Who needs a World Cup anyway?
NATHAN BURKE
Australia has meat pies, kangaroos and Holden cars – and AFL. I won’t mind keeping it that way.
LAST week I was fortunate or unfortunate, depending how you look at it, to spend the week in London.
As you can imagine, the place is gripped by World Cup fever.
English flags are hanging from shop fronts, cars are adorned with flags and nearly every pub seems to have a shrine dedicated to the event.
To say they are all a bit excited is an understatement.
The reason for my trip was to attend my company’s annual conference.
I went over prepared to wow them with the news that Vertex is now a proud and passionate sponsor of the Mighty Saints (and armed with some international membership forms).
While the news of the partnership and presence in Australia’s premier sporting competition went down well, I was surprised by the distinct lack of knowledge my colleagues from the US and the UK had of the great game.
Basically, the Poms and Yanks had no idea about Aussie rules.
The Americans wanted to know if it was anything like “their” football.
The English wanted to know if it was anything like “their” football.
The Indians knew nothing and became interested only when I said it was played on a cricket field.
On the whole I was extremely disappointed that in this age of sporting media saturation, with 24-hour global coverage and dedicated sports channels, the knowledge and understanding could be so small.
So I set about educating my colleagues on the basics.
The first thing I realised is that describing our game to people who have no idea is quite difficult.
They know rugby. So I started with: it’s a bit like rugby in that we can tackle, except you can’t hang onto the ball when you are tackled.
And of course they know soccer so I continued: it’s a 360-degree game in that the ball can move forwards, backwards and sideways and your opponent can come at you from any angle.
And we don’t wear padding or helmets (well, only the special players).
I doubt whether I was able to shed much light on our game as the vacant looks and attempts to change the subject spoke volumes for their interest.
One question I did get asked – probably due to the World Cup being imminent – was what other countries we played against and if there was a world cup for Aussie rules.
Now, prior to this question I was passionate in my advocacy, but my passion waned when I had to admit that we were the only country that played at a truly professional level.
Immediately I could sense a distinct loss in remaining interest among my audience.
I tried in vain to talk about crowd numbers and how any other competition in the world, including EPL, NFL and MLB, would be ecstatic to attract the average crowds we do.
Alas it was to no avail as a “domestic” sport was of interest only to locals.
I tried to explain our series against the Irish but that lost impact when I said we had to invent a hybrid of the codes.
The only positive there was that people seemed to know less about Gaelic football than Aussie rules.
Several colleagues did mention that they had seen glimpses on stations like ESPN in the early hours but hadn’t watched it for some time.
Perhaps I was trying to push our barrow through streets overcrowded with World Cup euphoria.
But I doubt that was the case as it’s pretty obvious to tell when people have no idea.
I came to the conclusion that it was fruitless trying to engage people about a game they are unlikely to see first hand nor have any interest on a country versus country level.
I believe AFL takes the best parts of all the world games and combines them into one.
However it seems that just being a great game is not good enough to get the attention you deserve.
I have never been to a soccer match here in Australia.
Despite that, I will be taking an interest in the Socceroos’ South African campaign. Why?
Because they are representing my country and probably most telling is the fact that I have found myself taking an interest in Serbian and Ghanaian soccer as well. Purely because they are going to be two of our opponents in the WC.
Now if international competition can have me studying the Serbian soccer team it must play an important role in the popularity and promotion of the game.
And this is what our game is lacking: the ability to inspire non-Australians to become emotionally involved via international competition.
Let’s be honest, this is not going to happen any time soon – if ever.
So we need to look at other possible scenarios for growing the game.
Firstly we could try to get other countries up to a professional standard.
But we will have enough trouble getting Gold Coast and GWS there before worrying about anyone else.
Secondly we could revisit the exhibition game strategy. Even if they were an excuse for expat Aussies to get together and get drunk.
Thirdly, we could push ahead with the Gaelic series. This would need reinventing with games being played in large Irish areas of the US like Boston. Chances of success would be minimal.
So I ask the question, do we really need the Yanks and the Poms?
Why not focus our energy on revitalising the State of Origin series rather than overseas promotion.
The money for AFL comes from here so there is no need to chase the offshore dollar.
The State of Origin series would be the sports pinnacle for a player and if the rest of the world is slow to catch up then I don’t really care.
There is plenty of other stuff we have that is better then them, so why not keep AFL on that list?
