Folau; drop him or keep him?

[Slackboy72]

Typical queenslanders...

 

[nqcowboy87]

http://www.smh.com.au/afl/afl-news/...game-of-mumfriendly-soccer-20100612-y4r1.html

No place for Folau in game of mum-friendly soccer
SEAN FAGAN
June 13, 2010

Big name … Folau. Photo: Darren Purbrick


So, with the signing of Israel Folau and Karmichael Hunt complete, the AFL now has its Ringling Brothers - two NRL stars to act as wandering AFL troubadours through western Sydney and the Gold Coast.

Although Folau is still a NRL player, his role has already begun.

Whenever he now leaps into the air to catch a Steeden, the accompanying written and spoken acclamations will assuredly include ''AFL'' in there somewhere … as if catching the ball was an unknown and unheralded feature of rugby league before last week's media frenzy.

And never mind that the ''mark'' Folau takes in league actually demands he keep hold of the ball if his effort is to be of any value, something that no longer seems to matter for the AFL ''speccy''.

On the other hand, if Izzy should tuck the ball under the arm and run, we will be reminded of what he won't be able to do in AFL.

Indeed, in commenting upon Cronulla fullback Nathan Gardner's incredible length-of-the-field solo try, the ABC's Melbourne-centric Offsiders panel chuckled in half-seriousness that "anybody can do that if you don't have to bounce the ball all the way".

Perhaps we should recall that in 1866 the need to bounce the ball (which wasn't particularly easy on uneven ground with a misshaped ball) was added to Australian rules to make it practically impossible to venture off on a long run while holding the ball instead of kicking it.

Nowadays, AFL players are so proficient at bouncing the ball, and run with the Sherrin so frequently and far, that William Webb Ellis would have willingly joined in. Bouncing the ball is now nothing more than a superfluous show, rather than an impediment meant to stop players from haring off on a ''rugby run''.

And what of the ubiquitous hand pass in AFL? One of the founding rules in 1859 was "the ball, while in play, may under no circumstances be thrown". Player ingenuity soon led to punching the ball to obviate the rule. Given they are all so good at the hand pass in the modern game, they might as well forget the flourish and throw it rugby-style anyway.

Which brings us back to the ''mark'' - a rule that existed in league until the 1960s and is just hanging on in union. Indeed, when the boys at Rugby School first put the game's laws down in writing, the ''fair catch'' rule was No.1. Its purpose was to ensure the well-being of a player who caught the ball - to save him from the opposing pack about to descend upon him.

How can anyone take seriously a code that has evolved a mercy rule into an art form?

But we all know that AFL is rapidly turning itself into mum-friendly soccer with a few handling rules added in for variety. While league, with all its imaginary dangers to the untrained eye, might sometimes give the appearance of being a caged gorilla, there's little doubt that AFL is hurriedly turning itself into a pet poodle.

Ever since the late 1870s the orbit of the Aussie Rules Comet has every few decades or so brought it close to Sydney. As the ''Australian rulers'' again faded into the dark after their 1903-07 passing, one letter writer to the Herald concluded: "The Victorian game may be the best game of football, but if it is so manifestly superior, one would fancy it could plead its own cause, and not require advertising like a quack pill."

Maybe AFL should examine poaching the concepts of rugby posts, off side, knock-ons and full-blooded tackling - then Hunt and Folau would be of some real use.

excellent article and the bolded text is exactly why we shouldnt parade him arouind, it boggles the mind that people cant see this

 

[BDH]

Typical queenslanders...

winning?

 

[RL1908]

excellent article and the bolded text is exactly why we shouldnt parade him arouind, it boggles the mind that people cant see this

Judging by what I heard uttered on tv and radio coverage of RL yesterday, I should have written "Whenever any RL player now leaps into the air to catch a Steeden the accompanying written and spoken acclamations will assuredly include ''AFL'' in there somewhere … as if catching the ball was an unknown and unheralded feature of rugby league before last week's media frenzy."

 

[nqcowboy87]

http://www.foxsports.com.au/story/0,8659,27267831-23211,00.html

AFL boss Andrew Demetriou says Israel Folau's move already worth $9m

June 14, 2010
AFL chief executive Andrew Demetriou says the multi-million dollar recruitment of NRL star Israel Folau has already more than earned its worth in publicity for the code.

Demetriou said the signing - to expansion club Greater Western Sydney (GWS) on a four-year deal, understood to be worth $4 million - had already generated the equivalent of more than $9 million in advertising.

He said the league would have struggled to produce anything like the same sort of promotional impact in NSW and Queensland with a marketing campaign.

"I don't think we've won the battle, but certainly we've been pleased with the publicity," Demetriou said.

"I think the latest report we got was that the Israel Folau publicity generated in excess of about $9 million of publicity, which you can measure and cost.

"If we were to spend $2 million promoting AFL in NSW and Queensland it probably wouldn't get a blip on the radar, to be quite truthful.

"There's certainly a lot of awareness around GWS because of Folau, so from that perspective we are pleased.

"(But) we haven't won the battle, we've always said it's a long haul, we're going to have to do more than just attract publicity around Israel Folau."

But he acknowledged Folau had a long, tough path ahead if he was to succeed as an AFL player.

After fellow rugby league recruit Karmichael Hunt's unremarkable VFL debut for Gold Coast on Saturday, Demetriou said Folau would face an even tougher transition.

"He has to learn a lot more that Karmichael Hunt, he hasn't played our game, which Karmichael Hunt has," Demetriou said.

"And certainly in Karmichael's case he has to work on some other areas, particularly his fitness and so forth and his body shape.''

Meanwhile, Demetriou said he did not necessarily think it was in the game's best interests for Geelong superstar Gary Ablett to move to the Gold Coast, who have put forward a huge offer to try to lure the dual premiership Brownlow Medallist.

He said while an Ablett move would be a "bonanza" for Gold Coast, the club would not be built around one player and sentimentally, he liked the idea of the gun midfielder staying at the club where his father, Gary Ablett Sr, made the family name legendary.

"In many ways the romantic in me likes the thought of Gary Ablett playing at Geelong, he's been a great servant of Geelong."

again we are just feeding them why are we letting our code be a whipping boy, lets have some stones and drop him

 

[hellteam]

$4 million of that publicity is probably because of NSW whinging over his Origin selection

 

[kmav23]

Seeing as he's now signed for AFL, I hope he gets dropped and replaced with Tuqiri.

The irony of your comments !!!

Replace him with a double code switcher who was kicked out of rugby....for discipline reasons...

If you are against code switching then why is NRL taking back all the code switchers ?

They are worse then Faloau as they are switching twice

 

[AuDragon]

I'm sure Demetriou also knows how much publicity $$ value this whole affair has generated for Rugby League in fumble ball land, because this is a sword of 2 edges. But he won't make any reference to that...:sarcasm:

Besides, the first cracks are starting to show!
Note the blog comments! :lol:
http://www.heraldsun.com.au/sport/afl/karmichael-hunt-i-have-doubts/story-fn53khop-1225878930676

And also...
http://www.heraldsun.com.au/sport/kevin-sheedy-begs-israel-folau-punt-rugby-get-fit/story-e6frf9if-1225879216539

This is the stuff fumble ball would like to keep out of the news!