There has been plenty of good news from the A-League of late, from sell-out crowds to free-to-air TV deals and the re-signing of some key marquee players. But it seems like the surge in popularity is treading on a few toes, particularly down south.
It’s been eight years since Simon Hill wrote his seminal ‘Smell The Fear’ articles on the persistent slurs football attracts from the mainstream media.
Yet it seems the more things change, the more they stay the same.
Lately the reporting from Melbourne tabloid The Herald Sun – Australia’s highest circulating newspaper and one well known for its extensive coverage of the AFL – has been more vociferous than ever in its coverage of football’s perceived flaws.
In particular, instances of seats being damaged at Etihad Stadium and flares being ripped at AAMI Park have attracted swift reportage from the tabloid.
But it’s a couple of strongly-worded editorials which deserve further scrutiny, despite the preference of some football fans to simply ignore them.
The first is Rita Panahi’s piece from the start of the month on ‘ugly soccer’ spoiling the image of the sport.
It’s behind a paywall now, but for those who missed it the highlights include her labelling football fans as flare lighters, insisting that the sport is called “soccer in this country,” citing unnamed others to suggest that “violence is an entrenched part of the global game,” claiming that football crowds are segregated “for their own protection” and perhaps most pointedly, writing that “(w)hen someone causes trouble during an AFL game, the majority tend to turn on them.”
Panahi is an unknown name to most football fans but a quick Google search suggests that riling up the masses is her usual stock in trade.
Her follow-up piece on interacting with football fans on Twitter was entitled “Soccer trolls’ abuse proves how right I was” – though reports from many football fans claimed she simply blocked anyone who asked her a question about the A-League.
More than two weeks after the Melbourne derby, the Sunday Herald Sun published a piece from Baz Blakeney called “Virtue in a nation’s footy code,” which climaxed with the suggestion that if you’re not proud of Aussie Rules you should “rack off” and “take your round football with you.”
Blakeney is an artist whose latest exhibition is called “The Defining Image: 150 Years of Football” (he’s referring to Aussie Rules) and he freely admits his love of a game which he implies is Australia’s national code.
Both Panahi and Blakeney’s pieces share a couple of things in common.
They’re both from Melbourne, they both extol the virtues of Aussie Rules, they both misconstrue the segregation of football crowds and they both infer that the round-ball game is a foreign interloper on Australian soil.
In his masterful ‘Smell The Fear, Part 2’ follow-up eight years ago, current Fox Sports commentator Hill touched on a key element of this type of reporting – race.
In her piece, Panahi highlighted how a Collingwood member had his membership revoked for racist abuse but goes on to write that “(e)ven the World Cup has been mired in violence and racial tensions” and implies that “vile racial taunts” are commonplace in most top-flight European leagues.
Blakeney says he “can vaguely understand the old ethnic woes that are inherent in soccer” but says there should be “no bitter rivalries or blood feuds” in the A-League because “(t)his is Australia.”
The inference seems to be that if your roots are from somewhere else, you’re likely to be harbouring some sort of pathological race-based hatred and the best way to deal with it is to assimilate and watch Aussie Rules.
There’s not much logic in either Panahi or Blakeney’s pieces, both of which ignore the fact the AFL remains widely unloved and unwatched outside of Victoria, South Australia and Western Australia.
But the most odious aspect of both is that they deign to tell us which sports we should be watching at all.
What is it that these ‘soccer haters’ are so afraid of?
Maybe it’s the fact that in spite of such openly hostile media coverage, vast swathes of Melbourne’s sports-going public are switching on to the A-League.
Can you smell the fear?
ZRock
Guest
For football, the only way is up. You only have to look at the Swans forking out a bloody fortune for Lance Franklin as a way to stay in the news and keep the Wanderers off the back page. In Sydney at least, the fear is alive and very real.
Bob Anderson
Guest
As an American, I love how the poster also stereotypes and disses the US in the same paragraph. I guess the whole world is supposed to play The One True Sport. Kicking a ball around is so far superior to those old fashioned handball games that parochial stone-age throwbacks still cling to in backwaters like Tasmania or California.
bryan
Guest
"I’ll give you a case of difference between supporters imagine reversing the crowds take an afl crowd and put them in a stadia where Melbourne Victory are playing Liverpool what would the atmospphere be like “excactly” and now put the Victory fans and the Liverpool supporters at the afl match two completely different forms of atmospheres and menatalaties" Well,the AFL crowd would be cringing in embarrassment,watching Liverpool demolish the MVFC! ;) The Liverpool supporters would probably back the Dockers in a Fremantle-v-Melbourne match. I can imagine them now, chanting "Freeeoooohhh!,Freeeeeooohhh!" Wait!--that's just what Dockers supporters do now!! ;)
Sky Blue
Guest
This isn't about one article, please get that through your head. This is about an ingrained pre-disposition to negative articles about football, particularly in AFL dominated areas, it's been happening for years and we're sick of it. You try having the sport you love being written about week in, week out by people who hate it for 30+ years and see how you like it.
Gordo
Guest
I agree it's always been up to football to determine our own fate, and we made many many errors in the past. My point was that I think we spend too much effort worrying about the other codes that could be better spent making our own sport better. 1.7 million people play football, so I consider it the biggest sport in the country. Picking the free to air Friday night NRL match instead of Home and Away is much less of a commitment than playing a sport yourself. Even if you disagree, calling it a non-mainstream sport is just not correct. ps. if the fourth line is fact than so are the first three. While I"m on here, the reason the other codes worry about football so much is that it's the only code that has uniform support across Australia. Rugby codes will always struggle in AFL states and vice versa, football has no such limitations. Looking forward 10 or 20 years you can see why the potential is there, we don't need to be more popular than AFL in Victoria, we can be second in all states and be the biggest sport. Damn it you made me waste time on other codes!!! It's very tempting.
Bondy
Guest
Redb, Are you suggesting afl is just simply built and designed for commercial tv ?.
Redb
Roar Guru
Mid, AFL is number one on TV ratings. International exposure is not a relevant factor to Australians most popular sport. Throw in revenue... AFL number one. Really it terms of what is popular as a spectator sport, the number of participants in the game is irrelevant.
Kickass Koala
Guest
True, seats broken and flares are poor. Ill even admit that, but i think the main issue is that its never an even playing field ... Ill give you a few examples, i once went to an NRL match where a guy was so drunk he unzipped and p*ssed next to his seat on concrete ! He was ejected by security mind you, but most people seemed to not care and just moved to other seats. I also went to an AFL match in Sydney where behind me some indigenous men were abusing what they called "white wannabees" who were playing on the field .... Now would that make an article, either of them ? It seems that some sports followers are just so usto some things happening within there code that they dont get annoyed anymore and just accept it.
Kickass Koala
Guest
When i read someone saying "what does simon hill a foreigner know about Australian codes" it makes me realize these articles mentioned above are delivered in papers for people exactly like you. Im a fan of Football and NRL, not so much AFL or Rugby, im a fan of NBA, NFL, Ice Hockey, hell if ESPN put on Curling or Archery id give it a shot. I dont b*tch or moan about any other sport or the people running or working in the field. Simon Hill immigrated here and has provided a valuable service to the media and Football and who should question his passion for Australian sport, for all you know he has an AFL and Rugby League team he supports! Some journalists are just lazy, if its a slow week, "why not throw a firework or two in the air and see where it leads?" thats the mental thought of many of them, Rebecca Wilson is another who springs to mind. Her back pages would have a short 50 word positive response to a sport, then a 2000 word article moaning about another. Why ? Easy option that gets a response and raises a media workers profile. It wont change, im just glad our Football media stick to our own sport and dont comment on other sports.
Cameron
Roar Guru
What do you deem scrawny?
Titus
Guest
HAhahaahhaahah.....that is pure gold!!!! Did you think of that yourself? That is absolutely brilliant!!!!!!! Champagne thinking!
Aide Vresme
Guest
Soccer... a great game for kids and srawny people who can juggle a ball on their foot
TC
Guest
I'm referring to point 2 in particular. Many on this forum regularly espouse the view that the A-League season runs over summer to align with the European leagues (as if there is meant to be some sort of magical logic to that), conveniently forgetting why the NSL changed the timing of their season over 20 years ago. I thought jb was trying to argue something similar, but re-reading his point 2, I openly admit now, I'm not sure what he is saying one way or the other.
tom
Guest
It should be reported as a news item. Any footage should be of the incident in question and nothing else. It should be left alone by commentators who have nothing to do with the game at all. The language should be objective. And incidents like these http://neososmos.blogspot.com.au/2013/02/das-libero-soccer-not-violent-enough.html should be given the same treatment and coverage.
c
Guest
….. why ?
bryan
Guest
I notice that they have fixed it,now. There have been a few others where they stopped in a weird place,but none quite so amusing! :)
Reynoldsinski
Guest
Brazil is not a third world country anymore. Anyway, the response was to Football United who tried to make out that other leagues around the world would have big attendances, if they played all their matches in big stadiums.
Wicked Ninja
Guest
Are goalkeepers the only position in association football?
Mike Tuckerman
Expert
How?
Wicked Ninja
Guest
Woeful? Brazil's a third world country.