"You get the feeling that like Monty Python's Black Knight, the Swans would regard amputation as merely a flesh wound."
[QUOTE=stevoswan;763450)
NRL always get the entertainment right....as for the match, wrong team won.[/QUOTE]
Yeah, it's interesting. Somewhere in the NRL HQ there is always someone who knows their music.
The AFL (with the exception of The Killers at the 2017 GF) haven't got a clue.
Oh, and the right team won. I wish the Swans could put together a first half as good as the
Roosters did last night.
Ok, all grand finals involving one Vic and one non Vic team.
Only 3 (1991, 1996, and 2002) has a non Vic team come out marginally in front of the free kick count. Out of 17 such grand finals .
Just 17% , and none for the past 16 years. Damning.
Re the free kick thing ; It's a given the home teams in SA & WA during the regular season are heavily favoured, so it's not
surprising the same thing happens at grand finals and the Melbourne based teams are the recipients of the positive counts.
You wonder if the umpires are ever counseled to not get sucked in by the crowd. Surely the AFL umpiring dept must know
this is an issue.
I have to side with barry on this one. If everything was fair, the law of averages dictates that free kick counts would even out over time. I know we've all seen this table before, but the evidence is undeniable. Is it unconscious bias, probably - but who really knows?
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Yeah, obviously stats accumulated over a long period of time present a picture, not sure why this is in debate.
That said, I'm one who's been saying for a while that while I accept both a home ground bias, and am open (to some degree) to a personal bias in some umpires, the biggest reason why some clubs give away more frees is because it isn't coached out of them. They are not taking enough care to avoid giving the frees away.
And I dare say some coaching staff are ok with this.
What would piss them off is the reactionary silly frees being given away. Hard to coach frustration out of players though.
Case in point would be Richmond (I remember them sticking out on some other table).
How do they have a poor record to 2010, then turn it around for 4 years, and then let it slide back.
They alone could bring some light to why the differential is as it is.
Freo possibly as well.
Would be interesting to see what changed within the teams during the green periods on the table.
The difference between insanity and genius is measured only in success.
This is not relevant to the Swans though. We don't play with aggressive intent (bar Jones) and don't give away free kicks 'willy nilly' through carelessness. We are a ball focused team and are clearly adjudicated with prejudice.
In regard to the 'noise of affirmation' of home crowds, it's real and it's clearly more of a factor in the two states west of Victoria as they are the traditional Victorian rival footy states in terms of Australian Rules history. They hate Victoria (actually, pretty much anything from outside their own state) and this is why their fans are feral and loud and intimidating. Crowds north of the Vic border don't have the inbred hatred of Victoria and 'outsiders' born from the State of Origin era and are rather meek compared with those of SA and WA.....hence less noise of affirmation.
Plus, on top of all that, the AFL simply don't like us because we got Buddy.
Nobody is suggesting that an aggressive style of play and demeanour is causing the free kicks against the team.
Simply, we have 2 choices here
1. The umpires are biased against the Swans
2. The team is not careful enough not to give away frees when playing.
As much as people like to think 1, is at play, in reality it isn't.
To reduce frees being given away, some motions and lazy actions need to be bred out of the team.
The question is - is it worthwhile and more effort required than the benefits it may bring?
Does the differential have that much of an impact on the game (generally - take out anomalies like 2016 GF)
The difference between insanity and genius is measured only in success.
Can't believe I'm saying this, but I think Barry is right on this one and Liz is wrong (is this really me speaking?). In any individual game the raw stats don't tell you a lot about ingrained systemic bias.... but over a long period you WOULD expect it to even out. They haven't got even remotely close to evening out so seems like a lopsided playing field to me.
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yep, this is the point.
My opinion is objective truth in its purest form
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