Where everything's made up and the points don't matter...
We're exhausted, grumpy and running out of microwavable cheese-burgers. Heading in to game 6 of this hasty attempt to balance the interests of a litany of conflicting parties, we have to admit it's getting a little tiresome. So while a half-baked Essendon side head north to face the Suns tonight, we were relieved to see a weekend which reminded us what football is about... men in suits arguing about money.
There's no denying the difficulty that faces Tony Shepherd, the man in the suit charged with creating an orange and white army to rival that of the Wanderers. It's not always easy being the new kid on the block. This is especially so when you're an AFL team in Western Sydney, an area that doesn't quite grasp the complexities of our great game and where the locals have ample other pursuits to occupy their weekends.
It makes complete sense for the Giants to try and gain some competitive advantage over their cross-city rivals, but one wonders whether Shepherd's weekend tirade against the Swans might backfire - or at least downfire and leave a gaping hole in his own foot.
In an utterly confounding interview with Fairfax Media, Shepherd denounced the decision of his cross-town rivals to sign Buddy Franklin as 'not a good move', urging the media to ingore his own clubs protracted pursuit of the power forward. Even more astounding was his criticism of the Swan's 9.8% salary cap allowance, arguing that by signing Franklin, the Swans had abused the extra salary-cap space that the Giants also enjoy and tried to use to sign none other than Franklin. It's an argument fraught with hypocrisy that puts the AFL in the difficult position of removing the concession for Sydney while retaining it in the cheaper western suburbs.
It's surely not the last we'll see of the COLA furore. The AFL Commission are meeting in Sydney this week to decide whether, in this Socialist Animal Farm of a league, some animals are more equal than others. While it seems an interesting choice to hold the meeting in Sydney - where it will presumably cost 9.8% more than anywhere else - we're pretty sure that if you look from Giant to Swan, and from Swan to Giant, and from Giant to Swan again, it might be hard to tell which is which...
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In other news...
The Demon resurgence is well on-track under the inspired tutelage of Paul Roos. While James Frawley's optimism stopped just short of actually signing a contract with the Demons, he did take time to mention some of his teammates in the win over Richmond on Friday night - albeit with a small degree of backhand.
"You see Treds on Friday night, he had a form slump the last couple of years but on Friday night he comes out and has 35 touches" he said, leaving some wondering if two years is perhaps a bit beyond a slump.
Carlton and Adelaide also celebrated meaningless victories on the weekend, with $2m man Eddie Betts kicking 5 goals in shorts that actually fit him and former Saint Nick Dal Santo picking up 29 touches.
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The knock on Wood
It would be patently unfair of us not to mention the remarkable 83 point Dream Team performance on surprise Carlton signing Cameron Wood. After he kicked the winning goal, we have upgraded our expectations of him from 'frustrating VFL ruckman' to 'potentially frustrating injury replacement'.
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