Well, sports-wise, it has been a tad traumatic this year and we poor sods who tend to live for sport, have been going though hell!
Anyhoo, I’m writing this epistle in the middle of the week after the grand finals of both the ARL and the AFL and just for the record, I picked both the winners! COVID 19 of course, has just about wrecked everything across our State and certainly in Victoria: they were in more trouble than a one-armed fan dancer, but some of their restrictions are now being lifted! This year’s added difference between the two codes of course, saw many of the League teams remain at their bases (save for The Warriors and The Storm, both of whom re-located to Queensland) while in the AFL, ALL the Melbourne based teams migrated to Queensland (teams in Adelaide and Perth stayed put and teams flew from Queensland to play them) and the grand final was played at The Gabba in Brisbane.
I guess you could say it was cute but the AFL boffins just couldn’t let Queensland do their thing with the final game at The Gabba. Nope, they arranged for two strips of turf to be cut from the hallowed MCG ground (true!) loaded them into a refrigerated semi-trailer, drove them up through NSW, into Queensland and then had them laid in the goal squares on The Gabba! Why, I hear you ask? Well, several years ago, the AFL managed to get a law passed in the Victorian Parliament, which stated, categorically, the AFL grand final MUST ALWAYS be played on the MCG. It was during a period when teams from Brisbane, Perth, Sydney and Adelaide were starting to flex their muscles and questions were being asked like, “If a team from Perth finishes on top, why can’t the grand final be held on their home ground?” But the AFL was having none of it: the game is ours and this is where the Grand Final will be held. If you don’t like it – don’t play in the comp! And with that mind set, the law was passed.
Now of course, COVID 19 has kicked that law to the dumpster and it was either play the grand final somewhere outside Victoria or not have one! If the question of where the AFL grand final should be held ever raises it’s ugly head again – the AFL will argue that the 2020 grand final was indeed played on the hallowed MCG (well, some of it) as the law requires. You and I would say that’s bollocks but the AFL legal eagles will argue that the presence of some MCG turf, no matter how small and where it is put, doth the MCG it make!
Thank you, linesmen. Thank you, ball boys. If you still want to argue the point, we’ll see you in court!
Bledisloe Cup
The first two matches in the blood sport that constitutes the Bledisloe Cup competition have taken place and while we came close in the first, we got thrashed in the second. There are two more matches to be played here in Oz shortly. Will we win any of them? Nope. Do I really care? Nope. Does anything about it concern you? Hope The Wallabies have got lots of Dettol and bandages!
The Bathurst 1000 has been run (in front of nobody, of course) and it was the last outing for Holden. The brand has now been consigned to said dumpster by The General, but I wonder? Holden was an Australian company before the American giant General Motors took it over and developed the marque we all know. Ford now runs Mustangs in the Great Race (because The Henry no longer makes cars here either) but last Sunday, they were no match for the Holden. In fact Holden finished 1st and 3rd with a Ford between them. Have we seen the last of the Holden or could it be re-branded and still race?
Well I’m Occupied!
I have a busy couple of weeks coming up (I’ve already watched the ARL and AFL grand finals and the Hew Hess Hay’s baseball World Series) but there’s still the Melbourne Cup, American football, women’s football, State of Origin, golf anywhere around the world to come and then we’re into Test Cricket (the Indians are coming) and then the Sydney Hobart! Go away! Leave me alone! I’m watching them all!
Talk at you later,
Hillside Critic