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Put an end to the madness that is AFL media

Roar Guru
4th April, 2022
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Roar Guru
4th April, 2022
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I’m just about done with AFL mainstream media.

In Collingwood’s final practice game this year, Brayden Maynard was reported for striking GWS’s Daniel Lloyd. Maynard belatedly attempted to spoil a mark Lloyd took in front of his face and struck him in the head.

Dermott Brereton reliably informed us that Maynard had no eyes for the ball – well, except for the fact that Maynard did actually spoil the ball. I’m not contesting the two-week suspension (well, not really), but Brereton’s call.

On Saturday night, I watched Jordan de Goey tackle Geelong’s Patrick Dangerfield. It was deemed a dangerous tackle. The free kick went to Dangerfield. And now De Goey has been offered a one-week ban.

What the AFL is telling us is that perfectly justifiably footy-based decisions are now punishable. These aren’t wilful, harmful acts. Maynard tried to spoil. De Goey tried to tackle.

But now, you can be punished if injury, or the potential for injury, has resulted.

Whoever would’ve thought that professional athletes barreling around and making split-nanosecond decisions might occasionally hurt one another through incidental contact?

Meanwhile, on Saturday night, I watched Joel Selwood collar Jack Ginnivan with a high tackle that rounded into a headlock. Ginnivan fell to his knees while Selwood held on. Free kick called. Okay.

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And yet Selwood still held onto the headlock as Ginnivan’s face reddened. Collingwood’s Darcy Cameron and John Noble charged in to remonstrate with Selwood, who belatedly released Ginnivan.

Joel Selwood of the Cats leads his team out onto the field

(Photo by Quinn Rooney/Getty Images)

And this is fine.

I’ll accept that inconsistencies riddle the AFL. It’s become just another stupidity in the game – like ruck infringements. In that case, an umpire blows the whistle, and players, fans, and commentators often have no idea which way a decision will go.

Do we cite how absurd this is that nobody knows what’s about to happen? Do we demand clarification? Do we insist on a delineation of the rules? No. We just elevate this phenomenon into the strata of a novelty.

I’m not even going to condemn the AFL for it. We know how Jeckyll and Hyde they are in their handling of the game. You don’t know what we’re going to get, even when they claim they’re taking actions to establish clarity.

But how about the media?

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Mainstream media used to mean something. They exposed corruption and injustice and held society to a standard that we could be something better. That applies equally to pockets of media covering specialised areas, like sport.

But the AFL mainstream media is far from righteous. Sanctimonious at times, maybe, but that’s a far cry from them holding the game – and all its components – to any standard of parity.

Joel Selwood choked Jack Ginnivan. Have we gotten any media condemnation? Of course not. Selwood is a darling of the game.

Why bring him into any form of disrepute by highlighting and examining an offence he’s clearly guilty of – especially on a night he passed Carlton great Stephen Kernahan as the game’s longest serving captain?

Meanwhile, we have to listen to Kane Cornes yet again condemn Jack Ginnivan for being exuberant. Cornes’ pillorying is now transcending into obsession and trending into bullying.

Caroline Wilson used to tee off on Dane Swan with farcical regularity. Problems at Collingwood? Dane Swan’s fault. Problems with Dustin Martin? Dane Swan’s fault.

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It became so ludicrous that even satirists such as Titus O’Reilly found comical fodder in it.

When the Essendon supplement scandal broke, what did the Herald Sun’s chief footy writer Mark Robinson write?

Well, nothing of any real note. He claimed he went harder on Essendon because he supported them, but everybody else – like everybody – could see how unfounded that claim was.

This was arguably the biggest scandal in organised professional team sport, and one of footy’s leading writers barely touched the story, yet he had no compunction in naming Collingwood players who had failed off-season drug tests that were meant to be kept confidential.

I cite Collingwood examples because I follow Collingwood, and those examples come quickly and easily to mind. But it happens everywhere. It’s happened for years. I’m sure any one of you reading this could find examples that involve your club.

How about last year, when the media agitated over the pressure on David Teague as Carlton coach? The Carlton Football Club backed Teague. Not good enough for the media. Apparently, Teague’s position was under threat.

David Teague

(Photo by Jono Searle/AFL Photos/via Getty Images)

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Carlton stood by Teague. The media created a frenzy within the Carlton-supporting public. Carlton now had to be seen to be doing something so launched an internal review. But on it went until the situation became untenable for Carlton and their head coach.

When Luke Beveridge teed off on Tom Morris after the Bulldogs’ opening-round loss to Melbourne, everybody rallied around Morris.

Was I the only one who cheered Beveridge? I know little about Morris, but I understand how the media works, and I liked seeing a coach call out a journalist for things that these piranhas clearly do.

Naturally, the remaining media wouldn’t side with the Dogs coach. This was a litmus test for themselves and better to reinforce the battlements than question their own methodology.

There is one truth in the AFL mainstream media. Theirs. Don’t let the actual facts get in the way.

And why should a medium that’s meant to be impartial be free of agenda? Be free of sensationalisation? Be free of fake news – a term for which many of us initially mocked former US president Donald Trump as its progenitor, but which we now recognise as a reality?

Now, I don’t apply this condemnation and criticism to every single person working in mainstream media.

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There are good footy journalists – footy geeks who report on the game, who don’t chase clicks on social media, who aren’t breaking mini-exclusives that aren’t exclusives at all, who aren’t constantly referring to a source as validation for speculative claims, who aren’t shouting headlines and then trying to stimulate events to fulfil a predetermined narrative, and who don’t believe that the game itself exists as a plaything for their enjoyment and indulgence.

They exist. They’re the footy nerds whose love of the game is always paramount – even people who write for forums like this and do so out of a passion for the game, rather than any celebration of their ego.

The rest?

I’m tired of the bull and the agendas and the selective reporting.

Stop following these idiots. Stop giving them power. Stop reading them.

It’s the only way to put an end to the madness.

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