Good God - a postive article.
The last week has exposed the often breathtaking hypocrisy of too many so called sporting journalists in Melbourne.
But, too my shock, today a postive article on Eddie and the club in general (incluing the help its given to poor clubs like North, Bulldogs and Melbourne -
http://www.realfooty.com.au/news/ne...black-and-white/2008/08/08/1218139086152.html
Bagging Eddie is not all black and white
Martin Flanagan, The Age
August 9, 2008
LAST year, when the Ben Cousins story was running hot and West Coast was burning with him, the idea was mooted that poor player behaviour be punished by the clubs involved losing draft picks and premiership points.
I wrote a column objecting to what was being proposed. The tradition in Australian football has always been that the game was open to all, that everyone was given a go. What was being proposed, I said, would lead to clubs censoring themselves as to the type of people they recruited. There'd be no more players like Jimmy Krakouer and Gary Ablett snr, both of whom were in serious trouble before beginning their AFL careers, but it would actually cut a lot deeper than that.
The person who responded most energetically to what I wrote was Eddie McGuire. I received one enthusiastic text after another on the subject. In recent times, he told me, Collingwood had in its team one player who was completing a master's degree and another who couldn't read. Like all clubs, it had kids from broken homes. The AFL has former street kids basically rescued by footy. If you open your door to all-comers, as has been the tradition of our game, there is inevitably going to be trouble. The way football is dealt with by the media, each incident of trouble is portrayed as a crisis for the club and the game.
I originally got to know Eddie McGuire through having a difference with him. I sided with Tim Lane against Eddie calling Collingwood games on Channel Nine. About six months later he tracked me down and an animated discussion ensued. We didn't agree on that, but there was something we did agree on to do with reporting. Like all people who experience fame, he was finding that things he was alleged to have said or done were then being used as the basis for follow-up stories without anyone asking him for his version of the event. He was being fictionalised. I agreed to ring and get his side of any argument from him and not from the media.
Since then I have got to know him reasonably well. I don't understand the ins and outs of his career with the Nine network. I have no idea what his outside business interests are. He burns with a bright flame and I imagine working near him could be wearing. But I would also describe him as a naturally political person. Most people when they talk about politics are really talking about the political game. Eddie's like Michael Long. When they talk about politics, they're talking about what ought to be done, what can be done, to make a difference.
Not knowing him in 1999 when he went to John Howard's convention on the republic in Canberra, I silently agreed with those who said he'd be out of his depth. Now he's someone whose political views I listen to with interest. He was in America last month and what he saw was an economy grinding into recession, or worse. Eddie thinks big changes are coming, and they're not going to be kind.
This week, in the city of Melbourne, two Collingwood footballers featured more prominently in the news than the Olympics. Eddie and I agree on why Collingwood is such a major personality in Australian sport. The 1930s is to Australian sporting culture what the 1960s is to popular music. The world was then in an economic depression. Europe was flirting with fascism. Australians adored a cricketer and a horse, Bradman and Phar Lap. The football club which dominated the decade was Collingwood. Eddie knows a lot about the 1930s. He talks about people like Syd Coventry who captained Collingwood to four premierships, won a Brownlow medal and was later president of the club. "No one talks about him now," he muses, "but his achievements are greater than Michael Voss'."
He also talks about the soup kitchen set up in front of the old Ryder Stand to feed the poor and the homeless; the grandstand built by local tradesmen out of work. He tells me the unemployed got in free to Collingwood games during the Depression.
If you ask Eddie what Collingwood Football Club is about, he says it's about its relationship with the community. The club has a formal "community policy" and is involved in numerous community initiatives.
In the area about which I know most, relations between indigenous and non-indigenous Australians, I rate Kevin Sheedy and Michael Long as the major agents of change over the past 20 years. But Eddie's on the list. When he took over Collingwood, it had the reputation of being the worst club in terms of racial abuse. It was part of a culture that I thought couldn't be changed. Eddie changed it. He had key people who understood what he was attempting, like coach Mick Malthouse and captain Nathan Buckley, but nonetheless the change came from the top.
Of course, you could argue that the change was in Collingwood's interest. Young Aboriginal talent didn't want to go to Collingwood; they were terrified of the place. You can argue the change initiated by Eddie was an example of what is called enlightened selfishness, but I think it goes deeper than that. Under Eddie's presidency, Collingwood has a history of helping other clubs. Each year, Melbourne Football Club's biggest fixture is its Queen's Birthday match against Collingwood. Each year, Collingwood allows Melbourne to take the gate.
Western Bulldogs president David Smorgon says: "Without Eddie, we wouldn't have landed Lease Plan, our major sponsor for the past six years." Smorgon describes Eddie as "a very genuine person who does what he says he's going to do". When the AFL ignored the claims of the Moyston Willaura Football Club to be involved in the 150th celebrations (Tom Wills grew up at Moyston), I rang Eddie. Collingwood, along with Essendon, are now among the sponsors of the Tom Wills night being held at the Moyston footy ground on August 18.
Everyone pays a high price for fame. The price Eddie pays is that everyone thinks they know him and what makes him tick. I don't believe they do. As I read football politics, Eddie is now in a spot of bother. Politics at any level are in part about perception. His comment to the players about his commitment to Collingwood having cost him four gold logies — which he insists was a joke — has taken off.
The old Celtic chieftains were judged in part by the prosperity they brought their people. For 10 years, Collingwood has had great prosperity, but this year, while Eddie says the club will have an operating profit of around $2.5 million, it will have a loss of around $2 million after the sale of two hotels.
And then there's Alan Didak, the club's best player and, in that sense, most valuable asset. As I see it, whichever way Eddie goes on that, he loses. In terms of their careers within the game, a whole lot rests on tonight's match and the rest of the season for Eddie and Mick Malthouse.
Journalists say Eddie is hyper-sensitive to criticism. He may be, but look at the volume of criticism that has come his way in the past week. This paper even ran a full-length editorial critical of him. But if, as Eddie fears, much tougher economic times are just around the corner, I expect Collingwood to step forward and play a part. If that happens, it's in part because Eddie McGuire hasn't let Collingwood Football Club forget where it comes from.
The last week has exposed the often breathtaking hypocrisy of too many so called sporting journalists in Melbourne.
But, too my shock, today a postive article on Eddie and the club in general (incluing the help its given to poor clubs like North, Bulldogs and Melbourne -
http://www.realfooty.com.au/news/ne...black-and-white/2008/08/08/1218139086152.html
Bagging Eddie is not all black and white
Martin Flanagan, The Age
August 9, 2008
LAST year, when the Ben Cousins story was running hot and West Coast was burning with him, the idea was mooted that poor player behaviour be punished by the clubs involved losing draft picks and premiership points.
I wrote a column objecting to what was being proposed. The tradition in Australian football has always been that the game was open to all, that everyone was given a go. What was being proposed, I said, would lead to clubs censoring themselves as to the type of people they recruited. There'd be no more players like Jimmy Krakouer and Gary Ablett snr, both of whom were in serious trouble before beginning their AFL careers, but it would actually cut a lot deeper than that.
The person who responded most energetically to what I wrote was Eddie McGuire. I received one enthusiastic text after another on the subject. In recent times, he told me, Collingwood had in its team one player who was completing a master's degree and another who couldn't read. Like all clubs, it had kids from broken homes. The AFL has former street kids basically rescued by footy. If you open your door to all-comers, as has been the tradition of our game, there is inevitably going to be trouble. The way football is dealt with by the media, each incident of trouble is portrayed as a crisis for the club and the game.
I originally got to know Eddie McGuire through having a difference with him. I sided with Tim Lane against Eddie calling Collingwood games on Channel Nine. About six months later he tracked me down and an animated discussion ensued. We didn't agree on that, but there was something we did agree on to do with reporting. Like all people who experience fame, he was finding that things he was alleged to have said or done were then being used as the basis for follow-up stories without anyone asking him for his version of the event. He was being fictionalised. I agreed to ring and get his side of any argument from him and not from the media.
Since then I have got to know him reasonably well. I don't understand the ins and outs of his career with the Nine network. I have no idea what his outside business interests are. He burns with a bright flame and I imagine working near him could be wearing. But I would also describe him as a naturally political person. Most people when they talk about politics are really talking about the political game. Eddie's like Michael Long. When they talk about politics, they're talking about what ought to be done, what can be done, to make a difference.
Not knowing him in 1999 when he went to John Howard's convention on the republic in Canberra, I silently agreed with those who said he'd be out of his depth. Now he's someone whose political views I listen to with interest. He was in America last month and what he saw was an economy grinding into recession, or worse. Eddie thinks big changes are coming, and they're not going to be kind.
This week, in the city of Melbourne, two Collingwood footballers featured more prominently in the news than the Olympics. Eddie and I agree on why Collingwood is such a major personality in Australian sport. The 1930s is to Australian sporting culture what the 1960s is to popular music. The world was then in an economic depression. Europe was flirting with fascism. Australians adored a cricketer and a horse, Bradman and Phar Lap. The football club which dominated the decade was Collingwood. Eddie knows a lot about the 1930s. He talks about people like Syd Coventry who captained Collingwood to four premierships, won a Brownlow medal and was later president of the club. "No one talks about him now," he muses, "but his achievements are greater than Michael Voss'."
He also talks about the soup kitchen set up in front of the old Ryder Stand to feed the poor and the homeless; the grandstand built by local tradesmen out of work. He tells me the unemployed got in free to Collingwood games during the Depression.
If you ask Eddie what Collingwood Football Club is about, he says it's about its relationship with the community. The club has a formal "community policy" and is involved in numerous community initiatives.
In the area about which I know most, relations between indigenous and non-indigenous Australians, I rate Kevin Sheedy and Michael Long as the major agents of change over the past 20 years. But Eddie's on the list. When he took over Collingwood, it had the reputation of being the worst club in terms of racial abuse. It was part of a culture that I thought couldn't be changed. Eddie changed it. He had key people who understood what he was attempting, like coach Mick Malthouse and captain Nathan Buckley, but nonetheless the change came from the top.
Of course, you could argue that the change was in Collingwood's interest. Young Aboriginal talent didn't want to go to Collingwood; they were terrified of the place. You can argue the change initiated by Eddie was an example of what is called enlightened selfishness, but I think it goes deeper than that. Under Eddie's presidency, Collingwood has a history of helping other clubs. Each year, Melbourne Football Club's biggest fixture is its Queen's Birthday match against Collingwood. Each year, Collingwood allows Melbourne to take the gate.
Western Bulldogs president David Smorgon says: "Without Eddie, we wouldn't have landed Lease Plan, our major sponsor for the past six years." Smorgon describes Eddie as "a very genuine person who does what he says he's going to do". When the AFL ignored the claims of the Moyston Willaura Football Club to be involved in the 150th celebrations (Tom Wills grew up at Moyston), I rang Eddie. Collingwood, along with Essendon, are now among the sponsors of the Tom Wills night being held at the Moyston footy ground on August 18.
Everyone pays a high price for fame. The price Eddie pays is that everyone thinks they know him and what makes him tick. I don't believe they do. As I read football politics, Eddie is now in a spot of bother. Politics at any level are in part about perception. His comment to the players about his commitment to Collingwood having cost him four gold logies — which he insists was a joke — has taken off.
The old Celtic chieftains were judged in part by the prosperity they brought their people. For 10 years, Collingwood has had great prosperity, but this year, while Eddie says the club will have an operating profit of around $2.5 million, it will have a loss of around $2 million after the sale of two hotels.
And then there's Alan Didak, the club's best player and, in that sense, most valuable asset. As I see it, whichever way Eddie goes on that, he loses. In terms of their careers within the game, a whole lot rests on tonight's match and the rest of the season for Eddie and Mick Malthouse.
Journalists say Eddie is hyper-sensitive to criticism. He may be, but look at the volume of criticism that has come his way in the past week. This paper even ran a full-length editorial critical of him. But if, as Eddie fears, much tougher economic times are just around the corner, I expect Collingwood to step forward and play a part. If that happens, it's in part because Eddie McGuire hasn't let Collingwood Football Club forget where it comes from.
