The 2015 Kel Carruthers Cup

Greetings Tipsters

 

That bloody AFL, do they know how to stretch out column inches or what! Just when they were wondering how to fill the gap between the overlong trade period and the overplayed draft, along comes Jake Carlisle.

 

He must be stratospherically dumb to allow that vid, or it was really good cocaine and he was King Of The World and it didn’t matter. I don’t care what players do on their time off, as long as they’re ready to go when it counts. They’re young men of fame and wealth, as young Andrew Boston said when he quit the Suns, “AFL football is a lifestyle, not a job. At the elite level you’ve got to live football 24/7.” They’re gonna blow off steam when they have the chance.

 

Doing cocaine in a hotel room doesn’t risk others like driving drunk does. But it’s okay if Luke Hodge does it.

 

It’s an odd year when a hat-trick of flags and a patricided coach aren’t the big stories. Everyone got something out of the Adam Goodes saga except Adam. The booers got to boo, the anti-booers got to boo back

 

I’ve no idea why the booing took off. It started with that ill-humoured, graceless lot, Hawthorn fans, and it just kept going. I don’t recall any interviews with booers, so the unknowing irony of the “Anyone that boos Adam Goodes is a bigot” had me choking on my ale, initially with laughter, later with frustration. Maybe Jake is typically football dumb, eh?

 

The best matches I saw all year were NEAFL games. Thirty tackles is a big effort in this league, and that’s why the football is beautifully pure. NITV telecast the NT Thunder games (yes, they too have a Motlop) and the Marn Grook Footy Show so win the Good For Football (Teev) gong.

 

The teev reception here is intermittent, strange when I live atop a hill, so I haven’t seen as much NFL as I’d like, but, whatever you do, don’t get Tom Brady angry. He’s steaming toward all manner of records, yet the Patriots are just one of three teams at eight and zip, an NFL first.

 

Detroit Lions is my team and the best that can be said about last weekend is that we had a bye. We’re one and six. But we have great colours.

 

In a year when the Matildas went on strike rather than play two matches in the US when they were on a roll, Michelle Payne was the first woman to ride a Melbourne Cup winner. You wouldn’t believe it if it was a movie, as the saying goes, so I’ll email my award-winning Hollywood screenwriter mate and run it past him. The youngest of ten, mum died when she was six months old, her Downes brother is her strapper, the owners wanted her off the ride but the trainer stuck by her, 100-1 and she’s #1. Onya Michelle!

 

Who couldn’t love her vernacular? “Get stuffed” is a great phrase, sharp and punchy, alluding to crudity without being crude and perfectly placed. ‘Sportsperson’ is an horrible, clumsy word, so Michelle is ‘Sports Hero’ of 2015.

 

And so to the Gabba, where many were worried that an inexperienced batting lineup would be found out.

 

Home ground advantage counts for a lot, but New Zealand have a good cricket team. Burns and Khawaja played great, the bowling attack didn’t have to rely on Johnson, we might be onto something here. Australian Test cricketers in their 20s, even the captain, who’da guessed? We need more of it. Now the IPL are throwing millions around, we can move ‘em on before they get embarassing and spark up the Test arena.

 

Kel Carruthers won every motorcycle championship in Australia then went to Europe. In 1969 he won the 250cc Isle Of Man TT and World Championship. His last win was the 250 Ulster Grand Prix. He ran Kenny Roberts’ Yamaha team that won three straight World Championships in the 70s..

 

I wonder what he thought of the last few rounds of the Moto GP. The Australian GP at Phillip Island was an alltime classic, four riders swapping paint for the entire race, Iannone’s iron balls pass at MG, Marquez’ jaw-droppingly awesome last lap to win the race. Then the Malaysian GP, out-front aggro, Marquez and Rossi playing Rollerball – it was great to watch while it lasted – an overwrought flap about sportsmanship, Rossi banished to the back of the grid for the deciding race where Lorenzo secured the championship.

 

Maybe Rossi should get out now. He had a lot of luck this year, Pedrosa missed races while having surgery, Marquez crashed a lot, Lorenzo was off the pace early in the season. Quit while you’re ahead.

 

As I write, my cousin’s compositions are being broadcast on ABC FM. Onya Mary! But have you ever written a 90 second pop song?

 

Moving house can really throw you. I wrote columns I didn’t think worth posting, now I’ve got the Ol’ Groaner in the back room with a wifi doovilacky and the sunset through the window, I feel like I can sit down and write again. Somerset Maugham would be disgusted.

 

Cheers, Tipsters

 

P&C, a Stop Privatisation Of Footy Production, a division of Trans-Dementia Inc.

Brought to you with the assistance of ABC FM, so crank your speakers for this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cxzWdxdk5QA

 

 

 

 

About Earl O'Neill

Freelance gardener, I've thousands of books, thousands of records, one fast motorcycle and one gorgeous smart funny sexy woman. Life's pretty darn neat.

Comments

  1. Mark 'Swish' Schwerdt says

    Welcome back Earl. Where’s Vanessa?

  2. Earl O'Neill says

    Vanessa’s in Switzerland, Mark. She gave a lecture on Universal Randomness at MIT and the LHC asked her over to run some maths when they contact a parallel dimension.

  3. We need to meet Vanessa. Universal Randomness sounds brilliant. Is that the basis of your own relationship?

  4. Good to have you back Kel. “Recreational” drug use is walking a tightrope. As we have seen with some sporspeople. When you sign on as a professional sportsman, a large part of the ridiculously inflated salary is “cultural role model”. If you want to be an off season jerk off, play in the parklands for fun,

  5. Earl O'Neill says

    John, Vanessa was the Stop Privation Of Footy Productions work experience kid this year, cf Rounds 5, 7, 9, 13. Universal Randomness is the basis of my life, tho Vanessa did drop a hint that her mathematics were inspired by the Milne Bounce in the ’09 GF.
    Peter, I don’;t expect anything of footballers but football. They’re no more role models than Pete Doherty, the new Libertines album is wonderful. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CKgRqBb__WA

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