Saturday 17 & Sunday 18 March). Here’s my preview (please disregard selections). Carlton (1st) 71pts v Dandenong (8th) 43pts @ Princes Park #1 Carlton Last 5 starts: C’ton LWLWW D’nong WLWLL Last time [Read more]
Uni Blacks Breakfast
March 16, 2012 by 1 Comment
Pool Sunset
March 16, 2012 by 3 Comments
Words and picture by Martin Reeves “As he emerged from the water, the swimmer’s lane-rage of moments ago dissipated as he glimpsed the setting sun over Fitzroy”.
Force For Good
March 16, 2012 by 9 Comments
This is a transcript of a seminar called Force For Good held at the National Museum of Australia. It involved Sean Gorman, Che Cockatoo-Collins, and David Headon. I moderated it. It is conversational and hence may lack a little structure (in its form and in its thinking) but it addresses the elements of the topic. [Read more]
The Inside Lane
March 16, 2012 by 6 Comments
“Get the inside lane.” That’s all he could think of. “Make sure you get the inside lane.” The cut grass between his toes was damp; spring on a Montmorency morning. The sun shone crisply through the eucalypts’ leaves. He was standing at the centre of his universe.
WHY BLOODY HAWTHORN WILL WIN THE PREMIERSHIP
March 16, 2012 by 18 Comments
THE OPTIMISTS’ GUIDE TO SEASON 2012. PART NINE. By Alex Wadelton WHY BLOODY HAWTHORN WILL WIN THE PREMIERSHIP This off-season all we’ve heard is that Hawthorn are this year’s favourites for the flag. They were a few Chance Bateman shanks and Cyril Rioli hesitations from last year’s Grand Final, where they would have beaten Geelong [Read more]
Football Forensics launch new sporting chapter
March 16, 2012 by Leave a Comment
by Robert Allen A new football group on the Queensland scene is keen to recruit new members with an interest in the history of Australian Rules Football. The Queensland Australian Football Forensics will be officially launched at the Pineapple Hotel on 30 March. The Forensics’ story began several years ago after a chance meeting [Read more]
Creeping wowserism: the AFL is making a rod for its own back
On Saturday 10 March 2012 the Stansbury Cricket Club won their ninth consecutive Lower Yorke Peninsula Cricket Association A grade premiership. The next day the team celebrated at a local hotel, in an area that was not open to the general public. They were joined by a teammate who had been unable to play in [Read more]