Ireland hold off Aussies in thriller

Redb said  | October 25th 2008 @ 12:30pm | Report comment

Cracker of a game after qtr time once the teams settled in. Set up for the MCG game. The game was the winner on the night.

Redb

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Norm said  | October 25th 2008 @ 1:26pm | Report comment

Is International Rules Football a better game than Australian Rules Football?
I liked the Aussie strip.

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oikee said  | October 26th 2008 @ 1:55pm | Report comment

Only watched the 1st quarter so far, 1st thing i noticed was that the game took nearly half a hour to start, bloody adds, you afl guys have a lot to answer to, then the game only went for 20 minutes,? a quarter. What the.? Now this damm goal thing, its the biggest blight on the game, ? take down those 2 silly side posts, ridiculous?

As for the game itself, dont think i have seen a better game. This is how you should be playing the game, with a round ball, the contest was brilliant, and i loved the way the guys could soccer the ball, and all the players knew where the ball was going so it left no cinfusion, you get rid of that senseless scramble. So 1 point for a over the bar goal, 3 points for a net goal and the game could be a real winner, why i say this is you would get more competition around the net. I loved it, twice as good as afl. Have 3 quarters of half hour to allow fatigue to set in. This game is a definite winner being a league follower i would watch this. And do.

Just one final thing i heard, those irish guys dont get paid much? this game really needs to kick on, you are really on a winner there. And the rectangle field is a good move, you can play the game anywhere.

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Pippinu said  | October 26th 2008 @ 7:27pm | Report comment

Interesting responses to what has remained a vexed question for decades.

The non-Victorians on this forum are probably unaware that Harry Beitzel took a VFL rep squad to Ireland in 1967, and challenged the then All-Ireland Champion, County Meath, to a game of Gaelic football - no comprises.

From The Australian Game of Football since 1858: At Croke Park, 23,000 “flabbergasted onlookers”, as on Irish journalist put it, saw the Galahs defeat Meath…” (the Victorians had called themselves the Galahs, after a derisory comment made from a footballing journalist before they departed)

Over the next two decades there was spasmodic interaction between the two footballing bodies, with more and more compromises sneaking into the game to allow the the two countries to play each other.

Our modern sensibilities are now far more alert to such compromises, but in pre-Federation Victoria, whenever an English rugyby team toured Victoria, what did they do? They played each other’s game with modified rules!

There are many compromises that I don’t like personally (I too would prefer to stick to the strict Gaelic scroing system), but this is what we can say with certainty:

1. The current set of modified rules (that go back to around 1988 or so) have created a very entertaining game - easily the fastest form of football of any kind that currently exists.
2. The fact that the victories are split about 50/50 suggests that the two footballing bodies have got it about right.
3. From day one, decent crowds have gone to see these contests - in both countries - so it is quite incorrect to conclude that there is no public interest in it. 35,000 in terrible weather conditions at Subi is pretty good, and the MCG will draw over 50,000 for it - I think those numbers are good enough. When I find out the TV ratings during the week, I’ll let you know what that is.

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Michael C said  | October 26th 2008 @ 9:04pm | Report comment

Dave -

yep, crowd down……..I gather the weather had a similar impact to probably a bigger crowd reduction that was seen at Suncorp for the Socceroos when they only drew mid 30,000’s too.

The ratings - - I hope you’re only doing a city by city comparison to the movie where in the IR was actually shown at a reasonable time, as, it certainly wasn’t uniform across the country. (surely I needn’t ask such a basic question??)

btw - given that most of the AFL media don’t give a hoot about it, these matches seem to go on inspite of a lot of people - - - within the AFL community.

etat -

I reckon these games are a nice throw back to the mid/late 1800s, when for example an English ‘football’ team might tour Australia, and in Victoria and South Australia for example they’d play double header matches against local sides, first by the English rules and then by the local Victorian rules……..then they’d head up to NSW and play whatever up there.

That’s really the spirit of sport, don’t worry too much about the differences,…..just make it work to have a game and enjoy it. That’s the spirit of football in my mind…….well………Australian Football…………the set of rules that allowed everyone to play and such that they have stuck with the evolutionary product of those first rules.

However, that spirit of compromise isn’t so strong in soccer and rugby - - given that they split to start with, and then the rugby folk split again…………………………splitters!!!!

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Michael C said  | October 27th 2008 @ 8:29am | Report comment

oikee -

for us AFL types, it just lacks a bit of extra ‘dimension’. How much of that ‘added dimension’ might exist should we play that or something more like it all the time - - - dunno!!

But - - part of those games that hope to allow for a broad variety of body types are - invariably the ’stoppages’ - - - i.e. Rugby codes with scrums etc bring to the fore the big bodied forwards etc, in AFL, the ’scrambly’ bits that can result in ’stoppages’, bring to the fore the tall ruckmen and in and under midfielders…………..the IR game tends to be more like Rugby 7s is to Rugby,……..it’s removed the body type variety.

That said, though, the Irish had that 6′6″ fellow who did really quite well - - the guy who is a star in the GAA now having got there via a TV reality show. (an interesting story there!)

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Zach said  | October 27th 2008 @ 10:22am | Report comment

Crowd was bigger than for the Rugby League World Cup opening match. The game was much better too.

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Michael C said  | October 27th 2008 @ 10:55am | Report comment

btw - these matches were ideally going at $25 entry - but the AFL have wisely allowed 2008 AFL club members to access $12.50 tickets.

That might be a sign of the economic times.

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Redb said  | October 27th 2008 @ 12:01pm | Report comment

Millster,

Stadiums are expensive beasts to construct, as they are funded by debt its no surprise the new Perth stadium is on the back burner.

Its the same with WC bid and some of the calls for 40,000 seat rectangular stadiums - they can quickly become white elephants if not used.

Even the mighty MCG with all the premium AFL games and cricket has used long term contracts to ensure enough matches are played at the stadium to pay off debt related to construction costs.

Look at ANZ Stadium in Sydney - city of 4 million, yet the stadium fell into the banker’s hands only 6-7 years after it was built.

re perth - probably a wise move in these uncertain times - Australia is is still 3 to 6 months away from feeling the results of the GFC.

Redb

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Redb said  | October 27th 2008 @ 12:31pm | Report comment

MC,

Once you stagger out of the MCC dining room (watch those stairs) look for me in aisle M15 row BB - in the section marked ‘Plebs’.

Redb

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oikee said  | October 28th 2008 @ 9:02am | Report comment

This might be a bit out there M.C , and you have heard me mention boutique sports before, if the afl got this game right and promoted it i really think that soccer would be dead in the water in this country. But having said that maybe also AFL would be dead also. It might even put pressure on the other 2 codes. I am looking forward to the next match now, good game and combines all the skills. The fans over in perth seemed to like it better than their afl games.? Any thoughts.

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oikee said  | October 28th 2008 @ 9:29am | Report comment

If AFL is better to watch then why did i enjoy this game so much. The 1st improvement was you could soccer the ball as well. I loved that part of the game, no need to scramble around just give it a kick and off you go. The game is a winner if they marketed it right.

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Michael C said  | October 28th 2008 @ 10:45am | Report comment

Redb - I’ll give him something to work on over lunch!!!!

Oikee -

Australian Football is ALL about risky actions. Simply, the bounce of the ball is a variable (it is able to be ‘read’, and ‘controlled’, but………it’s not quite as straight forward as a soccer ball, although, a soccer ball, like a cricket ball for example, may have heavily imparted spin and may make a fool of you should you not deduce such before the bounce).

Part of the ‘challenge’ of Australian football is that - unlike in the IR game - delivering the ball on the half volley is not nearly as ’safe’ an option.

The nature of our game is that it punishes skill errors.

So - - to insert a regular speroid ball (soccer ball) into the game, actually removes so much that it changes the game from chess to checkers. Not nearly as challenging.

Notice as well - - the game became more soccer like, as in, less 1 on 1 ‘match ups’. The greatest aspect of Aust footy invariably is that each player is ‘responsible’ for an opponent - - and depending upon the level of ‘defensive’ focus that each player will take will dictate how much of their time is spent effectively shoulder to shoulder with a direct opponent.

The IR game tends to move even further from that. It was like full court zonal basketball - personally, I love full court press basketball - - where each possession is fought for. On a larger arena as is used for Aust Footy, part of the reality is that you need to strike a balance and defend to the death possessions in dangerous areas, and avoid getting sucked into the wide open spaces.

The rectangle pitch means corners rather than pockets. That’s significant because you start getting this greater soccer style approach to goal. In AFL, with the curved boundary, it ensures that a shot can be taken from anywhere (not necessarily an ‘easy’ shot, but a shot nonetheless)………where as with IR you effectively get ‘black spots’ and suddenly having free kicks taken back at the 25 or whatever……I’m not a huge fan of that.

The penalty kick and goalie…………I don’t like, but, at least there’s no ‘designated penalty shooter’……….that to mean demeans sports (i.e. designated conversion taker in Rugby and penalty shooter in soccer - - surely, if you earn it, you take it - - - anything else implies a ‘lack of skill’ across the board).

I also don’t like that a goal is ’scored’ and not necessarily kicked………but……fair enough, I’m used to a game where we ‘kick’ goals, into our goal. And, in effect, IR is a game with a goal keeper and you ‘defend’ your goal. For us Aust Footy folk…….that’s a paradigm shift.

—— btw - that ’scramble’ around in normal AFL is symbolic that even just getting an effective kick is a major task at times…….let alone that some soccer folk suggest scoring a goal is easy, because, reality is, in the main, it’s hard enough just to get a kick (in an important area - - let’s not go down the meaningless stats that sometimes get accumulated by teams trying to wind down the clock or play ‘tempo footy’).

———————

there’s a couple of interesting IR rules though:
A. not allowed to pick up the ball when you are on the ground/on your knees (the AFL has never had this rule, but, have a pseudo version of it, by giving the person on the ground who takes possession zero leniancy……..i.e. it’s deemed that that play had the option to ‘knock the ball on’, rather than take possession, and so by ‘dragging it in’, they gain no leniancy. That’s this rule by stealth).
B. last team touching out of bounds concedes a free - (the AFL has tightened up the out deliberate rule so much, that at times it plays this way - - - which is entirely ridiculous for a curved oval, as many straight kick trajectories WILL intersect a boundary at some point)

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Michael C said  | October 28th 2008 @ 11:25am | Report comment

oikee -

yeah, but AFL is chess on steroids (so to speak - entirely figuratively!!).

The main thing is that the AFL primary supporter base is pretty solid and so the capacity for this ‘child’ game to overtake the ‘parent’ in Australia would be limited in the short term at very least.

Not so in Ireland, as, the ‘conversion’ would be lesser on their behalf.

However - as at other times - the potential in a neutral market might be reasonable - which is why it does the AFL a disservice to overly promote these games, such as incorporating a US representation.

btw - early days, Aust junior sides touring Sth Africa played the odd game of IR as well ( a few years back), but, now the progress of 100% AFL is such that that’s no longer required.

It is however, a potential ‘conversion’ tool in new markets. But - then again - you risk just confusing everyone too!!

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oikee said  | October 28th 2008 @ 11:57am | Report comment

No worries, just a mention now i have seen a game.

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Michael C said  | October 28th 2008 @ 12:20pm | Report comment

oikee -

ironically, check out the story on AFL.com.au

http://afl.com.au/News/NEWSARTICLE/tabid/208/Default.aspx?newsId=69327

‘Predictable’ bounce gave us grief: Pendlebury

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Lazza said  | October 28th 2008 @ 2:46pm | Report comment

Redb and others,

Can you explain to me how this series works. I noticed how you all mocked when Adelaide Utd won it’s tie but lost the second leg? Aggregate scores are common in Football but obviously you guys don’t understand it.

So if we beat the Irish by say 6pts who wins the series? If we had won the first game by 12pts but lost the second by 3 who wins?

Is it just a draw with one game each?

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Michael C said  | October 28th 2008 @ 3:05pm | Report comment

Lazza -

I’ve only ever mocked that the HAL has first round of their finals series as a two legged ‘match’, and then reverts…….for the key finals……..to sudden death.

The inconsistency of that befuddles me greatly.

A two legged event - - I’m fine with……..although, the question of the value of the home leg in the 2nd ‘leg’ is around that if a penalty shoot out and extra time occur, it’ll occur on the home turf………but……..in extra time……is the visitor still benefitting with ‘away’ goal value……….I guess I’m just not so sure about that double value on goals……it just inspires ultra defensive displays to NOT concede a ‘2pt’ goal……………….but, at least illustrates that NOT ALL soccer goals are only worth 1 point!!!

For the International Rules - the winner is the highest on points aggregate at the end of the ’series’, so, in 2 ‘tests’, you can’t win without winning at least 50% of matches……..

…….of course, a 5 setter in tennis can be entirely different, you may win 7-6, 0-6, 0-6, 7-6, 8-6 and on points aggregate you would lose 22 to 30, but on sets aggregate you win 3-2.

If the IR were played over 3 tests…….well…….points aggregate, just like tennis, would go out the door. I’d presume!!

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Michael C said  | October 28th 2008 @ 3:58pm | Report comment

Lazza -

I didn’t say away goals counted double or any different in IR.

I still don’t see why they should in soccer.

Does the Davis Cup give a ‘handicap’ to the ‘visiting’ team?

…………..hmmm………it is effectively a handicap……….where’s that Midfielder fellow and his detestation for ‘handicaps’ and anything but absolute de-regulation.

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Michael C said  | October 29th 2008 @ 5:12am | Report comment

Jimbo -

you know that’s a technicality, correct though, they aren’t counted as 2 pts on the scoreboard, but, everyone knows that if you concede an away goal that you need one extra - - so, true, if we’re talking more than one being scored, effectively, you’ve gotta have X + 1.

Actually, the whole logic that you speak of……..is exactly what would happen if there were a deadlock breaking rule around countback on corners (or ’short corners’)……..simply, a rule contrivance to encourage attack.

Sheesh…………is Midfielder reading this????

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Michael C said  | October 29th 2008 @ 8:23am | Report comment

Redb -

away goals,………..seems contrived to me. Bending rules to try to achieve a ‘more entertaining’ outcome.

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Millster said  | October 29th 2008 @ 8:42am | Report comment

To Redb - on the balance it also makes sense that they are worth more because simply it is harder to score away. This rule counters the instincty of away teams to do what would statistically make sense, and that is to play for the clean-sheet draw.

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Michael C said  | October 29th 2008 @ 9:36am | Report comment

Millster -

good business sense - certainly - - but it makes a mockery of those soccer folk who pick on the AFL and finals in general and 8 from 16 in the finals as purely a money making venture………………because…………after all, no money - - no sport.

the home & away 2 legged match up depends I guess on whether there IS a deserved advantage or not. In the AFL of course, you earn your home final. It’s the NRL that persisted for so long with ‘neutral’ venues….in Sydney…..forcing Storm and Broncos to travel even if they’d finished higher.

I agree with Redb - - we always hear the discussion around a ‘home leg’ is to ensure you don’t concede an away goal.

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Michael C said  | October 29th 2008 @ 12:24pm | Report comment

Millster -
in many respects, the US baseball and basketball finals series are perfect, best of 7 or whatever, split accross home and away. Surely there can be no doubt at the completion.

Obviously that’s not possible for all sports.

I still just don’t get the HAL switching from 2 legged to sudden death for the 2 biggest games, the prelim final and GF.

How would a two legged GF go in Australia? Would it ‘lose’ the public, or engage the public?

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