Raging Against The Machine- The Season Opener and all that is wrong in the AFL world

I was talking to a bloke tonight who said we need to start pointing out how the AFL have been chipping away at us for the last few years, taking this away, changing this or that rule, fixturing issues, more than our share of players and staff being hived off to the extension clubs, tribunal problems etc, etc. open letters to the media, calling talkback and that sort of thing. There's probably something to what he is saying. A squeaky hinge gets the oil.

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Originally Posted by Twodogs

I was talking to a bloke tonight who said we need to start pointing out how the AFL have been chipping away at us for the last few years, taking this away, changing this or that rule, fixturing issues, more than our share of players and staff being hived off to the extension clubs, tribunal problems etc, etc. open letters to the media, calling talkback and that sort of thing. There's probably something to what he is saying. A squeaky hinge gets the oil.

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Absolutely we should. That’s where I was going with the tape of edits for Boyd. You hear other coaches bitch and moan and say things like “we will be seeking clarification...” and it bloody works. We need to start stomping our feet and stop allowing ourselves to get walked over.

42k to Good Friday last year, only 34k this year

A mate of mine reminded me about this the other day. I am still staggered that we didn’t challenge this and counter claim that McGovern is a diver.

Ps Did karma take him out of this weekends game or did he fake an 8 week injury to avoid Wood’s revenge wrath on his ‘just out of the packet’ play dough ribs?

https://m.youtube.com/watch?feature=...&v=nCowAwGd0cQ

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Originally Posted by The Adelaide Connection

A mate of mine reminded me about this the other day. I am still staggered that we didn’t challenge this and counter claim that McGovern is a diver.

Ps Did karma take him out of this weekends game or did he fake an 8 week injury to avoid Wood’s revenge wrath on his ‘just out of the packet’ play dough ribs?

https://m.youtube.com/watch?feature=...&v=nCowAwGd0cQ

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Weak as piss McGovern is an accurate description. And while I can understand McGovern milking it to get a free, surely the contact was nowhere near severe enough for a medical assessment of "bruised ribs" a couple of hours later. What was the motivation for that? It's not like the umpire was going to burst into the medical rooms and award McGovern another free kick if they beefed up how hurt he was. Maybe to get their next week's opponent focusing on a bogus injury? That's the only one I can think of that's not just to be plain nasty to us.

Or are doctors routinely making crap up these days?

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Originally Posted by Twodogs

Weak as piss McGovern is an accurate description. And while I can understand McGovern milking it to get a free, surely the contact was nowhere near severe enough for a medical assessment of "bruised ribs" a couple of hours later. What was the motivation for that? It's not like the umpire was going to burst into the medical rooms and award McGovern another free kick if they beefed up how hurt he was. Maybe to get their next week's opponent focusing on a bogus injury? That's the only one I can think of that's not just to be plain nasty to us.

Or are doctors routinely making crap up these days?

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Retribution for us calling out their sooking over the umpiring the year before, and the Telliya incidents I think you'll find.

Vindictive bunch of twats that they are.

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Originally Posted by jeemak

Retribution for us calling out their sooking over the umpiring the year before, and the Telliya incidents I think you'll find.

Vindictive bunch of twats that they are.

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You're right. It could have been that. We have to get them back now.

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Originally Posted by Twodogs

Weak as piss McGovern is an accurate description. And while I can understand McGovern milking it to get a free, surely the contact was nowhere near severe enough for a medical assessment of "bruised ribs" a couple of hours later. What was the motivation for that? It's not like the umpire was going to burst into the medical rooms and award McGovern another free kick if they beefed up how hurt he was. Maybe to get their next week's opponent focusing on a bogus injury? That's the only one I can think of that's not just to be plain nasty to us.

Or are doctors routinely making crap up these days?

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GWS did similar with a claim of injury to Phil "autumn leaves" Davis from the Redpath incident last year.

Medical reports are given string weight, but their is clearly no integrity in them.

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Originally Posted by Bulldog Joe

GWS did similar with a claim of injury to Phil "autumn leaves" Davis from the Redpath incident last year.

Medical reports are given string weight, but their is clearly no integrity in them.

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Surely doctors reports have some sort of oath or something that they follow? A hypocrites' oath by the sound of things.

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Originally Posted by Twodogs

Surely doctors reports have some sort of oath or something that they follow? A hypocrites' oath by the sound of things.

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The only oath doctors have is to do no harm to their patient. Nothing about telling the truth to everybody else, sadly.

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Originally Posted by westdog54

The only oath doctors have is to do no harm to their patient. Nothing about telling the truth to everybody else, sadly.

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I never trusted them as a group. Far too slippery. Stalin had some intersesting ideas on the medical profession. He must have been thinking of the Crows medical staff when he thought of them.

Not sure if it was mentioned somewhere here or elsewhere, but they were talking about the one sided free kick counts at non-bipartisan stadiums (especially West Coast games in Perth).

They quoted the free kick count as something like 96 to WC and 30 odd to the oppostion this year alone. Both Richardson and Scott were not exactly playing a straight bat, both admitting they knew of the issue (especially against West Coast) and that it had been happening for years. It was also mentioned that the Crows were 14-4 up at one stage and, watching that game, a number of dubious calls kept the Crows in it when the whips were really cracking.

No one suggested it was sinister, more the human element of when the entire crowd yell for something that you are more likely to pay it as opposed to when there is silence.

Robbo was particularly annoyed about it and, as much as I don't rate him at all, it will probably mean a back page article is on its way. This is something that is long overdue. Lets hope something comes out of it.

There's an article about it in the HS today, doesn't say who wrote it though. It's a clear issue but quite at the level they were suggesting.

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the Eagles have topped the counts against Geelong (26-19), Gold Coast (28-19), Port Adelaide (30-13), Richmond (21-10) and St Kilda (25-12).

That is a total advantage of 57 free kicks.

Richardson last year highlighted the noise of the crowd as having a major influence on the umpires.

He said things hadn’t changed at the new stadium.

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Everything Chris Scott says in the media is in some way self-serving, so while acknowledging the problem I take his comments with a grain of salt.