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The custodians of sport are losing touch with reality

Expert
29th May, 2010
20
2785 Reads
Geelong Cats supporter

A Gelong fan flexes his muscles during the AFL Round 09 match between the Collingwood Magpies and the Geelong Cats at the MCG, Melbourne.

What do you do when fans aren’t turning up to sporting events and you’re left with the indignity of televising from empty stadiums? You create virtual spectators instead. Yes, in the race to satisfy the demands of television and fiscal goals, the custodians of our codes want to manufacture crowds rather than listening to them.

Over 40,000 may have turned up on a Monday night for Carlton versus St Kilda recently, but the AFL must still have concerns about the night’s ability to attract regular huge crowds if the crazy admission by Channel Nine’s executive director Jeff Browne is anything to go by.

Browne, whose network is keen to regain AFL television rights at the next round of negotiations, told The Age that as part of the network’s push to convince the AFL of Monday night footy they will use digital technology to superimpose a virtual crowd on to our screens to compensate for the possibility of empty stadiums.

So while there may only be 16,000 at AAMI Stadium (as there was yesterday for Richmond’s surprise victory over Port Power) or the like, television viewers at home could be treated to a packed stadium and, supposedly, the fake atmosphere to accompany it.

Upon reading the article I couldn’t help but check my calendar to make sure it wasn’t April Fools.

Could such a ludicrous proposition be genuine?

“People are being diabolically conservative about this,” Browne said.

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Is expecting reality – real reality not virtual reality – diabolically conservative nowadays?

What a fallacy that such actions and ideas could be deemed acceptable – cheating and misconstruing audiences to hide the truth.

It reminds me of the common practice of doctoring photos of models and celebrities in magazines to make them ‘perfect’ – and then we wonder why so many young people suffer body issues as they try and attain the impossible look propagated to them on newsstands.

What’s worrying is people in positions of power such as Browne not only believe such ideas are acceptable, but they seem confident enough to push them in the public domain believing people will support it.

According to Caroline Wilson’s article: “The AFL, which hopes to sell its next five-year broadcast package complete with nine weekly home-and-away games for $1 billion, said the virtual audience would solve the TV problem but not the prospect of relatively empty Monday night stadiums.”

So the AFL is okay with a virtual audience?

Perhaps the FFA could look into the technology for A-League games!

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But joking aside, the ridiculousness of the proposal highlights the gulf between such executives and the fans – not to mention reality.

With television executives increasingly influencing the direction of codes, is it healthy for them to be so submissive to the demands of television while ignoring the core reasons why fans are speaking with their feet on matters such as the popularity of footy on Monday nights in the first place?

Absolutely not.

Sports stand on the brink when they resort to such distortions to hide reality.

The reality is the future of punters actually going to sporting events is at risk, with the advent of high definition and 3D technology making it even easier for fans to stay in rather than face the traffic, costs, dodgy food and wintery conditions in half-empty stadiums – especially when atmosphere can be manufactured by digital technology in high definition on the couch.

And the increasing demand for live coverage of games is a reaction from fans who know live sport is the final ingredient in their viewing utopia.

But codes must not cave in to the lunacy of corporate suits and their bottom dollars and remember the soul of their sports can be found in the stands – the actual people sitting in the stands, not the digitised variation you may be seeing on Channel 9 on Monday nights in the near future.

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