Footy's future: More Skill, Less Biffo

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Peter P

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A guest at the preliminary finals was a Prof Tomlinson of Sports Studies, Brighton Uni, UK. You may have heard him on ABC Grandstand. It was his first experience of live footy and his view - "very impressive". What impressed him was the size (of playing field and teams), scale (long kicking to short close in work, ground play to aerial skills) and the amazing "multi-skills" of the players - more than any other team sport - the speed, stamina and total athleticism needed.

We have a truly great game. It has got better not worse over the last 20 years. Today it is fast constant running. Team work is absolutely vital, passing over distances up to 50 metres is frequently pin-point and the game flows so much more.

But if you think it was better in the days of king hits and quarterly shirt-fronts - just stay up and watch the old finals in the all night footy marathon next GF eve. Rarely does a pass hit its target, the game was much more pack to pack, kick and hope, and in comparison a far less exciting game to watch. It was all we knew then and it seemed good enough. But neither was there the competition from a hundred global sports.

Footy demands speed (if you don't have it in your legs you gotta have it in your hands and wit), stamina (to see Woewodin run and run the lines against Carlton in the prelim. final was to see something memorable), skill (more than any other game that narrows its skill to a kicking or hand to hand process), and strength. Yes strength - to break a Liberatore tackle, to grasp the ball away from the other hands in the flying pack, to hold your ground against a Mick Martyn and take the ball in one hand, to tackle and hold a charging Dean Wallis.

But you don't need or have strength in your head or your neck when an elbow or a charging hip comes your way. Nobody does and nobody ever will. Forget the big hits that maim. Go watch boxing or Rugby League if you like. If you get hit enough in the head you'll have trouble remembering your sporting deeds anyway.

The Rugby codes have problems with quadriplegia and repetitive concussion, even soccer players who head the ball a lot are now known to suffer mild brain damage - though much of it may be from head clashes causing concussion rather than the soccer ball per se. Aussie Rules Football can rise above all this and be the most athletic and sublime game of all. That's not turning it into basketball, but the game of speed, stamina, enourmous scale and multi-skilled athleticism that so impressed the professor from the old country.
 
Undoubtebly, Australian Rules Football is the greatest sport in the world.
It is the perfect mix of skill and toughness. You not only need to be skilled to play the game, but to back into packs and keep your head over the ball when it is on the ground, is the type of toughness you need to play the game.

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For all your footballing needs be sure to visit my AFL web-site at http://www.geocities.com/eastsydney5/index.html
 
Yes... the game has definitely got better... i totally agree...

let me conclude by saying, that you have proved that Essendon are the Greatest Team in history.. no doubt..
 

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Essendon certainly do play with the perfect mix of skill, speed and toughness. They are a great team. But Long's bump on Simmonds is the sort of reckless rough stuff that can end careers and send mothers and a fair few fathers to basketball and other sports with their primary schoolers.

I wonder if the big hip and shoulder will be outlawed one day. Though I recall enjoying laying them myself, I don't think it would be such a bad thing. The play at ground level would be crisper and certainly you wouldn't get cases like Simmonds. Still plenty of room for tough play as I mentioned in my original post.
 
Does anyone Know of any skillful players lost to the game because they weren't quite tough enough ?

In any case let's try to avoid the cynical play and ham acting that is the norm in world soccer
 
I watched the marathon this year & there is NO doubt that the skills of the game have improved out of sight. The players are also bigger, faster & stronger. Just look at the 77 drawn GF. All the players had stick arms. They looked like a player from today could break them in 2.

The 68 GF was also interesting. Very ordinary kicking skills (luved the droppies though). A 50 yard kick to a pack was a good kick). A Carlton bloke on the wing (Crane I think) seemed to kick off 1 step every time & set up 1 of his team mates with a hospital pass so badly I thought he was going to get killed. Also there were a lot of stoppages as a player took the mark & went back to take a set kick. I can only remember 1 guy playing on after taking a mark.

I think the game is also a lot tougher as well. Not as much biffo but the physical clashes during actual play are much harder.
Still I don't want to see the shirt front taken out of the game. Courage is an important requirement for our game & makes it what it is.

Also who doesn't like a bit of biffo at the footy occasionaly. Not enough to hurt anybody, just enough to realy get the blood pumping.
 
Drakey a bit of biffo is good and does get the blood pumping -- but the players are bigger faster and fitter and the game is so much faster.

The risks are great if the head and neck region is not fully protected by the rules - the Rugby codes get a few paraplegics every year - it doesn't encourage parents to encourage their kids to take up the game and Rugby League in particular has a decline at junior levels. These kids will go to Soccer and Basketball if their parents think Aussie Rules is a risk for serious head or neck injury. The ironic factor is that medical science suggests a high risk of minor brain damage in soccer from heading and concussions related to head clashes.

Australian Football can be different - a game of skill, speed, strength and stamina - a very tough and spectacular game - but someone will get badly maimed if the shirtfront is permitted to stay. We can do without it and the game will prosper in talent and numbers.

A sports medicine conference in Melbourne last week was reported in the press: A researcher said the speed of Footy had doubled in the last 30 years and there were 20% more collisions and the collisions were at higher speed. He said if the rules didn't change the physical wear and tear on players could lead to the game's demise. Footy is brilliant but the players are flesh and blood not terminators.

I suggest the contact rules move towards those of International Rules which are half-way between Gaelic and Australian Rules.
 

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Footy's future: More Skill, Less Biffo

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