Pies, Bombers and the RSL all want the day match stay

Hello fans:

First I have to say to the fans. I did not publish my report for the past four weeks because of university exams and a major assignment. I have managed to squeeze some spare time from my assignment work to write three more reports (this is the first) before putting final touches to the assignment, which is due in early August. Let’s go to the news:

Essendon has joined Collingwood and veterans groups in condemning any move to change the starting time of next year’s Anzac Day blockbuster.
The AFL is considering whether to leave the clash, which falls on a Friday in 2003, as a day game or move it to a twilight or evening timeslot. It is also considering whether to add a second match to the day.
Essendon chief executive Peter Jackson said a twilight Anzac Day fixture would detract significantly from the occasion. He said Anzac Day deserves more respect than being tinkered with just for the sake of it. (The Bombers will host the match next year.)
Collingwood chief executive Greg Swann agrees the game should be kept as a day event.
Several clubs, including North Melbourne, St Kilda, Melbourne, Sydney and the Western Bulldogs have expressed interest in an Anzac Day involvement.
The newly-elected Victorian president of the Returned Services League, David McLaughlan, said the organization would not mind an extra game being scheduled for the evening, but would object the time shift for the afternoon match, as it would disrupt the traditional routine for veterans and families who went to the dawn service, the march and the football.
AFL chief executive Wayne Jackson said the league would look at all options regarding the Anzac Day schedule, particularly interstate.
AFL football operations manager Andrew Demetriou said the league had held preliminary talks with its broadcasters regarding Anzac Day, and was interested in exploring as many options as possible for the day.
He said the league would consider scheduling the annual clash between Essendon and Collingwood at night, or an earlier than usual 6pm start, or keeping the match at its traditional start and adding a second match between two other clubs at night.
The league unsuccessfully introduced twilight matches to its home-and-away draw in 1998, scheduling 11 Saturday matches at 3.30pm for the first half of the year. (The timeslot was introduced again this year for Sunday matches played in Perth.)
Collingwood president Eddie McGuire was lukewarm about playing the blockbuster at night. He said the club organize an enormous amount of functions and lunches, which are a major part of both the Pies’ and the Bombers’ budgets for the year.
(Anzac Day, which falls on April 25, has similar meanings to Veterans’ Day in the US. The April date refers to the day in 1915, when a combined Australian-New Zealand troops landed in Gallipoli in present-day Turkey to fight against troops from the Ottoman Empire in World War I. More than 40,000 Australian and New Zealand soldiers were killed in eight months of battle.)

Federal Government to investigate clubs’ profiteering from traineeships
Australian Education Minister Brendan Nelson has been forced to investigate whether AFL clubs are profiteering from the Commonwealth’s New Apprenticeship Scheme.
The probe follows a report which revealed that clubs were making hundreds of thousands of dollars enrolling wealthy players and coaches as “apprentices” in taxpayer-funded training schemes.
Dr Nelson said in Federal Parliament he would be ordering his department to look into the issues surrounding the scheme raised by the report.
Labor’s employment spokesman, David Cox, said there were serious concerns that clubs were using Commonwealth money to fund sponsorship rather than training. He said he had repeatedly asked Dr Nelson to investigate the Geelong Football Club arrangement, in which training company Corpfit pays the Cats sponsorship on the condition that it receives a certain number of trainees from the club each funded by a $A4400 New Apprenticeship grant, particularly after the minister said initially he could see nothing wrong with the arrangements revealed by the report.
The report showed how clubs were using a Federal Government scheme to cash in on grants and tax and exemptions from Workcover (the Victorian State Government’s work insurance scheme).
High-profile big dollar players such as Geelong’s Ben Graham, Ronnie Burns and Steven King, Hawthorn’s Nick Holland and Ben Dixon, Richmond’s Steven Sziller and Leon Cameron, and St Kilda coach Grant Thomas have been signed up under the New Apprenticeship training scheme.
Documents show that at least 36 Geelong employees (including 22 players), 15 Hawthorn, 14 St Kilda and 23 Richmond employees have been enrolled in the training schemes, administered by the Office of Tertiary Training and Education, since the start of the season.
The training scheme is directed to those who leave school before completing Year 12 or those who have graduated from high school and have not gone on to other study.
The players, some of whom are on $A400,000 contracts, were signed up to do fitness, IT and business administration “apprenticeships”.
The Commonwealth provides $A4400 incentives to employers who sign up an employee as a trainee if they have no previous tertiary qualification.
Employers are eligible for exemptions from state payroll tax and WorkCover charges if they hire the apprentices.

AFL club membership figures level with last year
The AFL says the club membership tallies for the 2002 season are level with those figures recorded for the 2001 season.
AFL chief executive Wayne Jackson said total AFL club membership in 2002 had reached 447,338 people, down by just 21 on 2001.
Key points include:
*The three teams with the highest member numbers are all non-Victorian,
*Hawthorn has now become the Victorian club with the most members,
*Adelaide, the Brisbane Lions, Port Adelaide and Sydney have all increased their Victorian members with the Lions more than doubling its total from 2112 in 2001 to 4492 in 2002.
*The Lions increased their membership base by 21 per cent, while the Saints lost 20 per cent of members.
*Adelaide easily leads the table, with 46,000 members, while St Kilda has just 17,000.
*Adelaide, Hawthorn, Port Adelaide, and the Bulldogs all increased membership by about 10 per cent.
Essendon has again pleaded with the AFL for fewer night matches next season after a membership drop of more than 1000 and indications that many more will not renew their pledge in 2003.
The 2002 figures indicated that Hawthorn had more members than any other Victorian club. But Essendon immediately revised its figure from 33,014 to 35,219, taking it beyond Hawthorn’s 33,319 and retaining the mantle it has held since 2000. The mix-up was attributed to an ad ministrative error at Windy Hill and, while the late change prompted raised eyebrows, an AFL spokesperson confirmed the higher figure would be accepted.
While the Bombers kept their title, club chief executive Peter Jackson said there was no doubting the link between a 2002 schedule of 15 night and seven day games and a decline that he described as a great concern.
Jackson again criticised having nine of Essendon’s 11 home games this season under lights - a jump from four in 2001 - which had resulted in drops in family and junior memberships and a fall in the number of older adult members. He said the Bombers considered itself “more of a membership club than a corporate club”, and that such losses, no matter how small, affected the club’s bottom line.
Adelaide, up 11 per cent to 46,620, led Port Adelaide and West Coast in an all-interstate membership trifecta, while premier Brisbane boasted the biggest increase at 21.6 per cent. The Lions’ Victorian base more than doubled to 4492 members.
Hawthorn's 10.5 per cent increase coincides with its return to football’s traditional timeslot, with nine Saturday afternoon matches for the 2002 season, including seven in Melbourne. By contrast, Essendon plays just seven day games, with four of those interstate and none on a Saturday afternoon.
Hawthorn president Ian Dicker said the target areas in the pursuit of 35,000 members next season, apart from the push for more Saturday afternoon matches, would be the 9000 members lost from areas in Melbourne’s outer south-east in the move from Waverley Park to the MCG, further developing the Chinese market and creating an avenue to Melbourne’s Sri Lankan community.
On the other hand, St Kilda has not only replaced the Western Bulldogs as the club with the smallest membership in Victoria, it also recorded the biggest slide in membership of all 16 clubs - their final 2002 figure is more than 20 per cent lower than last year, and 2500 fewer than the next lowest, Melbourne.
St Kilda chief executive Brian Waldron estimated the decline amounted to about $A200,000, and partly blamed the horrors of last season, when the Saints won only four matches and sacked Malcolm Blight, the coach who at great expense to the club was appointed to lead it out of adversity.

Hunt regrets his outburst towards a smoker
TV personality and AFL commentator Rex Hunt has expressed his regreat over his onair outburst at a footy fan smoking in the stands of Optus Oval during the Round 12 Carlton-West Coast match.
Hunt let fly at the man during his match call for 3AW after smoke from the man’s cigarette wafted into the commentary box. He used colourful language and threatened to have the man kicked out, even though smoking was permitted in the area. (If you had been listening to 3AW’s match call you should have heard Hunt’s outburst.)
Hunt described his behaviour as “offensive” but said he was severely provoked into the outburst. “Also what I find offensive is the way that I carried on, I do regret that,” he told Channel Seven’s Sunrise program. “I plead guilty to the people of Australia under severe provocation because his mate had me frightened at one stage when he stood up and started to threaten me and it got a little out of hand.”
However Hunt, who said the debate over smoking in the stand between himself and the men he abused had been ongoing for three years, said he would be proud if his tirade prevented just one child from taking up smoking.
Smoking in the particular stand at Optus Oval is permitted under orders from Carlton president John Elliott, a heavy smoker.
Hunt’s employer 3AW has written to Carlton chief executive Don Hanly requesting a healthy and safe work environment.
Representatives from anti-smoking campaigner Quit had also met Carlton staff to try to have smoking at the ground outlawed. Quit executive director Todd Harper said that the MCG, Skilled Stadium and Colonial were all smoke-free stadiums and “it was high time Optus Oval joined the rest of us in the 21st century”.

McAvaney honoured with medal
Congratulations to Channel Seven commentator Bruce McAvaney, who has been awarded a Medal of the Order of Australia (OAM) in this year’s Queen’s Birthday honours list.
In his 25-year career with Channel Ten and Channel Seven, McAvaney has called many sports, from AFL to swimming to athletics to horse racing. He was honoured for services to sports broadcasting and his commitment for charity and support for disadvantaged young Australians.
Overall, 576 Australians had been acknowledged, eight of whom received the highest honour: the Companion of the Order of Australia (AC). OAM is the fourth highest on the Order of Australia honours.

Telstra announces AFL video streaming trial
The AFL’s telco partner Telstra is currently investigating issues around the audio and video streaming experience of international subscribers, following complaints the company has received in regards to poor user experience.
In an effort to improve the subscriber’s experience, Telstra has decided to make available selected AFL match audio and video from a server located in the subscriber’s home country, as opposed to Australia. New files for each round will be made available via this web page. The selection of audio and video will include narrowband (56Kbps) and broadband (a minimum of 256Kbps). This site will be updated at the beginning of each week.
Telstra says it welcomes feedback from subscribers, particularyly the following information relating to quality of the audio and video:
Q1 : Is the experience better than the current AFL audio and video?
Q2 : Is the video smooth or jerky?
Q3 : Is the picture quality clear, or does it appear grainy?
Q4 : Are the audio and video synchronised?
Q5 : Does the picture drop out or freeze?
Q6 : Are there any other comments?
After the trial, Telstra will take the information to implement a consistent and improved experience for all international subscribers.
The website is at: http://telstra.com/subscriptions/afl/InternationalTrial.asp

AFL rejects reintroduction of zones
An internal AFL discussion paper has rejected a push from clubs for the reintroduction of zoning.
Several clubs, lead by Carlton president John Elliott, want all Victorian teams to be allocated a country and metropolitan zone.
Elliott believes the AFL should pay the clubs up to $A250,000 if they work and develop their zones. He has also suggested the allocation of set hours for players so they can promote football in their zone through clinics and school visits.
Under the Elliott plan, the national draft would remain unchanged for the first three rounds and then clubs would have the option of selecting zone players at the start of each remaining round.
Elliott is leading the opposition to plans to give Sydney and Brisbane priority access to local players. He said all clubs should get priority access to players if they developed local areas.
But the AFL report says that allowing zone concessions at any point in the national and pre-season drafts would give some clubs advantages over their opposition.
It says under the Elliott plan, clubs would lose the best players in their zone in the first three rounds of the draft. And clubs which had better recruiting zones would have a huge advantage over other clubs which were allocated less productive zones.
The report says the best players should be drafted on the basis of club’s recruiting department doing its homework and a recruit being selected on a needs basis, not because of geographical fortune.

King, Roberts escape jail for assault
North Melbourne dual premiership player David King and former teammate Mark Roberts had been given good behaviour bonds and ordered to donate to charity over an assault on a kebab seller.
In the Melbourne Magistrate’s Court, King, 30, Roberts, 36, and a third friend Darren Postlethwaite, 32, all of North Melbourne, pleaded guilty to assault in company after a dispute over a stolen hot-dog.
The court heard the trio abused the food seller for being too slow, then one of them took a sausage from the warmer, after their chicken kebabs were prepared at the Flemington Road caravan around 11pm on May 13 last year.
Swearing, then an altercation began after Bulent Coskun, 24, left his van to demand the stolen sausage be returned. He suffered cuts to the hand and ear, bruising to his face and soreness in his jaw and back after he was assaulted to the face, chest, and stomach, prosecutor Sergeant Rod Hardy told the court.
The disputed sausage, which had been put between two kebabs, was broken and fell to the ground during the scuffle.
It is believed the trio had been celebrating after the Kangaroos’ two-point defeat of Collingwood in an AFL match at Colonial Stadium earlier that day.
The trio was unsuccessful in having the matter dealt with through diversion, which allows the accused to avoid a criminal record in return for obeying conditions set by a magistrate.
Magistrate Jelena Popovic said all three had contributed to the community through their athletic prowess and were held on a pedestal by young people. But she said children would think the trio “less special” if they knew they had been engaged in “cowardly behaviour, a three-on-one attack over something pretty stupid”.
She gave the three men 12-month good behaviour bonds, ordered King and Roberts to donate $A2,000 to the Royal Children's Hospital and Postlethwaite to pay $A1,000 to the court fund.
Outside court, Coskun said the trio had not apologised since the event and had been drunk at the time. He said he did not like AFL football and he had stopped working at the Flemington Road food van one week later because of the incident.
*Former Collingwood premiership ruckman Damian Monkhorst has escaped conviction for assaulting a young male at a function last year.
Monkhorst was charged with assaulting a 14-year-old at a function at the Woori Yallock Football Club last year.
Monkhorst was fined $A1500 and required to pay a 12-month good behaviour bond.

Mercuri charged with drink driving
Dual Essendon premiership player Mark Mercuri has faced court after allegedly being caught driving while disqualified.
It is understood Mercuri was nabbed after a policeman spotted the Bombers midfielder using his mobile phone while driving, which is illegal in Victoria.
Mercuri, 28, had lost his licence for four months earlier this year for driving 40-50km/h over the speed limit. But police now allege Mercuri failed to return his licence and was later caught behind the wheel in inner Melbourne suburb of Northcote on April 29, before his licence suspension period had ended.
Mercuri has been charged with driving while disqualified, using a mobile phone while driving and failing to send in his licence as required. He was listed to appear in Preston Magistrates Court on Wednesday but the case was adjourned until July.
If it is his first offence for driving while disqualified, Mercuri faces a maximum four months in jail or a $A3000 fine.

Dockers seek more public seats
Fremantle will seek a greater allocation of public reserve seats for its AFL home games next year following its faultless 2002 form at Subiaco.
The Dockers will push for a greater proportion of the ground’s 42,780 seats to be allocated public reserve following the high demand at home games, most notable in their recent win over Collingwood, which attracted a crowd of 33,087 - the highest to attend a Dockers home game outside a local derby against West Coast.
But with just 3076 - or 7 per cent - of Subiaco’s seats allocated as $A16 public reserve seats, the Dockers will push the West Australian Football Commission for a greater share to entice more fans to games.
Fremantle chief financial officer Gary Walton said the commission had been accommodating in allocating 600 extra public reserve seats for the Collingwood game. But he said depending on next year’s draw, which could include home games against the Magpies, Carlton and Essendon, the Dockers would push for more cheaper seating.
Of Subiaco’s 42,780 public seats, 3,076 are public reserve, 6323 are budget, 12,494 are standard and 20,887 are premium.
Fremantle’s average home crowds are up from 21,500 last year to 26,000 in 2002.
Fremantle intends to hold discussions with the WAFC and West Coast to significantly increase the amount of public reserve and budget seating available in 2003.

Elliott to be replaced as Carlton boss in two years’ time
Businessman John Elliott will stay on as Carlton president until 2004 under a succession plan for his embattled club.
Elliott, who will be 63 by then, will step down in favour of a hand-picked successor, with millionaire club director Colin De Lutis the hot favourite.
In his first public comments on the saga, De Lutis, who is a staunch supporter of Elliott, said Elliott would remain president until the succession was put in place. But he did not rule himself out from taking over if circumstances changed.
Elliott is believed to have a six-point action plan to rebuild the club: identifying a successor; a recruiting drive to attract young marketing and business experts on to the Carlton board; Elliott and De Lutis to pick the new directors; weeding out directors who don’t fit into long-term plans; preventing Elliott’s opponents from destabilising or splitting the club, and Elliott remaining as president for now because he refuses to leave Carlton while the club is at such a low ebb.
Under the Elliott plan, 25 to 30 young business experts will be identified as potential board members.
Elliott will seek one more three-year term as president at the end of this year.

AFL third most expensive sports event to sponsor
The first ever list of Australia’s most valuable sporting championships has found tht the AFL is the country’s most valuable sporting event, behind the Australian Open tennis (with a major package for the tennis tournament valued at $9.25 million) and the Formula One Grand Prix.
The report, by Melbourne-based consultancy Sponsorship Solutions, also shows that Olympic swimmer Ian Thorpe is Australia’s most marketable sporting star, with a principal sponsorship deal estimated to be worth $A450,000 a year.
The inaugural analysis of event and athlete sponsorship reveals that a single sponsorship package for tennis star Pat Rafter was valued at $A425,000 a year, making him the second most valuable athlete. Golfing legend Greg Norman emerged as the third most costly property for sponsors at $A400,000, followed by Cathy Freeman at $A385,000 and Lleyton Hewitt at $A375,000.
The valuations are based on the annual cost of a sponsorship package, which includes worldwide exposure and a minimum of six appearances each year. Career achievements, celebrity status, personal characteristics and exposure were some of the criteria used to measure athlete value.
A naming rights deal for the Australian Grand Prix, at present held by Foster’s (owner of Carlton & United Breweries), is said to be worth about $A8.5 million because of its strong ratings and exposure to worldwide audiences. CUB’s deal as principal sponsor for the AFL is valued at $A7.75 million, followed by Telstra’s sponsorship arrangement with the National Rugby League at $A6.5 million.
Sponsorship Solutions managing director Craig Richards said event sponsorship value was calculated by combining the cost of the package, the exposure it provided and other criteria such as crowd size.
Sponsoring the Australian rugby union team, the Wallabies, was calculated at $A5.75 million and the Melbourne Cup at $A5.5 million. One-day cricket packages, at $A4.5 million, were worth $A250,000 more than Test series sponsorship arrangements.

Swans’ unique marketing initiative
Behind the celebratory scenes of the first AFL game at Stadium Australia a few weeks ago, between the Sydney Swans and Essendon, was a marketing initiative that has inspired sporting administrators and business to begin copying.
The Swans asked Australia Post to target potential spectators for the historic game with a marketing campaign and, as a result, reached 20,000 out of a total crowd of more than 50,000 who had never been to an AFL game before.
Australia Post undertook a process of demographic profiling of the Swans membership to work out where in Sydney AFL supporters were most likely to live. It then did a letter drop with a special offer on three Swans games in those suburbs. The direct marketing push also took in the suburbs around Stadium Australia in Sydney's west, which is traditionally rugby league territory.
Swans management is so convinced it has struck upon a new way to build its supporter base it has asked Australia Post to do a similar campaign for its next two games at Stadium Australia.
Word of the initiative has reached the Australian Rugby Union, which is looking at using similar techniques across Australia when it comes to selling its Rugby World Cup tickets next year. In addition, a group of Sydney firms have decided to undertake their own pilot program using Australia Post’s mail profiling to launch a series of direct marketing programs relevant to their own businesses.
Australia Post managing director Graeme John said the awareness marketing campaign undertaken for the Swans was a clear demonstration “about getting bums on seats and it clearly showed it worked”.

Mixed fortunes for AFL broadcasters
Winning the television rights for AFL matches has been a boon for Foxtel - but much less of a ratings bonanza for channels Nine and Ten.
A half-season report card from leading advertising agency MindShare has found that football broadcasts this year lost 890,095 viewers.
In bad news for the AFL, most of those losses have come in the major markets of Sydney and Melbourne.
And male viewers between the ages of 25 and 54 were most likely to hit the off button, with 350,000 disappearing compared with the previous year when Channel Seven held the television rights.
MindShare said one of the factors weighing on the audience was the success of Foxtel, which has unofficially picked up at least 130,000 new subscribers on the back of its new AFL coverage. “It doesn’t take a genius to multiply these numbers by the 2.2 average occupancy of each household and understand the effect on AFL viewing on free-to-air television,” the report said.
Other factors contributing to the fall-off in viewers include:
*Lower crowds at matches, down about 3 per cent nationally and much more in Melbourne.
*Some level of dissatisfaction with the AFL at the grass roots level.
*Cheaper alternative entertainment options.
*A more fragmented coverage, with matches on three networks and at varied days and times.
*A lack of success by the powerhouse Melbourne clubs such as Carlton and Essendon, leaving Collingwood as the only big crowd puller.
MindShare Melbourne managing director John Petropoulos said the figures would be a concern for the AFL, especially the figures in Sydney (a major advertising market) but it was not time to panic. He said the Nine and Ten networks still had plenty of time to reap dividends from the AFL deal but so far the free to air rights holders “cannot conclusively justify the dollars spent on obtaining the AFL rights”.
He said many advertisers were still using AFL very effectively, including Carlton & United Breweries and hardware chain Mitre 10.
CUB reaped pouring rights at venues as a sponsor and reached a huge audience of beer drinkers through its advertising, and Mitre 10 used AFL coverage to reach its key audience before and during its peak trading period of the weekend.
Interstate viewing patterns were mixed with Perth improving but Adelaide flat.
Petropoulos said the new broadcasting arrangements would probably take a season or two to bed down.
*Channel Nine’s head of sport Gary Burns said an alarming drop in attendances for AFL games in Melbourne was simply due to television.
Burns said on ABC Radio the reason for the reduction in game attendances - some games in Melbourne are down by 4000 - was because of the new television broadcasting deal between Nine, Ten and Foxtel. He said it is very easy for people to sit at home and watch if every time is televised.
Channel Ten’s head of sport David White said none of the networks wanted a split round of games in the fixture. He believed there would be no split rounds next season.
Burns’ view has been supported by Essendon captain James Hird, who believes the big fall in Victorian crowd numbers this season can be explained by saturation coverage.
With the new broadcast rights deal delivering every game into the homes of football fans, Hird said coverage was almost too available. He said people just were not as desperate to watch footy as they were a few years ago.
Figures after round 11 showed attendances were down by 200,000, or 10 per cent, on last year.
Crowds were up interstate, mainly due to the strong showing of the teams in South Australia and Western Australia.
On the other hand, several of the well-supported Melbourne clubs such as Carlton and Richmond have been down on form.

ARU considering poaching AFL players
The Australian Rugby Union will consider poaching AFL players as it looks to widen its cross-code recruitment strategy, according to Eddie Jones, coach of the national team, the Wallabies.
With memories of the ARU’s raids on rugby league for new Wallabies Wendell Sailor and Mat Rogers still fresh, Jones was asked about targeting the AFL - an abundant source of tall, athletic footballers.
Rookie Wallaby second-rower Nathan Sharpe is a former junior Australian football ruckman who switched codes as a teenager.
Jones said actively trying to recruit AFL players was something that hadn’t been tried yet but would be looked at in the future.
Jones’ comments came after Brisbane Lions midfielder Jason Akermanis told Channel Ten that he was serious quitting Brisbane as early as the end of the season and switch to rugby union next year, if a lucrative deal could be reached. He was convinced he could make a successful switch to defence.
Ten reported that Queensland Rugby Union is frantically drawing up an offer to entice Akermanis. While it is understood the QRU would not be offering the $A500,000-plus that enticed Wendell Sailor (another Queenslander) to switch from rugby league this year, they would seek monies from the Australian Rugby Union to top up any deal offered.
Elton Flatley, who now plays for the Wallabies and attended Nudgee College at the same time as Akermanis, said the Lions midfielder had the necessary skills (“speed, good hands and a kicking game”) and athleticism to make the switch to rugby.

Jackson nominates Gold Coast and Darwin as growth regions
AFL chief executive Wayne Jackson has nominated the Gold Coast and Darwin as the two regions most likely to host AFL teams in the long term.
Jackson said while the AFL had no plans to issue a 17th or 18th club licence, southern Queensland – with its strong expat Victorian population - and the Northern Territory shaped as the most appealing new “homes” for the AFL in the next 20 years.
Jackson said he doubted whether Sydney could support a second AFL side in the foreseeable future. He said Sydney people certainly are not crying out for more footy and the city is the hardest sport market in the country because it has rugby union, rugby league, soccer presence and an AFL franchise.
Jackson conceded that football’s biggest sporting threat came from soccer, although he said it was pointless getting too concerned by the World Cup’s soaring popularity, because it was held only every four years. He warned an even greater threat is other forms of entertainment, followed by sport.

In Brief
*Adelaide’s Football Park is to renamed after the South Australian National Football League (SANFL) entered into a five-year multi-million dollar sponsorship deal with insurance company AAMI.
SANFL president Max Basheer claims the confidential sponsorship agreement will give the league a cash injection equivalent to those experienced interstate.
It will go towards much-needed stadium upgrades and junior training programs. But it will result in the end of a 28-year tradition with Football Park losing its name and becoming AAMI stadium.
AAMI has the option to extend the deal for an additional five years.
AAMI is owned by British insurance giant Royal & Sun Alliance.
*AFL football operations manager Andrew Demetriou has announced that former Carlton champion fullback and Australian team goal keeper Stephen Silvagni had joined the Australian match committee for the upcoming International Rules series against Ireland, replacing AFL national talent manager Kevin Sheehan.
The match committee is Gerard Healy (Chairman), Garry Lyon (coach), Jim Stynes (assistant coach), Rod Austin, Graham Cornes, Stephen Silvagni and Robert Walls.
This year’s series will be held in Croke Park in Dublin on October 13 and 20 (both are Sundays). Tickets will be on sale from August. Check the Gaelic Athletic Association website (www.gaa.ie) for details.
*Former Geelong captain Tom Morrow has passed away. He was 78. A talented ruckman and centre half-back, he played 120 games from 1946 until 1952 and captained the side for several rounds in 1949. He was the number one ruckman in the 1951 premiership side.
Morrow later became the club’s long-time chairman of selectors and controversially accused John “Sam” Newman of throwing the 1969 first semi-final, by asking Newman and teammate Ken Newland after the game if they had been paid to play badly in the 118-point loss.
*Channel Seven has reported that the AFL is looking at new sponsors for the match ball. Seven reported that German car giant Volkswagen, which has its logo on the ball since the start of 2001 season, is considering to pull out of the sponsorship.
*Fremantle forward Clive Waterhouse has been placed on the club’s long-term injury list. Waterhouse is recovering from knee reconstruction surgery, and will not play again until the 2003
season. He will be replaced by Andrew Siegert on the club’s senior list.
Anthony Jones was also replaced on the long-term injury list.
Jones was injured in the round 11 clash against the Western Bulldogs at Optus Oval. He
sustained a rupture to the pectoralis major tendon in his right shoulder.
Jones is recovering from surgery, having had this tendon repaired, and will not be fit to play for the remainder of the 2002 season.
Roger Hayden, who has been on Fremantle’s rookie list for the past two years, will replace Jones on the club’s senior List.
*St Kilda’s rotten luck with injuries will wipe at least $A200,000 from its bottom line this season.
The Saints budgeted $A200,000 for injury payments this year, but are now staring at a figure of more than $A400,000.
St Kilda chief executive Brian Waldron said the increasing list of injuries, which includes Peter Everitt, Austinn Jones, Robert Harvey, Nathan Burke, Stewart Loewe, Fraser Gehrig, Heath Black, Justin Koschitzke and Lenny Hayes, was extremely unfortunate.
St Kilda suffered a similar run with injuries last year, with its payments budget blowing out to more than double.
*The AFL has explained why Western Bulldog Nathan Brown was fined $A5000 for a one-finger salute, yet took no action against Port Adelaide’s Kane Cornes for a similar act.
AFL football operations manager Andrew Demetriou said Brown’s gesture was directed at the crowd, while Cornes’ gesture was at another player and could be considered part of sledging, which he said could not be outlawed but was not acceptable either.
Port Adelaide has counselled Cornes over his gesture. Port football manager Rob Snowdon said Cornes was remorseful and just got caught up in the emotion of the game and particularly the end result.
*Negotiations continue at Essendon over a new two-year contract for star midfielder Jason Johnson.
The 24-year-old Johnson comes out of contract at the end of the season and is entitled to a bonus for winning last year’s best-and-fairest award at Essendon, according to his manager Michael Quinlan.
*Collingwood Media Manager Rob Pyman has taken up a new role for the club in Player Development and Recruiting. Pyman has been replaced in his original position by Nicki Malady.
*Channel Seven sports reporter (and avid Carlton fan) Jim Wilson has not only just turned down a request to join a special Blues advisory board (he cited conflict of interest concerns) but last month was spotted in earnest conversation over coffee with Fox Footy Channel boss Rick McKenna. Wilson’s contract with Seven is believed to expire at the end of the year and McKenna, despite having a full compliment of on-camera personnel, may be thinking about some changes.
*Western Bulldogs fan Dean Townsend is threatening legal action against his favourite club. Townsend told Channel Seven he paid $A6000 for a framed jumper signed by club legend Charlie Sutton at the recent Bulldogs’ Team of the Century charity auction, but when he turned up at the club to claim the jumper, he was told by front office staff that the item was not ready. He also said he was also waiting for a jumper signed by Kelvin Templeton, for which he paid $A9000.
Townsend said if he did not receive the two jumper in the next few days he would withdraw support of $A100,000 in signage rights, and sue the club.
A Bulldogs spokesman said he did not know the details.
*ABC commentator Tim Lane and Channel Nine have yet to agree on a payout over their split on the eve of the current AFL season.
Lane could be eligible for up to $A600,000 (his three-year contract was believed to be worth $A200,000 a season) and legal action has not been ruled out by his management.
*The Men for All Seasons calendar, featuring AFL stars, is celebrating its 10th anniversary this year. For the 2002-2003 calendar, photographer Tony Ryan asked 13 players, including Western Bulldogs’ Daniel Giansiracusa, Geelong’s David Spriggs and Carlton’s Ryan Houlihan, to adopt poses by former AFL models, such as Matthew Richardson and Aaron Hamill. The new calendar hits the streets on August 1.
*Canada has been forced to withdraw from the first Australian football’s International Cup, to held in Melbourne this August, due to lack of financial support.
A disappointed Bruce Parker, president of the Canadian Australian Football Association, said his nation’s decision to cancel was solely down to the fact that the Canada had been unable to raise any substantial sponsorship.
Canada asked each player to raise $C2500 towards the trip but with only 12 players able to raise that sum by the deadline of this week, it was forced to withdraw.

General Silliness
*The Australian Advertising Standards Bureau is investigating a Windsor Smith shoes ad featuring Collingwood footballer Brodie Holland, in which he is sitting with his torso on show while a scantily clad woman squats behind him.
The bureau has received several complaints, however Holland claims the ad is aboveboard. “I can’t see why anyone would have a problem with it at all,” he said.
But as a result of the uproar over several provocative advertisements in recent months, the Victorian Government has revealed plans to make advertisers more accountable for producing sexual images of women and men. Under the proposal companies producing blatantly sexist and provocative images could be blocked from gaining work from the Government.
Victorian Women’s Affairs Minister Mary Delahunty said a charter would be drawn up for advertisers that will be part of the Government’s selection process for awarding contracts to the industry. Companies refusing to adhere to the charter risk losing government advertising because it will be a key element of selection.
The ground-breaking guidelines will be introduced in January next year. They will apply to outdoor advertising campaigns by all government departments and statutory authorities, including advertising on public transport.
*At a recent Carlton guernsey sponsorship function at which the Blues faithful coughed up big bucks for the honour of sponsoring individual players, club president John Elliott proudly announced he now has his private backer: a café in Melbourne City. The amount of sponsorship was not revealed, but Elliott said the figure was equal to that paid by the group which sponsors Anthony Koutoufides (believed to be between $A2500 and $A3000).
*An incident in April when former Swan and Port Melbourne captain Peter Filandia was suspended for grabbing the bottom of Chad Davis has now attracted the attention of overseas media, including ESPN: The Magazine, The Sun in London and the South China Morning Post in Hong Kong.
*A newspaper reader has discovered that Carlton had in fact finished last on the ladder back in 1894, when it was playing in the Victorian Football Association. In that woeful season Carlton could manage only two wins from 18 matches, scoring just 55 goals all year at a pitiful average of just three a game.
In fact, in what in some ways was a mirror year of 2002, back in 1894 the other poor performers included St Kilda, which finished second last with just three wins, and Richmond, which was third last with four wins.
The Blues have already set a new club record, having now been at the bottom of the ladder for more than half the season (the previous highest was five, set in 1998).
However there’s just one more unsavoury statistic looming amid the continuing gloom. You see, Carlton has never gone through a season without having won a match at Princes Park/Optus Oval (the worst year was a one-win 1897) and has only the round-19 game against Port Adelaide to ensure it doesn’t happen in 2002.
*Fremantle’s Peter Bell recently became victim of the “blood rule” in the most extraordinary of circumstances while doing some hosting work for the Fox Footy Channel’s Classic Quarters program to be screened in Perth.
Bell arrived at the Southbank studios unshaven, so at program producer Bill Cannon’s request, network make-up girl Libby Hicks gave the Dockers captain a razor but told him to be careful because it was very sharp.
Cannon said: “Peter mentioned, tongue in cheek I thought, that he was ‘a bleeder’. Anyway, I went looking for him about 20 minutes later and found Libby trying to stem the bleeding from about four nicks under his chin. Eventually she did so, but it was a bit of a worry.”
It turns out Libby is a sister-in-law of St Kilda champion Robert Harvey.
*Coaching has always been a risky business. Nobody knows this better than Tony Jewell, who has had no fewer than three stints at it, including two that ended with the him being sacked, by Richmond at the end of 1981 and by St Kilda in 1984. All of which had prepared him well for his
third attempt at the caper - at Tigerland from 1986 to 1987 - as he revealed amid much laughter on the White Line Fever program on the Fox Footy Channel.
Jewell said that at the end of 1987 he was thinking about retiring, but one afternoon he pretty much had his mind made up for him in the most extraordinary of circumstances during a quiet moment at the club’s Punt Road headquarters. Extraordinary because he just happened to be perched on the loo at the time. “I was sitting in the toilet which backs onto the car park at the club and I overheard two directors talking about defrocking me and appointing Kevin Bartlett,” said Jewell. “So I wandered out of the rooms and ran into one of the blokes involved - I won’t mention their names – and said, ‘Listen mate, I’ve been thinking about retiring’, so I got in early.”
*All-round team efforts don’t come any better than this. When St Bernard’s crushed Williamstown by 257 points on Willi’s home soil in the Victorian Amateur Football Association’s under-19 competition in early June, all 20 players kicked a goal. St Bernard’s manager Paul Garth said to the team’s knowledge it had never happened in the VAFA before. He said at three-quarter-time when 14 players had managed goals, coach David Law shifted the six who hadn’t done so from the back line into the forward line to see if everyone could become involved.
Garth insisted the team didn’t go out of its way to get the ball to the final six players, but that it just happened that way, right down to the final 30 seconds when defender Dane Evans’ snap sailed through for a goal to complete the perfect team scoreline. As for the opposition - well, the less said the better. Not only did they fail to manage one goal for the entire match but their only scores - two behinds - came in the third quarter when the St Bernard’s defenders were apparently busy trying to convince their coach to shift them so they could become part of history. Oh, and for the record, the rout was certainly comprehensive, St Bernard’s scoring 39.25 (259) to 0.2 (2).
By the way, both teams were undermanned: St Bernards had 20 players and Williamstown had only 16. And no St Bernard’s player kicked more than four goals.

Hammerheads update
Made-for-TV club Kensington Hill Hammerheads continued their bullying run, this time sparing no mercy for league lightweights Kealba. The Hammerheads delivered their third 120-point drubbing in a row with a huge away win over Kealba, scoring 22.18 (150) to 4.4 (28).
The Hammerheads controlled the game from the outset, kicking seven goals in the first quarter to lead by 32 points at the first break. By half time the lead had blown out to 58.
Over the Queen’s Birthday weekend, the Hammerheads beat the cash-strapped Brooklyn Bulls by 125 points, 20.31 (151) to 4.2 (26), in front of a healthy crowd of 3000. Full-forward Heath Buck kicked eight goals and midfielders Andrew Jacobs and Justin McCallion had the ball on a string.
But Bulls president Glen Ludolff couldn’t contain his delight. The financially embattled Bulls, who could not pay to renovate their dilapidated club headquarters in nearby Yarraville, are expecting to reap a cash bonanza of about $A10,000 after the generous decision from the Hammerheads to concede home ground advantage to the Bulls, and to donate all proceeds from the day to them.
The match was moved forward from July 27 to accommodate Channel Seven’s telecast of 17th Commonwealth Games from Manchester, England.
However there was uproar the week before the game when club chief executive Greg Miller announced that the senior list had to be revamped because increasing injury toll was hurting its on-field performance. By then 11 players were on the injury list and Miller said enough was enough.
After a preliminary vote by all players, the four names with most nominations were submitted to Channel Seven for viewers to decide which two of them should stay. The nominees were “Chub” Cullinane, Aaron Sweet, “Dizzy” Lynch and Lance Pitt. Results from a week of voting saw Cullinane and Sweet retained (38 per cent and 29 per cent of total viewer vote respectively) while Lynch (18 per cent) and Pitt (15 per cent) were omitted.
The Hammerheads are now searching two quality players to replace them.
In Round 7, Albanvale defeated the Hammerheads by 37 points, 13.6 (84) to 7.5 (47), with the Hammerheads kicking only two goals in the second half after scores were locked at 5.2 (32) apiece at half time.
The Hammerheads have now won five of their last six matches, including victories over North Footscray in Round 5, 22.13 (145) to 18.13 (121) and Glenorden (a team in Werribee) in Round 6, 15.14 (104) to 8.6 (54), and Sunshine Heights in Round 8, 23.15 (153) to 4.8 (32).
Hammerheads coach David Rhys-Jones was charged with making contact with a Glenorden player after the player crossed the boundary match during the match, but was cleared after a WRFL investigation found there was lack of video evidence to support the charge.
Rhys-Jones is banned from entering the field of play after an incident in a seconds match with Heidelberg last year.
After nine games the Hammerheads are level with North Footscray, Glenorden and Albanvale on 24 points, but are placed fifth due to a superior percentage. Central Altona leads the competition on 32 points.
*The hopes of Debbie Lee playing in the Hammerheads had been dashed by a Football Victoria report, which said that no changes should be taken in the foreseeable future to allow female players to play alongside males. Lee, the only female player remaining in the Hammerheads’ senior list, is one of best players in the Victorian Women’s Football League, with five B&Fs. She is now the club’s assistant coach, but she will still play for her old team St Albans in her spare time.
*Former Bulldogs player Daniel Southern, who missed becoming senior coach of the Hammerheads back in March, has walked out of the club altogether. Southern, now a special comments man for ABC Radio’s football coverage, has confirmed that the Hammerheads wanted him to take charge of their reserves team, a position he might have accepted, except when he sat down to discuss a salary package, the management pretty much said: “What salary package?” Southern said he walked out after he decided that coaching the reserves team would not help him financially nor his career.
A club spokesman said Mick Garvina, who missed out on the final squad but was keen to stay involved, had stepped in as his replacement.

That's all for today. See you soon.

Regards,