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Is he on the hate list too?
No grace in Pagan remarks
By Michael Davis
Friday, June 29, 2001
DENIS PAGAN has been accused of dyeing and curling his hair, and chewing gum incessantly like somebody stuck in a time warp. The man can coach and should be high on the list of Fremantle candidates for next season, even if he is under contract to the Kangaroos.
By and large, Pagan also knows how to lose graciously, mouths the right platitudes in defeat and unfailingly dips his lid to the opposition.
But his comment -- that a ''Chicken Little bounce'' by a field umpire in the closing stages of last week's nail-biting loss to Hawthorn had cost his team victory -- was churlish at best.
The crooked bounce to restart play in the centre of the ground favoured Hawk ruckman Nathan Thompson, who was able to grab the ball and belt it forward with a kick, thus gaining some relief for his tiring team against the rampaging Roos. Thompson's opponent, the gallant Matthew ''Spider'' Burton, had no hope of making a contest of it.
If you were a Roos fan it was gut-wrenching stuff. Your season hung in the balance on a ''skill error'', not by one of your players but by an umpire. Yet Pagan's remark was ill-considered. Indeed, he probably wishes he'd held his tongue.
In the heat of the post-mortem, Pagan may have forgotten a similar woeful bounce had fallen ''Spider's'' way earlier in the match.
One suspects Hawthorn coach Peter Schwab was less than impressed with Pagan's remark.
''What happens in a close game (the Hawks hung on by three points to break a three-game losing streak), everything is scrutinised and I can see that they got the bad luck at the last centre bounce,'' Schwab said.
''But there were plenty of other occasions where things go against you in a game. I think you've just got to wear it. It's just a fact of life.''
Golf's equivalent of the ''rub of the green'', if you like.
There are certainly more pressing problems facing the game than whether or not to retain the traditional ''ball-up'' by the men in white.
No grace in Pagan remarks
By Michael Davis
Friday, June 29, 2001
DENIS PAGAN has been accused of dyeing and curling his hair, and chewing gum incessantly like somebody stuck in a time warp. The man can coach and should be high on the list of Fremantle candidates for next season, even if he is under contract to the Kangaroos.
By and large, Pagan also knows how to lose graciously, mouths the right platitudes in defeat and unfailingly dips his lid to the opposition.
But his comment -- that a ''Chicken Little bounce'' by a field umpire in the closing stages of last week's nail-biting loss to Hawthorn had cost his team victory -- was churlish at best.
The crooked bounce to restart play in the centre of the ground favoured Hawk ruckman Nathan Thompson, who was able to grab the ball and belt it forward with a kick, thus gaining some relief for his tiring team against the rampaging Roos. Thompson's opponent, the gallant Matthew ''Spider'' Burton, had no hope of making a contest of it.
If you were a Roos fan it was gut-wrenching stuff. Your season hung in the balance on a ''skill error'', not by one of your players but by an umpire. Yet Pagan's remark was ill-considered. Indeed, he probably wishes he'd held his tongue.
In the heat of the post-mortem, Pagan may have forgotten a similar woeful bounce had fallen ''Spider's'' way earlier in the match.
One suspects Hawthorn coach Peter Schwab was less than impressed with Pagan's remark.
''What happens in a close game (the Hawks hung on by three points to break a three-game losing streak), everything is scrutinised and I can see that they got the bad luck at the last centre bounce,'' Schwab said.
''But there were plenty of other occasions where things go against you in a game. I think you've just got to wear it. It's just a fact of life.''
Golf's equivalent of the ''rub of the green'', if you like.
There are certainly more pressing problems facing the game than whether or not to retain the traditional ''ball-up'' by the men in white.
