It's like a time machine to the 80s! Aussie Rules ESPN2!

OK, we're three pages in, and I can't believe nobody's posted this yet, but ...


AUSSIE!!!! AUSSIE!!!! AUSSIE!!!!

 

I wonder why it's so heavily centered in the Melbourne area and what has spread out west has been more or less recent.

 

Just a historical quirk. Aussie Rules has been the top football code in WA and SA, with leagues operating.

The whole move outside greater Melbourne only started in the early '80s when South Melbourne moved to Sydney.

If you look at the National Rugby League, most teams are based in Sydney with no teams in Adelaide or Perth.

 

I guess my real question is because Aussie Rules and rugby aren't entirely dissimilar. It's not like saying cricket is big in one area and Aussie Rules/rugby is big in another. It just seems that the two are similar enough games that way back when one would have taken a dominant role and the other faded.

I'm glad rugby didn't, I suppose, because if had I guess we wouldn't be talking about Aussie Rules!

 

There are a lot of players who cross over. One of the players for the Gold Coast team that starts next year came over from rugby league.

 

OY! OY! OY!

 

FINALLY!!! ;D

Thank you.

 

My brother-in-law's club, the Quairading Bulls, won both the championships and reserve championship (sorta JV division, as far as I can tell) in the Avon Football League last year. It was supposedly the first time in 30 years the same club had taken both premierships.

Of course, this AFL, out in the Wheat Belt of WA, is just a bunch of farmers who play footy on weekends.

It will be interesting to see if my nephew, who just turned 11, hangs around long enough to play o goes offto university instead. His mom seems to think he'll be coming to the States to matriculate. If he comes during his high school years (Quairading doesn't have a high school), I bet I can make some cash auctioning his skills to any Texas prep team.

 

This deserves a bump for Saturday's (Aussie time) Grand Final: Collingwood vs. St. Kilda.

 

Television time, HanSe? DVR needs to be set or mancave needs to be occupied.

Still can't make St. Kilda's status as anything but a punching bag fit in my mental Samsonite.

 

Don't know the precise time, but ESPN Classic and ESPN3.com including pregame, ESPN2 joined in progress after college football (by the start of the second quarter at the MCG), and complete on TSN2 in Canada.

"One day in September..."

 

10 p.m. Friday PDT on the deuce ... DVR set for post-high school football viewing!