berniejones
Rookie
Interesting to see the media start turning on each other over the Cousins and Didak issues the past couple of days. First Tim Lane on Saturday, now Rohan Connolly.
http://www.realfooty.com.au/news/ne...-poppies/2007/07/07/1183351518294.html?page=2
Mean-spirited, short-sighted views dog tall poppies
Rohan Connolly | July 8, 2007
YOU could almost hear the sfellowing going on across the country when Ben Cousins strained his hamstring during training at Subiaco Oval on Friday.
Karma seemed to be a popular line. As were the obvious jokes about icing the injury. Just desserts. Serves him right. Etc, etc. Yes, people, bask in the glow of Cousins' latest setback. Make you feel better? Of course it does.
Because that smug satisfaction isn't about sheer mean-spiritedness, jealousy and tall poppies, is it? It's about genuine concerns for the moral leadership of our impressionable youth. The damage done to our great game, etc, etc.
It's amazing how many people who previously couldn't have given a rat's about the AFL's image now quote like a mantra that fashionable chant about "trashing of the brand". Cousins and now Alan Didak will certainly be pretty familiar with it.
It's a very handy shield to hide behind when you want your pound of flesh but need a rationale a little more convincing than merely wanting to sink the boots in. And the hypocrisy of some of the loudest chest-beaters in the football world right from the start of the whole Cousins saga has been breathtaking.
When the story broke, there were lots of glib lines about tragedy, heartbreak and how the whole football community wished nothing but the best for "our Ben", his rehabilitation from a drug addiction and return to the fold.
Feigned sympathy that subsequent posturing has proved to be nothing more than hogwash. Every little step forward Cousins has taken since has been met with a backdrop of bitter resentment.
Why? Because he wasn't seen to suffer enough. That rehab clinic in the US was more like a luxury resort. When every step Cousins took was hounded and filmed, he committed the cardinal sin of daring to smile.
And let's not forget the "disgrace" of that filmed media statement on his return to Perth. Another round of indignation because he chose to wear a low-cut shirt that, tut, tut, revealed his chest. An outrage. String the man up.
This week, it was about Cousins returning straight to the West Coast line-up without coming through the WAFL. Despite the fact he's one of the best handful of players in the competition, renowned for his consistently high levels of output, and whose last start in a practice match, when his substance abuse problems were reportedly at their height, delivered a best-on-ground.
The reservations were said to be about match fitness, upsetting team structure and morale. You couldn't help but wonder, though, whether they were just a convenient excuse for simple petty bloody-mindedness.
There'll be a lot more of that yet. And now the outraged moral guardians of football have a veritable banquet of indignation at their disposal with Didak for their sport.
The jeers whenever he went near the ball last Sunday were sadly inevitable. Again, they could be cloaked as genuine anger about the trashing of the brand. Not the less palatable explanation of a lynch mob drooling at the prospect of a head-kicking.
Victorian Police Commissioner Christine Nixon was one of the few parties to the Didak story with a genuine vested interest. Interestingly, she not only refused to play judge, jury and executioner, but seemed to show genuine sympathy for Didak's plight. Damn you, Christine. You ruined the fun.
Well, for some. Not for another outraged moral guardian in The Bulletin this week, who used the Didak saga to indulge in a bevy of cheap shots not just at the Collingwood forward, but the entire AFL playing contingent of 650-odd.
Here's a selection. "Success in footy is still based on a superior brand of thuggery'.' "Like outlaw bikies, footballers and their fawning menials do not believe sporting stars are bound by society's norms'." And the doozy … "Footballers and bikies share similar attitudes to women'."
Yes, of course they do. Particularly the scores of AFL players who do hours and hours of community and social work, motivated by genuine empathy for those less favoured than themselves, without seeking or receiving any pats on the back. Certainly not from the likes of pontificating journalists spotting a very soft target from behind their computer keyboard.
Like a lot of his playing peers, Hawthorn vice-captain Sam Mitchell has seen a lot closer the impact of drugs on friends and acquaintances than many of those older people who have been rattling their sabres the loudest on the Cousins issue.
The empathy he has for his West Coast midfield opponent is genuine. For Mitchell, and a lot of AFL players, the Cousins saga is not about grandstanding or wielding a big stick, but simply helping out someone who, although having acted foolishly, genuinely needs a hand.
They really do want to see a troubled champion back doing what he does best. Perhaps winning another premiership medallion and a Norm Smith to go with it. And understanding the temptation for Cousins, should that happen, to tell a sizeable army of critics where to go.
Not that they would necessarily be listening. Many of that army would be too busy banging out some spiel about an uplifting tale of courage and triumph over adversity. Genuine words coming from the heart, of course.
http://www.realfooty.com.au/news/news/dont-punish-without-proof/2007/07/06/1183351457323.html
Don't punish without proof
Tim Lane | July 7, 2007
The travails of Alan Didak and Ben Cousins show how quick some are to accuse and judge, writes Tim Lane.
IT'S been another week in which football's "spare the rod, spoil the child" pack has been in good voice. Ben Cousins is a hamstring twinge away from playing again, while Alan Didak's black and white stripes are still those of Collingwood, not of a reputable institution. It hasn't pleased everyone.
This is not intended to trivialise, and certainly not to champion, the follies of a pair of social miscreants. Their misdemeanours had to be dealt with. But the nature of their offences needs to be considered if their penalties are to be seen in perspective.
In Didak's case, Collingwood resisted calls to suspend him after a shooting escapade with a man who is alleged to have subsequently committed murder. The club has been derided as a result.
The Magpies appear to have treated the case as purely one of alcohol abuse. They have imposed a curfew on Didak as well as a condition that bans him from drinking alcohol for the term of his present contract with the club.
The club's sanction was seen as selective and self-serving. Collingwood coach Mick Malthouse says you make special cases for special players. Didak played last weekend against Hawthorn, and suspicion was strong that the Magpies' injury-stricken playing list weighed upon their decision.
Collingwood found an ally in Victoria's Police Commissioner, Christine Nixon. She took a less judgemental view on Didak's inaction after he saw shots fired, saying the goalsneak had been "damned without people really understanding what might be the circumstances". Nixon's comments were timely and impartial.
Such a quality is rare, and invaluable, when matters like this arise. The power of football to blind people with bias is at once depressing and delightful. So much of the talkback opinion on the issue has been along party lines even though this is a matter that, in a sense, could have involved life and death.
When football clubs find themselves in these situations, they face an impossible task in trying to impose just verdicts and sanctions. Their conflict of interest couldn't be more glaring.
They are expected to come up with outcomes that provide justice being seen to be done by the members of what are effectively 16 warring tribes. As one lucid talkback caller pointed out this week, if the AFL Tribunal can't succeed in convincing the public of the consistency of its verdicts, what hope have the clubs?
Hopefully, there will be a growing recognition that the clubs will gain most from courageous decisions that consider the long-term development of their teams ahead of the week-to-week imperative. It's also important that the clubs don't seek to gain excessive control of their players via sanctions.
A club banning an adult from drinking is surely an outrageous breach of his rights. Didak says he doesn't believe he has a drinking problem. From now, if he sits down and has a can of beer while watching a movie or a game of footy on TV, he violates his contract.
If he chooses to exercise his rights as a citizen and do it publicly, he's a goner. Such a draconian measure looks suspiciously like one intended to speak of firm action. Unfortunately, it's firm but not fair.
As for Cousins, he has done his penance and deserves to be welcomed back to the fold. There is no evidence, not even of a circumstantial nature, that he committed a crime against sport by deriving an advantage from drugs. Unless such evidence exists, he must be given the benefit of the doubt.
While he could do with some lessons in humility and public relations, he should be let free of the past. Yes, he let his teammates and his club down, but his greatest crime by far was against himself.
Sounds like the civil libertarians at The Age are up against their female colleague who likes to go the high moral ground!
http://www.realfooty.com.au/news/ne...-poppies/2007/07/07/1183351518294.html?page=2
Mean-spirited, short-sighted views dog tall poppies
Rohan Connolly | July 8, 2007
YOU could almost hear the sfellowing going on across the country when Ben Cousins strained his hamstring during training at Subiaco Oval on Friday.
Karma seemed to be a popular line. As were the obvious jokes about icing the injury. Just desserts. Serves him right. Etc, etc. Yes, people, bask in the glow of Cousins' latest setback. Make you feel better? Of course it does.
Because that smug satisfaction isn't about sheer mean-spiritedness, jealousy and tall poppies, is it? It's about genuine concerns for the moral leadership of our impressionable youth. The damage done to our great game, etc, etc.
It's amazing how many people who previously couldn't have given a rat's about the AFL's image now quote like a mantra that fashionable chant about "trashing of the brand". Cousins and now Alan Didak will certainly be pretty familiar with it.
It's a very handy shield to hide behind when you want your pound of flesh but need a rationale a little more convincing than merely wanting to sink the boots in. And the hypocrisy of some of the loudest chest-beaters in the football world right from the start of the whole Cousins saga has been breathtaking.
When the story broke, there were lots of glib lines about tragedy, heartbreak and how the whole football community wished nothing but the best for "our Ben", his rehabilitation from a drug addiction and return to the fold.
Feigned sympathy that subsequent posturing has proved to be nothing more than hogwash. Every little step forward Cousins has taken since has been met with a backdrop of bitter resentment.
Why? Because he wasn't seen to suffer enough. That rehab clinic in the US was more like a luxury resort. When every step Cousins took was hounded and filmed, he committed the cardinal sin of daring to smile.
And let's not forget the "disgrace" of that filmed media statement on his return to Perth. Another round of indignation because he chose to wear a low-cut shirt that, tut, tut, revealed his chest. An outrage. String the man up.
This week, it was about Cousins returning straight to the West Coast line-up without coming through the WAFL. Despite the fact he's one of the best handful of players in the competition, renowned for his consistently high levels of output, and whose last start in a practice match, when his substance abuse problems were reportedly at their height, delivered a best-on-ground.
The reservations were said to be about match fitness, upsetting team structure and morale. You couldn't help but wonder, though, whether they were just a convenient excuse for simple petty bloody-mindedness.
There'll be a lot more of that yet. And now the outraged moral guardians of football have a veritable banquet of indignation at their disposal with Didak for their sport.
The jeers whenever he went near the ball last Sunday were sadly inevitable. Again, they could be cloaked as genuine anger about the trashing of the brand. Not the less palatable explanation of a lynch mob drooling at the prospect of a head-kicking.
Victorian Police Commissioner Christine Nixon was one of the few parties to the Didak story with a genuine vested interest. Interestingly, she not only refused to play judge, jury and executioner, but seemed to show genuine sympathy for Didak's plight. Damn you, Christine. You ruined the fun.
Well, for some. Not for another outraged moral guardian in The Bulletin this week, who used the Didak saga to indulge in a bevy of cheap shots not just at the Collingwood forward, but the entire AFL playing contingent of 650-odd.
Here's a selection. "Success in footy is still based on a superior brand of thuggery'.' "Like outlaw bikies, footballers and their fawning menials do not believe sporting stars are bound by society's norms'." And the doozy … "Footballers and bikies share similar attitudes to women'."
Yes, of course they do. Particularly the scores of AFL players who do hours and hours of community and social work, motivated by genuine empathy for those less favoured than themselves, without seeking or receiving any pats on the back. Certainly not from the likes of pontificating journalists spotting a very soft target from behind their computer keyboard.
Like a lot of his playing peers, Hawthorn vice-captain Sam Mitchell has seen a lot closer the impact of drugs on friends and acquaintances than many of those older people who have been rattling their sabres the loudest on the Cousins issue.
The empathy he has for his West Coast midfield opponent is genuine. For Mitchell, and a lot of AFL players, the Cousins saga is not about grandstanding or wielding a big stick, but simply helping out someone who, although having acted foolishly, genuinely needs a hand.
They really do want to see a troubled champion back doing what he does best. Perhaps winning another premiership medallion and a Norm Smith to go with it. And understanding the temptation for Cousins, should that happen, to tell a sizeable army of critics where to go.
Not that they would necessarily be listening. Many of that army would be too busy banging out some spiel about an uplifting tale of courage and triumph over adversity. Genuine words coming from the heart, of course.
http://www.realfooty.com.au/news/news/dont-punish-without-proof/2007/07/06/1183351457323.html
Don't punish without proof
Tim Lane | July 7, 2007
The travails of Alan Didak and Ben Cousins show how quick some are to accuse and judge, writes Tim Lane.
IT'S been another week in which football's "spare the rod, spoil the child" pack has been in good voice. Ben Cousins is a hamstring twinge away from playing again, while Alan Didak's black and white stripes are still those of Collingwood, not of a reputable institution. It hasn't pleased everyone.
This is not intended to trivialise, and certainly not to champion, the follies of a pair of social miscreants. Their misdemeanours had to be dealt with. But the nature of their offences needs to be considered if their penalties are to be seen in perspective.
In Didak's case, Collingwood resisted calls to suspend him after a shooting escapade with a man who is alleged to have subsequently committed murder. The club has been derided as a result.
The Magpies appear to have treated the case as purely one of alcohol abuse. They have imposed a curfew on Didak as well as a condition that bans him from drinking alcohol for the term of his present contract with the club.
The club's sanction was seen as selective and self-serving. Collingwood coach Mick Malthouse says you make special cases for special players. Didak played last weekend against Hawthorn, and suspicion was strong that the Magpies' injury-stricken playing list weighed upon their decision.
Collingwood found an ally in Victoria's Police Commissioner, Christine Nixon. She took a less judgemental view on Didak's inaction after he saw shots fired, saying the goalsneak had been "damned without people really understanding what might be the circumstances". Nixon's comments were timely and impartial.
Such a quality is rare, and invaluable, when matters like this arise. The power of football to blind people with bias is at once depressing and delightful. So much of the talkback opinion on the issue has been along party lines even though this is a matter that, in a sense, could have involved life and death.
When football clubs find themselves in these situations, they face an impossible task in trying to impose just verdicts and sanctions. Their conflict of interest couldn't be more glaring.
They are expected to come up with outcomes that provide justice being seen to be done by the members of what are effectively 16 warring tribes. As one lucid talkback caller pointed out this week, if the AFL Tribunal can't succeed in convincing the public of the consistency of its verdicts, what hope have the clubs?
Hopefully, there will be a growing recognition that the clubs will gain most from courageous decisions that consider the long-term development of their teams ahead of the week-to-week imperative. It's also important that the clubs don't seek to gain excessive control of their players via sanctions.
A club banning an adult from drinking is surely an outrageous breach of his rights. Didak says he doesn't believe he has a drinking problem. From now, if he sits down and has a can of beer while watching a movie or a game of footy on TV, he violates his contract.
If he chooses to exercise his rights as a citizen and do it publicly, he's a goner. Such a draconian measure looks suspiciously like one intended to speak of firm action. Unfortunately, it's firm but not fair.
As for Cousins, he has done his penance and deserves to be welcomed back to the fold. There is no evidence, not even of a circumstantial nature, that he committed a crime against sport by deriving an advantage from drugs. Unless such evidence exists, he must be given the benefit of the doubt.
While he could do with some lessons in humility and public relations, he should be let free of the past. Yes, he let his teammates and his club down, but his greatest crime by far was against himself.
Sounds like the civil libertarians at The Age are up against their female colleague who likes to go the high moral ground!
