You could flip that and say it represents a notably poor finishing performance. Something of both, I reckon.

Back to topic, does the standard of the A League deserve better crowds, or are they sitting pretty much at attendance levels commensurate with performance? I think, club by club, yes, with one exception: Melbourne City. But in their case, how do you sell a club without identity or tradition...

I am unconvinced that is true. We will have friendly games coming up and ideally we will see what happens if the shackles are taken off. With Popa though, the odds aren't good in that regard. He's a reactive coach through and through. My concern is that we are going to be slaughtered anyway...

I have to admit that unless it is a crucial game, I now avoid watching the Roos. Life is too short. Is it the players or the coach? The players are an ordinary group, admittedly, but my feeling is that Arnold and now Popa are the drivers of the playing style. They are both coaches who play...

One thing I will say for AFL on an admin level, is that the corporatisation of the sport has been thorough and ruthless, as has been the monetarisation of the code. It is the only part of the sport that can claim to be world class.

What I mainly feel about AFL is disappointment - that so many people in this country attach so much to a scrappy game that is as aesthetically appealing as a headless chook running around a farmyard. It's a cop out that allows people to revel in a completely bogus form of Aussie exceptionalism...

It's complicated. I'm not sure that is accurate, but short of dropping the mountain of work I should be doing right now and embarking on a full blown research project on the subject, I'm happy just borrow a quote from an old, old play and say that the past is is a foreign country - they do...

Sorry, Mono, I beg to differ. Football has always been king, but it was a very different sporting world. I'm not sure how much you were able to absorb during your nappy changes. :)

Context is important. Football then is not what it is now, globally, and remember that World Series Cricket had busted all the norms and changed the game forever. It is difficult now to communicate just how different the sporting landscape was then to anyone who did not live through that time.

This from the Guardian article on the club World Cup: If a professional club team (or several) consistently played in front of stadiums that were half-full or less, one might question whether they’re playing in the right stadiums Indeed one might. The single biggest problem the A League...

Well, at least I was too young to change them for you.

Yeah, who knows what the decision process was.

Looking back, Gallop was a disaster, but Lowy's concept of the A League was deeply flawed and undercapitalised from the outset. What is remarkable, I think, is that the competition still exists after years of declining crowds and disastrous ratings. But the League is entirely dependent on...

Yeah, it was the perfect window, and Packer was putting up serious money - enough to finance an internationally competitive league at that time. He saw it as the winter counterpoint to World Series Cricket. What might have been, eh?

My understanding, which is limited, is that it was around the time of World Series Cricket, and - again, this is a loose understanding - that Packer wanted to create a competition based on a structure of new – Mono will shudder here – clubs. George apparently would not agree to this, but...

And, yeah, I know its La la land stuff. There isn't the money to run one fully pro division, let alone two. It's easy to see what we need; next to impossible to see how we get it. We had our big chance in the 70s when Packer wanted to fund a pro football league. That moron Arthur George...

Football has so many problems in this country, its hard to know where to start with addressing them. The key point of advantage AFL and NRL have is that they are "world's best" competitions. Yes, that may be biggest tadpole (NRL) or only tadpole (AFL) in a very small pond, but it is still...

This amount of money is staggering considering our small population and, as you say, a no (AFL) or joke level (NRL) international dimension. It's crazy - the network CEOs appear to have been sucked into a big swinging dick competition for the rights. I keep waiting for the bubble to burst, but...

He will certainly need to! O'Shea is surely at his use-by date.

My view is that the wierd asymmetrical fixturing is a factor too. The way fixtures for a club are lumpted together and then spread apart is seriously unhelpful. If it was one home, one away and so on I honestly believe it would make a real difference. And this comes back to the number one...