Why the double standard for the Olympics and our local codes?

Roar Guru

28th July, 2016

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The tales of Stephen Dank and the Essendon drug scandal made for good reading. (Image: ABC)

The Crowd

Roar Guru

28th July, 2016

The Rio Olympics are getting a lot of negative coverage. From Russian drug cheating athletes to problems with Rio’s organising of the games.

Then again every summer Olympics the media declare the games are going to be a disaster. Athens 2004 was declared a debacle and that the games would fall apart due to Greece’s poor preparation, except the opposite happened. The games turned out quite well.

There definitely appears to have been a decline in the interest in the Olympics over time. I have been asking myself why have the Olympics declined in popularity?

Drug cheating is definitely a major negative for the Olympics. Corruption in the IOC? Definitely a possibility.

» Check out the complete Rio Olympics schedule
» Download your printable schedule for the Rio Olympics
» The full Australian team headed to the 2016 Olympic Games
» The Roar’s countdown to Rio with the greatest, wackiest and most infamous moments in Olympic history

But why do these issues result in the decline of popularity in the Olympics and not other sports? Its not just in Australia that the Olympics have declined in popularity, but Europe too.

We have 12 Essendon players banned from playing in the AFL 2016 due to drug cheating and the Cronulla Sharks also had their own PED problem.

I think we can say that the Bombers and Sharks’ performance enhancing drug scandals only skimmed the surface of PED cheating in the NRL and AFL. You’d have to be naive and gullible to not think that PED cheating isn’t rampart in European football and being covered up.

Only a couple of years ago Andrew Johns admitted to taking recreational drugs and easily avoiding the NRL’s pathetic and weak drug testing system. If it was so easy to avoid being caught using recreational drugs, why wouldn’t it be almost as easy to avoid being caught using performance enhancing drugs?

The FIFA World Cup in Australia remains as popular as ever and football remains as Europe’s sporting obsession. Whatever the multiple of flaws and failures of the IOC they look like angels compared to the massive corruption and arrogance of FIFA.

Can any decision by the IOC compare to FIFA’s awarding the 2022 World Cup to Qatar? None. Not even Juan Antonio Samaranch’s despotic reign as head of the IOC compares to Sepp Blatter and co’s antics.

The Parramatta Eels have had a salary cap scandal and an incompetent board. Eddie McGuire and Sam Newman are more toxic to the AFL than a stockpile of biological weapons. Every other week there is a sex or alcohol scandal in the NRL or AFL.

One of the most tedious and boring Euros was recently completed. Yet those sports do not suffer in a decline or interest in their respective countries.

So why do the Olympics suffer from scandals and negative media coverage while the AFL/NRL in Australia and football in Europe does not? The local media give even more coverage to NRL/AFL/football scandals than they do to Olympic scandals, yet fans do not seem to lose interest in their major football code.

So I can’t blame the media or suggest some sort of conspiracy since those sports’ flaws are known.

I wonder how many Bombers or Sharks fans are criticising Russian athletes for drug cheating and the IOC’s response, yet defend the AFL and NRL’s limp wrist action against their team?

Olympic athletes are seeing less and less in sponsorship due to the decline in interest. Elite athletes who compete against the world struggle to earn a living while sponsors throw money at the AFL and NRL.

The AFL has 18 teams from a player base of 12-15 million people. There are 15 Australian NRL teams from a similar player base. Aussie rules and rugby league are only popular in one half of the country.

From a population of 24 million people we have 33 NRL/AFL teams. The NFL has 32 teams from a population of 320 million.

I am not trying to say that the criticisms of the IOC and the Olympics are not largely valid but you only have to look through the here on theroar to see AFL/NRL savage the Olympics and compare that to the mindless defending they do of their preferred football code in those sections.

Why do sports fans walk away from the Olympics because of scandals yet blindly stick to their football code regardless of the scandals in that sport?

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