Take a quick glance at the sporting headlines this past year and you could have been forgiven for thinking it was 2002. On January 7, Shane Warne was bowling in front of adoring crowds at the MCG, and two days later Thierry Henry scored for Arsenal against Leeds.
Dustin Fletcher has finished another tremendous pre-season, while South Sydney is not living up to expectations. To be fair both those events could have easily happened in 1992, 2002, 2012 or even 2022.
Lleyton Hewitt made it to the round of 16 at the Australian Open.
But of course, the biggest event in Australia’s Retro Summer of Sport is next month, when Ian Thorpe pulls on his togs for the Olympic selection trials in Adelaide.
Even if Stephanie Rice posts an offensive tweet while launching a new line of bathers during a world-record swim, Thorpe will dominate the sports bulletins.
Why do both the Australian media and public act like Rolling Stones fans, clamouring for the greatest hits while ignoring the new releases?
Are the modern day feats of Dave Warner, Bernard Tomic and James Magnussen not enough for us? Magnussen is one of the favourites for London but his build up to the selection trials has been as low key as a gnome’s front door.
I believe the answer lies in nostalgia for a time when the country was a global sporting colossus. Beginning with Pat Rafter’s American Open win in 1997, Australia was fortunate enough to experience a golden age of sport that lasted until we lost the Ashes in 2005.
In that period Australia won four tennis grand slam tournaments, two Davis Cups, 16 cricket Tests in a row, two cricket World Cups, a rugby union World Cup, and produced our two most successful Olympic Games teams in terms of gold medals won.
At one point during the 2002 Winter Olympics we were even above Austria on the medal table. Australia could have challenged St Michael and the heavenly host and been confident of at least a draw.
When measured against that orgy of achievement, beating China 5-0 in a Davis Cup tie in Geelong is as satisfying as a kiss from your sister.
However, we should not let this fixation on nostalgia blind us to our current champions. As well as the potential of Magnussen, we have the successes of both Cadel Evans and the Socceroos to be proud of.
Who among Australia’s long suffering football community wouldn’t have traded one of our Sydney 2000 golds for an extra goal against Iran? And now Cahill and co. stand on the brink of a third World Cup in a row.
Yet if Warne or Adam Gilchrist were to even mention thinking about the possibility of considering the idea of playing in the Twenty20 World Cup, sports editors around the country would be shouting “Hold the back page!”
Australia’s sporting heritage is something to be proud of. But if we continually look backwards, we may not see the champions of today until their time has passed.
Scotty
Guest
Thats a really good comment mate. I think the over exposure of the public to sporting contests at the highest level has made them blase for the most part. As a rugby fan for about 35 years I remember in my teens that an international involving the Wallabies was about the most important event in the sporting calendar. The annual Bledisloe Cup games were often heartbreaking but they really did mean a lot, and when the Wallabies won the Grand Slam in 1984 it was front page news. But now we have the Trinations now 4 Nations, and the RWC has completely subverted and taken control of the game.....there is far too much test rugby being played IMHO to make all of the games special. In fact I can see a time when teams play "freindlies" - which would be terrible!!!
Gucci
Guest
I do agree with you, but I think if we're "blaming" that for the demise of other sports, we'd be a bit harsh on ourselves. Every other country is the same: there is very little coverage on things they are not traditionally good at. I am no expert in sport administration, but I can imagine it's a chicken and egg issue. What elements do you need for a successful sport? Star players, lots of money, public interest, media interest, preferably some international element. Which one of those do you need first to create the others? That's the million dollar question! I always loved watching Commonwealth Games watching Sarah Fitzgerald kick butt in squash, and having commentators tell me that she's been kicking butt for the last 500 years. Despite us having a long-standing world champion in squash, there was hardly any Australian public interest in her or the sport. Back to your point. Clearly it's difficult to create interest in a sport from scratch. I think that's why where you have a popular sport AND a superstar, it sticks out immensely. For soccer, lots of people like it, heaps of people like playing it and also watching European leagues. To bring it to the A-league though, it's more than just shipping messi ronaldo and rooney over to our shores even if we can!! And if it's hard for a world sport like soccer, imagine how hard it would be for more "niche" sports.
JVGO
Guest
Seriously, trying to talk up soccer over other sports using this argument is ridiculous. All the biggest names in soccer, Kewell, Emerton, (who the A League marketing campaign was centred around), Cahill and Scwarzer, are pretty much has beens. All the other sports are promoting themselves with young stars, james O'Conner, Foran and Cherry Evans, Patrick Mills, Dave Warner and James Pattinson, Sally Pearson. I couldn't name a young Australian soccer star. i wouldn't point the finger at other sports.
traread
Guest
It only relates slightly to this article but I wrote a report at University a few years ago about this topic and one of the contributing arguments was that the more sport there is on TV now and how easily sport news and results is available on the internet, has changed the Australian sporting psyche and how we view our 'heroes' for the casual Australian sports fan and the non-fulltime fanatics. If you look back in the 1980's and 1990's, there wasn't as much sport on TV as there is now. Sport was more of a must watch event... Be it the 2 Rugby League or AFL games shown on the weekend, an Australian cricket Test or ODI, a weekly NBL game or a Tennis Grand Slam. We wern't spoilt for the choice that we have now from the selection of sport shown on the FTA's, Fox Sports 1 Fox Sports 2, Fox Sports 3, Fox Footy, ESPN, ESPN2 and Eurosport. There is barely a moment when there isn't a LIVE sporting event shown. Australians used to look up at sports stars as idols a lot more than they do now, purely because they wern't inundated with sport as they are now. Now sports stars aren't commonly viewed as idols as they were 10-20 years ago but more as what they really are, really talented human beings. With Australians being spoilt for the choice of all this sport on television, athletes, teams and sports themselves have lost a bit of their importance to the general public. A big match, whilst still much hyped and look forward to by most, have now lost the euphoric feeling that it used to have. The fact that Australian's are so interested in past greats such as Thorpe, Gilchrist and Warne could be seen as Australians subconsciously trying to hold onto the "good old days" when watching these guys perform at their best was viewed more of an 'event' because back when they were at their peak, we didn't see "every ball, every race, every moment of their lives" LIVE on Fox Sports. Add to the fact we can now follow every thought of our elite athletes on social media such as twitter humanises them even more, further adding to this. Also, we can now keep up to date with any sporting event in the world in our pockets on our smartphones. No longer do we eagerly await in anticipation to watch the replay, see the news bulletin or wait till the morning to read the paper but are in fact up to date with everything happening in the world of sport instantaneously. This isn't only true in Australia but most of the sporting world.
Ben Anderson
Roar Rookie
Good point. I remember both the Australian and World Swimming Championships being on free-to-air TV, the latter in prime time when it was held in Fukuoka. Do you think another reason is that our golden period was based on stereotypically "Australian" sports like tennis, cricket and swimming and the media still sees soccer and cycling as "niche" sports?
Gucci
Guest
For me there's another reason. There used to be more sports shown on free tv. For example I think it wasn't even 10 years ago when they still showed some Masters Series tennis matches on ABC. The lack of coverage doesn't help. Sure there's plenty you can get from the internet, but it's just not the same without being pounded by ads telling you of events coming up.