The AFL.
I grow wearysome of it.
It has been an ugly year for sport in Australia. With AFL there has been drug taking, purposefully losing games, strange rules and racism. In my eyes, the AFL has lost it with all of these points.
Drug Taking
Before the year had even begun, it was announced that illegal supplements were taken by certain players, and in fact whole teams were in trouble.
Investigators to this day are running questions past players. Coaches have been brought into questioning.
The CEO of Essendon mentioned something along the lines as "Any person found taking illegal drugs will lose their position within the club."
The coach admitted to using supplements not yet approved for human consumption. This is an illegal drug, the same practice as mentioned by the CEO, that if taken the said person shall lose their position in the club.
Has it happened? No. Why isn't anyone talking about it?
Yet players still play with an unfair advantage over others, taking precious premiership points in their wake.
Sure, once investigations have completed, their points will likely be stripped. But they wont be given back to the losing clubs, which could cost a club a chance at the finals all because of doctors/players pushing the limit without being punished.
Frustrating.
Frustrating.
Tanking
In the AFL, the lower you finish on the ladder and the lesser number of wins that you finish a year with, the better draft picks in the following year.
Melbourne Demons were discovered to have purposefully lost games to gain these higher draft picks.
Karma did strike the unfortunate Demons, with high draft picked players poached by other teams and high fines brought upon the club for their strategy of unfair gain.
Persons were banned from being at their club, including Dean Bailey, previous Head Coach for the Demons and now working as an Assistant for the Adelaide Crows.
Bailey has been banned from assisting for numerous games for the Crows. This is punishing a club that has nothing to do with the Demons rather than punishing the person.
Bewildering.
Strange Rules
Expert AFL commentators were asked to state how they would explain the game of Aussie Rules to a person who has never seen the game before.
One person said something along the lines of "No one knows the rules, but half the crowd will cheer the decision and the other half will vehemently boo it."
Commentator after commentator will at one stage throughout the year shake their head at a decision. Shake their head at a bad call that is confirmed correct by the Umpiring Panel or shake their head at a player ban for an on field discriminatory action.
This has been the case for years and will still continue to be the case for years to come, and we accept it.
We shouldn't. It's impossible to keep up, argh!
Annoying.
Racism
There has been enough talk about Racism. I'd rather not talk about it any more, but enough is enough in the AFL.
To summarise for those that aren't aware to the last few weeks stories, a young girl racially abused an aboriginal player in Indigenous Round. That player after the game was met by opposition team's CEO to personally apologise. The following few days, that CEO bewilderingly racially abused that same player on radio.
What has happened since then?
The CEO offered his resignation from his club. It wasn't accepted.
He is instead being put through a few weeks of a racial discrimination program and no one has talked about it since.
Disgusting.
So we have the ultimate sporting league in Australia, trying to do what I believe is the right thing in our Community, trying to do what the right thing for our kids and our indigenous people.
Do the right thing AFL.
Stand up against drug cheating.
Don't ruin our game.
Stand up against racism.
You banned Melbourne staff for sending the game into disrepute. You helped deal a hand against Matt Rendell for overheard comments.
Eddie McGuire referred an Aboriginal player to King Kong days after a thirteen year old girl called him an ape.
It doesn't get worse than that.
But Eddie is back on TV, back in his spot as CEO, back sipping Lattes with his buddy and AFL CEO Andrew Demetriou.
What is going on? Ban Eddie McGuire from his roles associated with the AFL! Stop ruining our great game and be consistent!
Racism ends with us. Prove it.
- tork
