What we see and hear about behaviour in and at sporting event rarely adds up to anything other than a pile of over-heated perceptions.
Today I will attend the ‘Gabba for a one day international, my first in a long, long time.
Here’s what springs to mind when I ponder what I’m in for.
Bars will be full en route. Bellicose, sweaty blokes will be squeezed up against temporary balustrades erected to prevent them stumbling drunkenly into the path of oncoming traffic.
They’ll be belching profanities through Winfield exhalations. They’ll be wholly unaware of the children within earshot. They’ll be ogling female office workers unfortunate enough to have opted for that particular route back to the Yaris.
And all this before a ball is bowled in anger.
My point?
It doesn’t take much to assume the worst.
And so to the much-maligned A-League.
Just a few days back the Wanderers and the Victory faced up and finished off with ne’er a dodgy moment between the 15,000 who attended.
But what were people sweating on?
More of what happened at the earlier fixture when a pair of ridiculous posses made up of fashionably tough-stickered, creatine enlarged torso-waxers all decided to chest-pump and spew childish vitriol in the name of clubs who never invited it.
Of course, the media lap this hoo-haa up.
The imagery it offers is news gold.
Of course, it’s helped on its way by horrible paranoia on the part of A-League fans who are always so awfully quick to condemn it all as some sort of conspiratorial code-bash.
Take it from a supporter of AFL club, St Kilda: there ain’t no plot. Put simply, some institutions simply offer incredibly convenient editorial fodder.
Just as the post-season burning of a dwarf’s shirt-tail titillates as much as a flash of Kardashian side-boob, so too the exotic intoxicant that is flares pluming coloured smoke and rioting youths going feral.
We’ll run that off the top at six, Hendo. You bet we will. Just as we would a burning factory, a counting cat or a kid up a tree in a flood.
Why? Because it looks awesome.
And in the end a perception sticks. But reality is far different.
Few, if any, get hurt. Has anyone ever actually seen injury stats on errant flare burning? How would they stack up next to, say, alcohol-induced injury among the Barmy Army after day 1 of the first Ashes Test? Entirely favourably, I say.
The same paradoxes of perception exist on-field too.
This week The Age published a piece by philosopher and academic Christopher Cordner. His argument, paraphrased, was that the current stable of Australian cricketers are graceless bullies who drag down a game that, for genteel historical reasons, deserves some kind of built-in purity.
What he failed to consider was that we only ever hear the thin edge of the sledge wedge.
Most cricket banter is well-humoured and wholly disposable. Most of it comes and goes with the same regularity as English tail-end batsmen.
In fact, sledging’s contribution to the broader vernacular of the game is similarly irrelevant. What we see and hear is the endpoint of a highly technical, highly pressured game played at a slow burn pace.
Usually it’s irrepressibly hot. Often there’s been a string of near misses. Often the last barb will be the punctuation mark on a longer conversation – Michael Clarke’s suggestion that Jimmy Anderson might brace for a broken arm, for instance, was less a threat than a warning about what might come if Anderson’s persistent yappiness didn’t measure up to his batting ability.
Australia, it’s worth noting, had been on the receiving end of Anderson’s down-the-nose smartarsery for quite a while.
In sport, memories inspire a little heat. Sometimes it spills over.
Not often, though.
In the end, once the consistency of 150 km/h grenades can finally be relied upon, they tend to do all the necessary talking regardless of anything else.
A blabbering slips cordon imparting a form of mental disintegration?
Hardly.
Just silly, reactive stuff that happens in a long-winded game. As the recent Ashes showed us, the players quickly tire of it. By day three in Adelaide most of the overt fire-laden blab was gone.
Still, a picture is painted. Column space becomes devoted to it. All of a sudden it becomes an ethical challenge requiring rehabilitatory massage.
But it all self-corrects in a jiffy.
Pity our perceptions aren’t as willing to move.
And no doubt mine will at today’s second one day international when the likelihood of me of enjoying the company of a delightful family of five from Ashgrove all zinced up in green and gold far outweighs the prospect of my teeth being knocked out by a random drunkard’s fist.
Jack
Guest
It may sound odd, as I really don't care for soccer at all, but in a funny way all the thuggery of the WSW fans has actually made me follow the game a bit. I'm genuinely hopeful that they lose every game now - particularly against SFC (a team I would otherwise never watch). In a sense they're pretty good bad guys; WSW are for a passing viewer like myself a little like the Springboks in Union in that they optimise the worst in their game and so even if you don't follow it you can enjoy their failure. Very clever A-League, you've sort of hooked me in.
Jack
Guest
Wow... by this logic we could pretty quickly dismiss pretty well every code of football as being an excuse for uneducated thugs to drink till they're stupid and/or bash one-another. I fear that soccer would lose any right to calling itself a "beautiful" game too, if we were to judge each sport by the lowest common denominators of its fans.
TedTurner
Guest
Very good post. I went to a Raiders v Sharks finals game a few years ago, was told they have a good rivalry and the atmosphere would be tasty, more akin to English football than Union games. Capacity crowd, all mixed with no segregation, a lot of friendly banter, a lot more fat blokes than you get at Union...but my mate remarked at the end that we hadn't heard a single swear word all game. That is impossible in England or Scotland at any major match. Nobody took it too seriously. The most pointed barb we heard was "get back to the beach".
TheBeautifulGame
Roar Pro
It's so rather cringeworthy, how mainstream Anglo commentators adore and support the fanatics at the tennis, yet fear foreign-style support in other sports. I.E A-League active support.
TheBeautifulGame
Roar Pro
Fast forward that clock 40 years will ya!
Jack Russell
Roar Guru
If there was no vision, then I doubt it would have got a mention anywhere, irrespective of who was involved. For those of you that remember the TV show Frontline, there was a quote from the producer as to the 3 rules of a good story. 1. Good vision. 2. Good vision. 3. Good vision. Flares are good vision. Street fights are good vision. A bunch of young guys marching wearing balaclavas is good vision. That guy at the Heart game that king hit another bloke and was caught on camera was good vision. No vision is not good vision. That's why it doesn't get reported.
Jack Russell
Roar Guru
Are you serious? Clarke was enemy number 1 a couple of years ago before he started making serious runs.
Steven McBain
Roar Guru
Well said AZ, very important point that you making.
Ian
Guest
Mwhahahahaha!!!!!!!!!!!!! The absolute most rubbish trolling attempt in the history of trolling..................mwhahahaha!!!!!!!!!
Silver_Sovereign
Guest
what is it about soccer that creates such violence in it fans? It seems to follow the game and is fanned by people bringing ethnic tensions from overseas to Australia.
AZ_RBB
Guest
Don't disagree with much of what has been said above. But I don't want us to get to the point where we're like "Violence in Aus sport isn't an issue because Europe is worse". It's a low standard to set.
Steven McBain
Roar Guru
Absolutely Michael. Impossible to compare, just completely different experiences. I think one of the things I would ask myself is this, my son is only 3 next month but in a few years time, would I take him to a State of Origin or an AFL game or a cricket match - absolutely. Would I take him to say Chelsea West Ham or Rangers Celtic at that age - almost certainly not.
Michael_Newcastle
Guest
Hear hear! Unfortunately most Australians don't have the opportunity to travel like you and I and haven't seen those things for themselves, so the prism they view things through is only what they know. Events that hold a very mild threat level will seem extreme to them, because they haven't seen a more dangerous alternative. Which is not saying that the more dangerous alternative is better, BTW. It's like comparing tea and coffee.
Suburban boy
Guest
Interestingly there was a fight inside the ground at last Tuesday's MV v WSW A-League game, it happened a few rows in front of me, Some pushing and shoving then two blokes had a swing at each other and one was sent sprawling across a couple of rows of seats. The cops were onto it quickly and the fighters and their mates were marched out of the ground. One of the blokes involved had his kids with him, and they trailed behind him as he was ejected from the ground. One of these kids, a girl about thirteen, gave the cops the finger as her father was booted out. Classy hey. The thing is this was not MV v WSW supporter fighting. it appeared to involve MV supporters only. There was no mention of it in the media. I wonder how it would have been portrayed if MV and WSW fans in club colours had been involved. In five or more years of attending A League games this was the first violence I have seen, despite the view in some areas that A league supporters are dangerous groups of louts.. I also regularly attend AFL games and it must be thirty years at least since I have seen any sort of physical crowd violence at an AFL game. So I agree with the argument made by this article's author, violence at Aussie sporting events is very rare, not that you would know it by what is written in the media.
Steven McBain
Roar Guru
Interesting article. Whilst I've never lived in Australia I've been fortunate enough to attend many sporting events down there including a union test match against South Africa, several AFL games, many Ashes test including the Ashes Boxing Day one in 2006 and the opening match in this year's State of Origin in Sydney. I grew up watching football in Aberdeen, Scotland. I then was and still am a season ticket holder at Chelsea although I'm now living in Singapore. I'd make the following observations about watching sport in Australia. I think watching sport in your neck of the woods is an incredibly positive experience. Yes there are pockets of isolated behaviour but generally I find it's an atmosphere that adds to the excitement and the experience with a healthy amount of self policing. I've been present at matches in the UK with completely poisonous atmospheres such as Chelsea v West Ham and Rangers v Celtic. I was also ejected from Wembley once at the England versus Scotland Euro '00 play off for 'my own safety'. I simply cheered when Scotland scored I would add and was sat around the half way line, not in the Scotland end admittedly but certainly not in the England end, anyhow a long time ago now. I would compare this with what I witnessed at the State of Origin. I was told by everyone prior to the game that it would be an atmosphere like nothing I had ever experienced (although I understand watching it in Queensland is much more intense although not sure if that is correct). Now it was definitely one hell of an atmosphere and I felt priviliged to be there but it had nothing of the poison, bile or venom that you get at a British football match and that's a good thing. There was a Queensland fan several seats along from us who was being a massive pain in the proverbial. He'd clearly been out all day and was spilling his Bundys and Coke all over everyone else. He was very loud and generally annoying everyone. Yet people around him seemed to try to calm him down and encourage him to sit quietly. Parallel that with my required ejection for cheering when Scotland scored. I think Australia and Australian sports fans are often painted in a bad light, all the old stories about Bay 13 etc. But if you compare it to watching cricket in say India (many IPL games were screened in cinemas and they had to stop serving booze as there was so much trouble!), or a football match in the UK or anywhere in Eastern Europe then it is a breeze. The fact that you can't even take a beer to your seat watching football in England and that is was necessary to ban it completely in Scotland since the '80s tell you a lot. I have to say I find watching sport in Australia much more akin to watching sport in the USA where it is far more family orientated. I honestly don't think Aussie sports crowds are a bad bunch, far from it in fact. Not sure about some of the stewarding though, what they got against beachballs!?
c
Guest
the media do generally highlight all of the negatives in all codes but do they highlight all of the positives in all codes a fair and balanced article matt
leon
Guest
Why the obsession with tattooed, muscled WSW supporters? Michael Clarke is as, if not more, inked than any of them, and isn't subject to widespread opprobrium. Makes you think.
Robz
Guest
unless (as in their cases) you are an ignorant buffoon with tunnel vision; then it is quite difficult to write any other way
willy
Guest
i have been to a few wsw games and when they light the flares it seems it is always set off amongst the rbb supporters group . ive never seen them thrown into the crowd .
slane
Guest
The last time I was at the Boxing Day test (2008) I saw one man throw a cup of his own urine on another gentleman. Very sophisticated.