AUSSIE RULES - Writers Forum

LoneWolf · 08-01-2005, 08:24 PM

Holy crap I finally saw it!! Austrailian football is really, super cool. At first I was still neutral, but after 5 minutes I was yelling and jumping up and down. It's like a mix b/t American football, basketball, and soccer. I have some questions, though, if anyone cares to enlighten me.

I must say, it is awesome, and I must salute you fans of Aussie Rules who already knew how cool it was.

Drzava · 08-01-2005, 08:33 PM

I watch rugby on TV, but never Aussie Rules. I can't understand what's going on...I may appreciate it more if I knew what they were doing. Enlighten me too.

journyman161 · 08-01-2005, 08:46 PM

I'm here LW.

I have yet to meet anyone that likes sports who didn't find AFL exciting. Rugby's pretty good, and US faces are a true study when they watch it for the 1st time. It's usually about 3 tackles into the game where you can literally see them realise there's no padding!

But AFL has to be the best game. Its fast, contstant gameplay, the to & fro that stops only occaisionally when there's a free (If there's a foul, the team so fouled gets a free kick of the ball) or the other feature of the game, a 'mark' when a player catches the ball from a distance of greater than 15 metres.

The ball cannot be thrown, it must be either kicked or 'handpassed' A handpass is holding the ball in one hand & using a closed fist with the other to hit the ball, ie. two-handed.

A mark can be a simple pass or it can be spectacular (a 'speckie', as in jones took a speckie or a 'screamer' which is a really good speckie) when one player leaps into the air & at full stretch takes the ball from the air. I've seen many where the knees of the person marking are at head level of the other guy jumping for the ball & although this mostly occurs when the leaper climbs the back of the other guy, some of the marks taken are amazing.

There's a number of aussies who'll be only to happy to help, so ask away.

Talia_Brie · 08-01-2005, 08:52 PM

And just so you know, The West Coast Eagles RULE! So if you want to pick a team to support, jump on the bandwagon (refer to avatar).

And Ben Cousins is GOD! Unbackable for the Brownlow Medal, which is the equivalent of the Most Valuable Player, and still 5 weeks to the end of the season.

LoneWolf · 08-01-2005, 08:55 PM

Yay! J-man!!

That helped me...still a bit confusing with all the words and such.

I've seen a number of players bounce the ball on the ground while they run. What's up with that?

I've seen some "speckies" (HA I feel funny writing that!). They're really cool...I'd love to try that some time. Anywho, thanks for the help. I'll have to keep all that in mind.

Talia_Brie · 08-01-2005, 08:57 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by LoneWolf

I've seen a number of players bounce the ball on the ground while they run. What's up with that?

You're only allowed to run 15 paces without bouncing the abll. It's the equivalent of travel in basketball.

Sometimes if the ground is soft and wet the player will bend down and touch the ball to the ground, rather than bounce it

journyman161 · 08-01-2005, 09:20 PM

0 <<< magpie fan saying nothing about which team.

LW, ignore the rabid eagles fan, there's 16 teams you can choose from. The weagles are just one of those flash in the pan outfits, recently (well,approx 20 years, a drop in the bucket) allowed to play in the big boys game & we have to give them a win now & then or they'll go play by themselves

There's 2 teams in Western Oz, 2 in South Oz, 1 in New south wales, & 1 in brisbane - the other 10 are in Melb, with one of them in Geelong, a provincial city about 45 miles from Melb.

Brisbane Lions, another newcomer to the big game, has been pretty much THE team to beat for the past 4 years, but the weagles are up there this year.

But the finals are always the time it all gets sorted. They're not far away now.

Drzava · 08-01-2005, 09:22 PM

Why do they wear such short shorts? Like retro basketball.

Drzava · 08-01-2005, 09:23 PM

Do teams get relegated if they perform poorly?

journyman161 · 08-01-2005, 09:28 PM

Aussie women prefer them in the tighter shorts, plus, when you run and kick, bloomers like they wear in BB would either trip you or interfere with the kicking action.

relegation was suggested a while back in Melb. We not only have 9 teams in the national league, but also a very healthy Victorian Footy league, & the suggestion was for lowest team to drop back, highest from VFL to come up to AFL - didn't get anywhere. The fans of the 1st team dropped back would have scragged the AFL HQ.

Talia_Brie · 08-01-2005, 09:52 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by journyman161

relegation was suggested a while back in Melb. We not only have 9 teams in the national league, but also a very healthy Victorian Footy league, & the suggestion was for lowest team to drop back, highest from VFL to come up to AFL - didn't get anywhere. The fans of the 1st team dropped back would have scragged the AFL HQ.

As you can see from this in Victoria 'Tradition' is stifling the Leagues ability to adapt to the fact it is now a National Competition.

Around 20 years ago the West Coast Eagles joined the league (after paying a massive joining fee mind you, $1.5 million I believe), which was then called the VFL (Victorian Football League). A few years later the a team from South Australia, the Adelaide Crows, and a team from Brisbane, the Brisbane Bears joined, and the league became known as the AFL (Australia Football League).

The poor sad people in victoria who haven't had a genuine premiership contender in the last 7 years, still have a little trouble with the fact that Australia is made up of 5 other states, and 2 territories.

Journeyman, has Mick Malthouse's life span expired at the magpies. I think maybe it has.

journyman161 · 08-01-2005, 10:03 PM

I grin that we might be miffed about a national competition that comes from a MELBOURNE game!

But my 2nd team is Eagles, cos I lived in Perth for 3 years, 12 months next door to Subi oval.

And you forgot poor struggling sydney swans who, with a city bigger than melb, struggle to find support.

But LW, you can see we tend not to get fired up over our footy. (not) The Malthouse reference is because he's the Collingwood Magpies coach & used to coach out west.

Also, the AFL/VFL game goes back about 130 years, when teams in Melbourne started a comp, & although it has now become a big money game, for most of the 130 years, it has been a game of the workers. Many regret the loss of the halcyon days, when it was family tradition to go to the footy on saturday. In country areas, it still is.

Also, I knew when we had a couple of cracks at the final & didn't get there for the second time, it would be a long recovery. Every team in history that's been in the final twice without winning has suffered for the next 2 or 3 years. It's as if, having almost been there & failed is OK once, but to do it twice running seems to sap the will of the team & it takes some time to get that belief back again.

LoneWolf · 08-03-2005, 12:15 AM

Hmmm...well I sure have learned a lot! I like this one team, but I kind of forget which...it's all very confusing. Uhh...I'll get back to you on that one.

I've noticed that they have more freedom to do stuff. Like...I once saw someone pull on another player's shirt and pull him back, and he didn't get stopped or anything. I'm used to a Holding call.

Oh, and why do they have 3 different goal thingys?

Talia_Brie · 08-03-2005, 01:24 AM

There's four goal posts, two large ones in the middle, and 2 smaller ones on the outside.

To score, obviously, you need to either kick or handball the ball between the posts.

Scoring works like this:

Kick between large posts - 1 goal = 6 points
Kick between smaller posts - 1 point
Kick into larger posts (i.e. hitting the post) - 1 point
Kick into smaller posts (i.e. hitting the post) - out of bounds. If this happens on the full (i.e. without bouncing) there's a free kick to the defending team. Otherwise the umpire will throw the ball back into play.
Handball between either larger or smaller posts - 1 point.
An 'own goal', which is when a defending player carries, kicks or handballs through the goals they are defending - 1 point.

The winner is determined by the highest cummulative score.

BTW, one player holding another's jumper and stopping them from chasing the ball, that's called "holding without the ball" and should be a free kick to the player being held. They don't always get called though, because the umpires are on the ground with the players, and don't see anything (no video umpiring).

The grounds are about 200 metres long, and around 100 metres wide at the widest point. There's 18 players from each team on the ground, and only three umpires. And you've seen how fast the ball moves - 3 decent kicks can take the ball from one end of the ground to the other in 30 seconds. It's hard for the umpires to keep up at times.

Ilan Bouchard · 08-03-2005, 12:36 PM

I tried downloading some Aussie football, but Limewire provided nothing.
It's quite intriguing. Can anyone suggest where I can download a game (I don't have TV and this doesn't interest me enough to rent a season or something)?