RichmondLest we forget.
Melbourne
St Kilda
Geelong
Western Bulldogs
Essendon
Hawthorn
North Kangaroos
Sydney
Fremantle
Collingwood
Carlton
Adelaide
Port Adelaide
Brisbane
West Coast
REVISED: Because this is important.
RichmondThe years shall not condemn this list.
Melbourne
St Kilda
Geelong
Western Bulldogs
Essendon
Sydney
North Kangaroos
Hawthorn
Adelaide
Fremantle
Carlton
Collingwood
Port Adelaide
Brisbane
West Coast
Posts
Your ranking reads very much from the school of “good old Melbourne suburban competition forever”. Do the so-called interstate teams rate so poorly because for example, you have no memories of them running around Windy Hill or Moorabbin? Perhaps you can’t recall “Uncle Doug” on World of Sport handing out Footy Franks to a Fremantle player? Or Port Power players never featured on League Teams with Lou, Bob and Jack? Or a Riccuito or a Modra never got their faces on Scanlens footy cards? Perhaps you need to spell out your criteria for such a ranking and I’ll be better informed! (btw, I used to be "Phil")
ReplyDeleteFilibuster Phil! What a relief. When I saw I had a comment from some newcomer named ‘Murtoa,’ I feared that perhaps this strange, possibly Turkish-sounding name belonged to some decidedly Turkish person who had taken offence at my A-to-Ottoman Scale of Value. Fortunately not! :)
ReplyDeleteNow, to your question: let me make two points at the outset. First, anyone can rank a list of teams based on skills and stats, so I’ve gone for values that are more abstract and that play more to my strength of football ignorance. Second, I am by nature a black & white person (though thankfully not of the Magpie variety), and so, as a Victorian, it follows naturally that all Victorian teams are superior to interstate teams simply by virtue of being Victorian. This parochialism is however, as you’ve seen, not enough to keep all teams above the line.
So. The reasoning runs along the following lines: Richmond. I was five. I had to pick a team. Richmond had just won the Grand Final. I chose Richmond. I do not think this makes me a bad person. My Dad disagrees, and saw this act as a foul betrayal of the family team, Melbourne. So Melbourne comes second by way of placation. St Kilda. As someone who seeks to emulate the Saints of Christian tradition, admiring a team of them seems entirely appropriate. That a team of Saints comes second to a team of Demons is justified by how many Ministers I’ve encountered who follow Melbourne. So, you know, it must be ok. Cats. Need I say more? Western Bulldogs. I love a good underdog, even if it is a dog, and the Western Bulldogs seem like a team of plucky underdogs. And Chris Grant, who’s given his career to a team that’s never achieved much, seems like a noble fellow of great loyalty and character, so tick. Essendon seems to have a number of strong connections to Richmond, so despite most of their supporters being arrogant tossers, they are redeemed as a team. And you’ve got to respect a mad, hard bastard as mad and hard as Sheeds, don’t you? Hawthorn. I hate brown, and yellow, and Dermott Brereton’s mullet, and The Rat's wig, and... actually maybe they should be further down the list? North of somewhere Kangaroos. When North dropped Melbourne, I dropped them. Sydney. As a one-eyed Melburnian I buy fully into the Traditional Rivalry between the two cities, so Sydney really should be at the bottom of the list, but they do actually seem like a decent, professional team, and they do have South Melbourne blood, and that captain guy looks like he’s from Oasis, so I guess they’re ok with me. Fremantle. Awful bloody colours, but at least they’re not West Coast. Collingwood and Carlton are both a pack of munters. Being Victorian did not save them. I don’t know why Collingwood came first. I should have ordered them alphabetically because how do you decide who’s worse? In fact, I should have put Collingwood second because their fans are way more scary. Um, Adelaide. They had to go somewhere. Actually, they are Crows and I like crows. Maybe they should be up above Freo? Port Adelaide. I seriously hate teal. I can’t look at it. It makes me feel ill. Brisbane makes me feel ill, too. Thinking about Brisbane reminds me of when I was travelling around Queensland many suns ago, with the heat and the sweat and endless beaches and stupid big pineapples and nothing much pleasant. Their connection to Fitzroy is not enough to ward off the feeling of oppressive humidity. And last and least, West Coast. Prancing pony boys the lot of them. And I never quite recovered from the shock as a proud young Victorian lad way back in 1986, when Ahab’s mother and brother both chose to change their team allegiance to a non-Victorian team! Could they do that? Was it allowed? I held those self-described “Big Birds” from West Coast responsible. And they have the worst Club Song, worse even than Fremantle's appalling rockeisteddfodesque ‘Freo Way to Go’ Club Song. Shocker.
Um, is that it? How’d I go? Any questions?
Though actually, this is all by the by, as the inspiration for my post came from a feeling that the much-vaunted "Anzac Spirit" seems to mean pretty much whatever you want it to mean these days. Everyone's got their own take on it, and seems intent on shoe-horning their brand or product in, no matter how tenuous or laughable the connection.
ReplyDelete"Here at Telstra, we're Sacrificing the prices on all our 3G handsets, so head in to your Telstra Shop today. Telstra: part of the Anzac Spirit."
I couldn't believe it when I heard the AFL announcer guy on the TV list "fair play" as a part of the Anzac Spirit! "Alright Johnny Turk, I've had a shot at you, mate, only fair now if I let you have a shot at me. Off you go." What? It’s a part of the Australian spirit, perhaps, but not the Anzac one! Surely?
Next year I think I'll declare the "sleep-in" as a part of the Anzac Spirit.
PS: Oh, and Phil, I’m well grateful that you’ve started a blog devoted solely to the Australian Loyalty Scheme scene. Now when people laugh at my cat blog, I can simply point them your way. Hehe.
ReplyDeleteBut seriously, folks, I’ve added your blog to my Reader, and will wait with interest to see where it goes. Fly on.
And ‘scuse the stream of consciousness, but Phil, what are we supposed to call you now? Murtoa? Mr Murtoa? Mr Road? Or still just Phil?
ReplyDeleteAnd can I infer from this new name that you were once a crow-eater? Is this another piece to the Phil-puzzle? :)
The unerring accuracy by which you are slowly-but-surely dissecting my once anonymous background is disturbing.
ReplyDeleteYes, my new moniker does betray my state of origin, hence the chip on the shoulder evident in my swallowing your pro-Melbourne bait.
What a load of AFL rubbish we put up with over Anzac Day, or is that Anzac week. Firstly, what by what god-given right are Essendon and Collingwood awarded the Anzac Day fixture? The contradiction of the AFL – on the one hand they philanthropically prop up the struggling clubs with lashings of TV money, and then on the other hand give a huge leg up to a minority of clubs in the name of “tradition”. What opportunity do other clubs have to form such “tradition”? They should take a leaf out of the SANFL’s book, where the Anzac Day game pits last years Grand Finalists against each other - a blue-ribbon fixture but one that changes every year. And you note quite rightly the ugly and lamentable confusion of football with military notions. Let’s not confuse the horror and revulsion of war with a sporting contest.
I’d like to offer constructive criticism on the rationale for your Anzac team rankings, but my South Australian-ness would shine through too gloomily. Suffice for me to state that the days of a Melbourne suburban competition are long gone, and the bloated number of Melbourne-based clubs is prime for decimation. Let’s merge North and Hawthorn, Melbourne and Richmond, St Kilda and Bulldogs. That would bring us back to a nice even 13 teams. Eliminate the pre-season cup, and over 26 weeks we’d have each team with 24 games and 2 byes, with at last, each team playing each other twice, home and away. Of course, it would awfully muck up such “traditions” as Collingwood playing nearly all of their games at the MCG.
There would be much gnashing of teeth at the loss of identity of those Melbourne suburban teams. But if the advent of the AFL severely diminished if not decimated the former great SANFL and WAFL competitions, then it’s only fair that the old VFL teams cop their fair whack in the name of progress.
Thanks for noticing the beginnings of my blog. To be truthful, I was more interested in seeing how such technology works. The loyalty scene is of some interest to me (as you have noted) but is not an overwhelming passion, so it may or not “take flight”. So thanks for your interest anyway. And for inexorably tearing away my lingering shreds of anonymity! :)
I’m well under-qualified to offer opinions on this, other than to observe that (and maybe it’s just the Promotions Dept at Channel 10 getting carried away, but) it seems every match I see advertised is billed as “Traditional Rivals [Insert Team of Choice Here] and [Insert Other Team of Choice Here] going Head-to-Head! BOOM!. It only takes one or two games to establish a new tradition as hard-fought as those beachheads on the Gallipoli peninsula.
ReplyDelete”Suffice for me to state that the days of a Melbourne suburban competition are long gone...”
Again, well under-qualified, but I like your plan, Phil! Even if it does mean the loss of my team. (Any team'd be better at the moment. Hehe.) Although Melbourne and Richmond couldn’t become the Melbourne Tigers, could they? Or maybe they could? It is a different sport after all. Maybe all Melbourne teams in all sports should be called the Tigers? Although I’d prefer ‘Storm’. I do like that name for a team, fallacy though it may be. Makes we wish I thought rubgy was a sport worth following.
”Let’s not confuse the horror and revulsion of war with a sporting contest.”
Ha. I didn’t mean to laugh, but this reminded me of the exchange between Blackadder and General Melchett from Blackadder Goes Forth before Blackadder and his men go Over The Top into No Man’s Land:
Melchett: Well, fine body of men you've got out there, Blackadder.
Edmund: Yes, sir -- shortly to become fine bodies of men.
Melchett: Nonsense -- you'll pull through. (laughs) I remember when we played the old Harrovians back in '96: they said we never could break through to their back line, but we ducked and we bobbed and we wove and we damn well won the game, 15-4.
Edmund: Yes, sir, but the Harrow fullback wasn't armed with a heavy machine gun.
Melchett: No -- that's a good point. Make a note, Darling...
Darling: Sir.
Melchett: "Recommendation for the Harrow Governors: Heavy machine guns for fullbacks." Bright idea, Blackadder.
Love the Blackadder Goes Forth reference. Certainly left the preceding series for dead, as it were, imho.
ReplyDeleteNaming merged teams is a topic of fascination, and one needs to go no further than the regional Victorian leagues for some fine examples. I like ROC in the Mornington Peninsula-Nepean Football League, being the consolidation of Rythdale, Officer and Cardinia. The acronymic approach is taken a delicious step further with South Gippsland's DWWWW, the concatenation of Devon, Welshpool, Won Wron and Woodside. Finally, there is the curious Yallourn-Yallourn North, with the amalgamation of the two former clubs revealing a lack of economy in its merged form. I await its eventual merger with South Yallourn, generating the mouth-watering prospect of South Yallourn-Yallourn-Yallourn North.
Perhaps the St Kilda / Western Bulldogs combine could become the Dogs Bar Dogs?
”Certainly left the preceding series for dead, as it were, imho.”
ReplyDeleteOverall I’d agree with you. Series One was completely forgettable, and Two and Three had great characters, lines and episodes, but I think Four was the most consistent. As I say, 'Chains' from Two and 'Ink and Incapability' from Three are my two favourite eps Of All Time, but I still think Four was best overall.
Such a shame it eventually had to. Stop. :)
”Naming merged teams is a topic of fascination...”
You certainly seem to know a lot about football, Phil! And “South Yallourn-Yallourn-Yallourn North” sounds like a good name for a horse in the Melbourne Cup.
I’m not sure about any of the names for your proposed mergers. The Brisbane Lions worked well as a new name, if only because it got rid of that awful koala mascot Brisbane had beforehand, but ‘St Kilda Saints’ is a far better name than either ‘St Kilda Bulldogs’ or ‘Western Saints’. Maybe St Kilda should merge with Melbourne: the St Kilda Demons? That could work! I also like ‘Hawthorn Hawks’ better than ‘North Hawks’ or ‘Hawthorn Kangaroos’. Maybe they should just make new teams altogether? Give some other suburbs a go. What about the Templestowe Titans? No wait, the Templestowe Saints (to play on the Temple bit)! I could get behind the Templestowe Saints! Whatever happens, Melbourne has to stay. You can’t NOT have a team called Melbourne!
I could get behind the Templestowe Saints!
ReplyDeleteBringing in non-traditional names has appeal. The introduction of new municipalities in 1994 following amalgamation provides additional opportunity. So Boroondara Bulldogs or Darebin Demons are legitimate starters. With my anti-"Melbourne suburban comp" bias firmly entrenched, I do have to object to persisting with anachronistic geographical pointers . What is currently "west" about the Western Bulldogs? On an Australian scale, they look pretty "east" to me. You wouldn't get Arsenal referred to as the "Northern Gunners", even though they are "north" for other Londoners. I won't even mention West Ham, who in fact reside in East London!
Phil, your impressive Sports Knowledge is making me look decidedly un-Anzacian by comparison. I need to spend more time reading the back page and studying the Form. Although your knowledge of the round-ball game does cast a shadow on your Anzac credentials...
ReplyDeleteFunny how things work out with us having a North and Western team in Melbourne, but no Southern or Eastern.