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Concussion and the slow demise of contact sport

contact-sport-concussion — Image: John Hain, www.pixabay.com

As you might know, one of my unlikely ‘hobbies’ is watching rugby league games on television. It’s as exciting as things get around here, especially if your team is winning. Once or twice a year we go to a live game (at least $100 admission for two).

The technology used to televise contact sport has led to a level of live scrutiny the game has never known before. Back in the day you could tackle someone and give him a ‘facial” (mashing your forearm into his face), and if the referee didn’t see it, you got away with an unsporting, illegal ‘dog act’.

The advent of The Bunker (a small team of referees armed with the technology to forensically replay on-field incidents), has changed the game forever. There is only one referee, and he/she can’t be in all places at once. That is why the Bunker alerted the referee to an incident last week where Parramatta Eels forward Reagan Campbell-Gillard slid his knees into the back of Titans hooker Chris Randall (who was already on the ground). It didn’t look good and the player on the ground was in apparent agony.

Campbell-Gillard was sent to the ‘Sin Bin’ and later suspended for four weeks over a grade three dangerous contact charge.

Repeated replays of such incidents prompt mothers (and fathers) around Australia to say, ‘no son of mine is playing that brutal sport.’ Then they sign them up for under-12s soccer, even though 22% of injuries in the round ball game are concussions.

Australia can’t be too far away from a class action brought by former contact sport players for whom repeated head injuries have left a legacy. There have been a few individual cases brought in Australia. Former Newcastle Knights winger James McManus eventually settled out of court after suing the National Rugby League (NRL).

One does wonder how much longer contact sports like rugby league and rugby union can be justified when there is so much evidence to show what repeated head trauma can do to an individual.

Research published in the British Medical Journal canvassed the extent of head injuries/concussions and the risk of under-reporting. The research found that 17.2% of Australian rugby league players suffered a concussion in the previous two years and did not report it to the coaching team or medical staff. About 22% of NRL first grade players admitted to not reporting at least one concussion during the 2018 and 2019 seasons. The most common reason was the player ‘not wanting to be ruled out of the game or training session’ (57.7%) and ‘not wanting to let down the coaches or teammates’ (23.1%).

Rugby league has changed immeasurably since I first started watching the game in the 1980s. Many rule changes occurred, technology worked its way into the game and now, it seems, an entire game is played with player welfare a priority. Back in the day, players commonly used their shoulders to tackle an opponent, usually resulting in the foresaid opponent being concussed and having to leave the field. Players who led with their shoulders inevitably spent time off the field having shoulder reconstructions. Even now, when shoulders are much less utilised than they were, it is not unusual to find a player in his mid-20s who has had two or even three reconstructions.

The shoulder charge is not the only banned ‘tackle’. There is the crusher tackle, the hip drop, third man in and any tackle involving contact with the head. The latter usually ends with a player being sent to the ‘sin bin’. This means the team is a man down for 10 minutes. This commonly leads to the good teams putting on 10 or even 20 points in the period where they have a numerical advantage.

You’d have to ask why rugby league players persist with high contact tackles which sports administrators have agreed are dangerous. At times it seems malicious. True, you might get sent off for 10 minutes, but the bloke you tackled into oblivion is going off for an HIA (head injury assessment) and will not return to the field. The player in the sin bin, perversely, is allowed to return to the field.

Since the tightening of concussion rules in 2016 a few players have retired prematurely because of repeated concussions or ‘head knocks’ as they were once known.

Many instances of high contact are accidental, such as head clashes (at times with your own teammate’s head). Others come from fatigue – the opponent has already beaten you, but you instinctively throw your tired arms up and hit him around the throat, chin, and head.

The NRL, the professional body which administers the game, has in recent years initiated a range of measures designed to protect players from repeated head injuries.

Any contact with the head, be it an accidental head clash, a careless or deliberate high tackle or the unconscious player’s head hitting the ground is reviewed. The Bunker can intervene and order a player off the field to be assessed by an independent doctor.

Typically, the injured player goes off for a mandatory 15-minute HIA. The player may pass the test and return to the match, but more often if it is graded category two or three the game is over for that player. If the contact is deemed serious he may be banned from playing for several weeks.

Some players seem prone to head injuries and in recent years there have been plenty of premature retirements. In the UK, law firms are leading two court challenges, one against World Rugby and another against the promoters of rugby league in England. In all there are some 350 former players involved, all alleging that the sports’ governing bodies failed to protect them from concussion and non-concussion injuries. They allege that these injuries caused various disorders including early onset dementia, chronic traumatic encephalopathy, epilepsy, and Parkinson’s disease.

Despite an older study reporting that 23.2% of parents discouraged their children from playing rugby league, about 480,000 Australian adults, juniors and school children are engaged in the sport.

Speaking of school children (about 30,000 are involved in school programs every year), many will have reached adulthood thinking that sports betting is all part of the game. Sports betting has been legal in Australia since 1983. Lately there is much talk about placing constraints on the industry’s saturation advertising. So far the controversy has led to preposterous warnings after sports betting ads about the dangers of gambling addiction.

Gambling ads are a genuine issue given that NRL games were watched by 119 million viewers cumulatively over the 2022 season, an average of 620,000 viewers per game. The 53% increase in viewers on Channel Nine is reflected in a similar rise on Foxtel, with most games attracting 50,000 to 60,000 viewers.

The choice of betting types is large and varied. Punters can bet on the outcome of league games with novelty bets thrown in: first (and last) try scorer and in big games, man of the match, exact score, and exact winning margin. You cannot yet bet on which player will go off for an HIA, or which player will be sin binned, but never say never.

Australians have bet on stranger things.

More reading https://www.aans.org/Patients/Neurosurgical-Conditions-and-Treatments/Sports-related-Head-Injury

Why our media mostly ignores New Zealand

New-Zealand-News — Photo of Auckland with rain looming by Bernard Spragg https://flic.kr/p/2kXpL9W

The young New Zealand journalist broadcasting from down town Auckland described the rain storms which drenched Auckland last weekend as ‘completely apocalyptic’.

This may not be overstating the case. as Auckland received 284mm (nearly a foot in the old measurement) in the 24 hours from Friday to Saturday – and it kept on raining.

As The Guardian reported on Monday, intense rain on January 27 brought more than 200mm in 18 hours, as recorded by most of Auckland’s weather stations. Some parts of the city were hit with more than 150mm in three hours, prompting flash flooding and landslides. These totals are almost 300% of a normal January rainfall and beat the previous record set in January 1986. You have to go back to 1969 to find more rain that that – 420mm in February 1869.

New Zealand is not unaccustomed to rain – you can tell how much the country gets by how green are its valleys. But Auckland is not at all used to cloudbursts on a scale more often associated with northern Queensland or the Gold Coast and Sunshine Coast hinterland. ABC Breakfast crossed to a Kiwi correspondent on Monday morning, who used the A word but also added ‘it’s still raining’.

By Tuesday, it had eased to ‘light rain showers’ with precipitation at 19% and humidity at 89%. As we all know, any amount of rain closely following a 300mm deluge will wreak havoc with saturated catchments.

Generally speaking, you won’t see, hear or read much about New Zealand on Australian media. If it’s not an earthquake, a volcanic eruption or a mass shooting, they usually don’t bother. One of the reasons for this is that Rupert Murdoch’s News Ltd does not own any newspaper or electronic media in our Pacific neighbour country.

But journalists and others who support Kevin Rudd’s campaign against News Corp’s monopolistic approach might be disturbed to read this.

News Corp did report on the deluge after it initially discovered that two people had died, and there was scary looking footage on a couple of TV networks. Auckland is built on a chain of extinct volcanoes, so many residents live in houses perched on hillsides. Excessive rain causes landslides or slips, as they are called over there. One news channel had footage of a house in Remuera (think Ascot or Toorak) which in Kiwi parlance was ‘munted.’

I’m due to arrive in Auckland next Thursday. For purely selfish reasons, we hope the rain has gone by the time we get there. Among the news stories to emerge from the wet weekend was the cancellation of Elton John’s two concerts at Mt Smart Stadium, better known as the home of the Warriors rugby league team.

Our contact said Elton was also trapped in Auckland as all flights were grounded during the worst of it. One dejected Elton fan could be heard, wading through the drowned streets, clutching a bottle in a soggy paper bag, lustily singing: “I guess that’s why they call it the blues”.

The Australian chimed in later this week with a report, not so much about the death toll of four, but criticism of Auckland’s Mayor for not doing enough. When do Mayors ever do enough eh?

One of my old friends from newspaper days was a Kiwi who was recruited during a little-known period in Australian newspaper history when there was a dire shortage of sub-editors.

Publishers advertised abroad and subsequently hired experienced people from New Zealand, the UK, Canada, South Africa, Northern Ireland and the Pacific Islands. My friend, now retired, hails from Otago. As I recall, he would arrive 10 minutes early for his shift and sift through the AAP news agency feed looking for stories about New Zealand. These would be copied to an internal directory so that those of us in the building whose accents were often chucked off at could keep up with what’s going on at home.

I’ve not done in depth research, nor could I find any, that makes findings on the Australian media’s scant regard for what happens across the ditch. Jacinda Ardern of course got more column inches than any Kiwi politician since Rob Muldoon. Earthquakes, eruptions and mass shootings also attracted the mainland media pack but not much else. It has to be quirky news, like this week’s announcement of the first All Black rugby union player to come out as openly gay.

The online new website Stuff said the former All Black decided to “open up that door and magically make that closet disappear”. Known as All Black No 1056, Campbell Johnstone, who played three tests for the All Blacks in 2005, did confide in some teammates and his family during his playing days. He made his debut against Fiji and played his last game against the British and Irish Lions.

Statistically speaking, of the 1207 Kiwi men who have played rugby union in the famous black jersey with silver fern, 53 of them would be gay.

That this rates as a ‘news story’ from the Australian perspective is a solid example of editors’ approach to selecting New Zealand news. As Jerry Seinfeld would say ‘Not that there’s anything wrong with that.”

We have read stories here about the incoming Prime Minister, replacing Jacinda Ardern. Fair to say he had no media profile in this country, unlike Jacinda, whose shock resignation made headlines in New York, London, France, Canada and Australia.

She may be criticised for not doing enough policy-wise, but she dealt with an unprecedented series of catastrophes in her country that marked her as an international leader of substance. She may be taking time out to be a wife and mother, but I’m sure we have not heard the last of her in politics or academic life.

One example of big news stories from New Zealand which probably did not rate here are those about three Nobel Prize winning scientists.

The most recent was the late Alan MacDiarmid (2000), while Maurice Wilkins (1962) and Ernest Rutherford (1908) also took out the honour.

Meantime, I’m trying to finish the notes for a Basic Computer Skills course that starts three days after I get back from a family visit to New Zealand. As always, I’m trying to balance spending time between family and friends and also having what young Kiwis used to call a ‘OE’ (overseas experience).

As part of that, we will be attending the first major rugby league game of the season, the Indigenous All Stars vs NZ Maoris at Rotorua. She Who Got Up at 10am New Zealand Time claimed early bird seats and also found (with some difficulty) a place to stay.

Next day we are heading off to Gisborne to spend a few days with my sister before travelling further south to catch up with the rest of the whanau. We will take the inland road through Waioeka Gorge because, something that probably didn’t make the news here, a cyclone has destroyed some parts of the East Cape road.

We were going to take the slow drive (5.5 hours) around the Cape to Gisborne for sentimental reasons. It is a beautiful, unspoiled, under-populated part of the country.

I’m taking a rare holiday from FOMM so the following three weeks will feature (a guest blog) then episodes from my Back Pages (curated from almost nine years of archives). Kia Ora and Aroha.

Music festivals and footie finals

music-festivals-grand-finals — Night shot of the Neurum Creek Festival marquee

Some of our musician friends in Melbourne and Sydney have ‘festival envy’, akin to the mixed emotions felt by southern footie fans who will miss out on this year’s grand finals.

As you might know, the National Rugby League (NRL) moved all teams across the border into Queensland. As a result of ongoing Covid lockdowns in Victoria and New South Wales, this year’s Grand Final will be held in Brisbane for the first time ever. Likewise, the Aussie Rules Grand Final has been moved from Melbourne to Western Australia.

As for those southern musicians, most if not all of their live music events have been cancelled or postponed. For people who combine day jobs (also affected by lockdowns), with weekend gigs, these are very hard times. It’s been harder still for those who do earn a living from music and persevere with touring plans and CD launches, only to see them curtailed by lockdowns.

So we can consider ourselves blessed to have performed at one of the few music festivals to go ahead in Australia last weekend at Neurum Creek bush retreat near Woodford (see image above).

The Neurum Creek Music Festival is in its 15^th year, not counting a cancellation in 2020. It’s a medium-sized festival held outdoors (a camping weekend). The organisers hire one very large marquee with associated infrastructure for a bar and a ‘green room’ for performers. It is a minimalist event – numbers are capped at 1,000 and most of the work is done by volunteers. There were three food stalls this year and a hugely popular coffee van. The festival is billed as an ‘acoustic music’ festival,(ie no heavy drum kits or electronica, thankfully. Ed) with 23 acts performing from Friday evening through to Sunday afternoon.

Organisers Angela Kitzelman and Don Jarmey kept a daily watch on Covid developments in Queensland while planning the 2021 event.

“We sat down and assessed the risk.” Angela said. “It’s a very relaxed festival that we run and the money that we spend on it goes mainly to performers, for the marquee costs and the sound guys.

“It was looking at how much we spend and also looking at the situation in Queensland and what the health directions were.

“At the time we decided to go ahead with it, there had been a lockdown. We came out and talked to the camp site managers. They told us that in the event of a Covid lockdown cancellation, people who had booked tickets could get a full credit to do it at another time.

“We realised we could afford to do this at half capacity, as it was at the time, and be very clear that we would pick (the festival) up and put it on another date if something happened.”

After looking carefully at their finances, the organisers decided to press the ‘go’ button, without the usual lead time to host music festivals.

“We invite people to play and say this is how much we can afford to pay.

“We didn’t have enough time to invite expressions of interest so we just asked people who had played here before, abiding by our rule that performers don’t get to play two years in a row.”

“Our advantage is that people come for the festival itself. We don’t have headline performers. We often sell out before I’ve finished finalising the programme. People come here for the experience.”

While Queensland has been able to avoid ongoing lockdowns, some music festivals have been cancelled or postponed regardless. Last month, Woodfordia announced the cancellation of its six-day Woodford Folk Festival, held at New Year. Instead, the organisation will schedule smaller events called Bushtime.

The Byron Bay Blues Festival, which was cancelled just one day out from the Easter 2021 programme, has been postponed again to April 2022. The National Folk Festival, held in Canberra at Easter, has called for expressions of interest for 2022, a move which surprised many, as it was cancelled in 2020 and 2021.

Illawarra Folk Festival artistic director David De Santi took to Facebook this week to announce the cancellation of the music festival set down for 13-16 January, 2022.

“It is just too hard in the current climate for a non-profit association to take the risk on a festival of the scale of the Illawarra Folk Festival,” he said.

Mr De Santi said there was a chance the festival may be able to apply for a grant from the Federal Government’s RISE Fund and reschedule later in 2022.

Despite these and many other cancellations, two smaller music festivals are going ahead in north Queensland next month. Smaller social gatherings where musicians gather to jam have been held or are set down for later in the year. Woodfordia is also staging its Small Halls tour around Queensland country areas.

Professional arts groups including theatre, ballet, opera and orchestral companies have also suffered from lockdowns and Covid restrictions. Some Queensland arts events have since gone ahead, including ballet, theatre, musicals and the Brisbane Festival. Even so, this press release from Queensland Ballet is just one example of how arts companies have struggled to stage shows since Covid started in March 2020.

Queensland Ballet artistic director Li Cunxin took the decision in May 2020 to postpone the season to 2021. Despite forecasting a 43% drop in revenue for 2020 and a drop in patronage for 2021, Queensland Ballet resumed performances in 2021. As subscribers, we were lucky to have seats for sold out performances of the 60^th Anniversary Gala in March and Sleeping Beauty in June. The company also toured the regions (Tutus on Tour). and has five more ballets scheduled between now and the end of the year.

Government funding is available to support the arts, but it is relatively lean compared to the money invested in professional sport. The Federal Government’s $50 million Arts Sustainability Fund might sound generous, but it is spread over two financial years (about $2m a month). Then there is the hard-to-fathom RISE grant program. This post in The Conversation last September tosses it into the too-little-too-late basket.

For the professional sports sector, it has been mostly ‘business as usual’, although at a considerable financial cost. The NRL decided in early July to move NSW and ACT-based rugby league teams and staff into Queensland at a reported cost of $12m to $15m per month. The NRL funded the move, but it needed formal State Government permission to make it work.

As usual, money talks. It comes down to billion of dollars in sponsorship deals, international broadcast rights, betting agencies and other contractual obligations (not the least of which involves players’ salaries).

The NRL decided to relocate when there were eights weeks of the competition left to run (not including the finals). Now, primarily because of the Covid situation in NSW, the finals are being held in Queensland as well. So by the time the NRL wraps up the season in early October, the cost of what was meant to be a month-long trial may have blown out to $45 million or more.

The good news for Queensland is that local hospitality businesses have benefited from this, with more than 500 people living in hotels and serviced apartments for three months.

The hospitality flows most on ‘Mad Monday’, when players who did not make the finals let their mullets down. Let’s hope that the relatively strong Covid bubble around these 13 visiting teams remains unbreached during coming weeks.

We only need to remember the infamous Illawarra Dragons barbecue debacle to realise what could happen amid the inevitable celebrations and drowning of sorrows that follow a grand final.

Go you Rabbitohs!

Morris Dancing And Other Cancelled Events

morris-dancing-cancelled events — Image of Morris dancers at Mt Coot-tha (2019) by Mary Brettell

Most of us have one social activity we love to share with like-minded people, be it Morris dancing, concerts, plays, ballet, rodeos, stock car racing, cricket, playing or watching football (all codes) or participating in surfing carnivals or golf tournaments.

Perhaps camp drafting is your thing (nothing happening here); there are no country shows or rodeos and the list of cancelled music events and festivals goes on for pages.

Even if your interest is excentrique (a dozen friends gathering for dinner and Chateau de Chazelles while trying to speak French for two hours), COVID-19 restrictions have put paid to it.

I might just add, before developing the theme, I’m puzzled why the horse racing industry has not come under much scrutiny for its lack of attention to social distancing. Horse racing, trots and even greyhound racing have continued without disruption throughout COVID-19. Sure, there are no crowds in attendance, but just envisage a typical blanket finish in a horse race: a nose, a neck and half a head. Pity the poor jockeys at the back; copping all that flying sweat, saliva and horse drool. That’s not social distancing, folks. As animal rights group PETA rightly observes, “staff members at a typical race meeting include trainers, jockeys, vets, strappers, farriers, stewards, handlers, and stable and kennel staff. “They’re required to be in close proximity, and many travel considerable distances to attend.” (Nothing to do with gambling revenue, of course. Ed)

But as we were saying about cancelled events, Queensland’s Morris dancers called off today’s traditional May Day event.

Every year on May 1, dancers gather on hilltops at dawn to welcome the sun. Morris dancing is a 14^th century English tradition which lives on, not only in the UK, but in Australia, New Zealand, Canada and the US.

This was the topic of my first FOMM, six years ago. It was an eye-witness account of pre-dawn shenanigans atop Brisbane’s best-known spot to view the city. It was cold, dark and showery, but nothing could extinguish the enthusiasm of musicians and dancers and their loyal followers.

Morris dancers clash sticks and bump bellies, symbolising the battle between the seasons. Morris men often wear hats with flowers, and “tatter coats” and many paint their faces. Dancers use either garlands of flowers or hankies for the gentle dances. But there are as many variations in dress and dance style as there are Morris ‘sides’ or teams.

Brisbane Morris musician and dancer Nicole Murray told FOMM that local dancers would not be congregating at Mt Coot-tha this year, the first no-show for at least 40 years.

“But we are marking the occasion,” she said. “Emma (Nixon) and I recorded a version of Princess Royal (a traditional dancer tune). Everyone is dancing a jig at dawn and filming it. The aim is to do a stitched-together video. I hope that will be the outcome, anyway.”

Amongst other things, COVID-19 has postponed attempts by those who aspire to topple world records for mass participations. World records of this nature are many and varied – mass gatherings of Peruvian folk dancers, people wearing Akubra-style hats, Elvis impersonators, people dressed as Harry Potter, the longest River Dance line – the list goes on.

In 2018, the Potty Morris and Folk Festival set the record for the largest Morris dance in Sheringham (UK) with 369 dancers (33 Morris sides).

(Ed: Bob reels about clutching his head screaming ‘the bells, the bells”)

Nicole Murray’s partner John Thompson penned a song a few years ago which starts: “Dance up the sun on a fine May morning, dance up to sun to call in the Spring…” and traces the English tradition that spawned this annual event. The ritual insists that if Morris dancers don’t dance up the sun, it will never rise again.

May Day also commemorates those who struggled to win the right to fair pay and an eight-hour day. Perhaps that is one reason British Morris dancers arced up last year when the UK government arbitrarily decided to shift the date of the May long weekend (in 2020).

Meanwhile back home, a survey showed that Australians are anxious, bored and lonely as a result of the COVID-19 restrictions.

This may not apply so much to the over-65 cohort, many of whom will tell you they routinely experience anxiety, boredom and loneliness. For example, the highlight of my week was queuing up at 7.15am for my annual flu shot, along with 150 others over-65s. (We stayed at least three walkers apart).

Freedom of movement restrictions are sending some people a bit bonkers. Look how much trouble these rugby league players are in, not only breaking curfew but sharing their co-mingling activities on social media.

Young people are finding self-isolation and social restrictions tough. I offer as evidence the chart that shows more women aged 20-29 have been infected with COVID-19 than any other age group.

We have noticed, on our evening strolls along the river with the dog, increasing numbers of runners, seemingly out for more than routine exercise. Most people whizz by at one or two metres with a cheery “G’day”. Some give us a wide berth, occasionally muttering “1.5 metres mate.” A solitary young man can be seen repeatedly whacking a hockey ball into the net, not missing very often. One can only guess, in these uncertain times, at the level of frustration felt by people who enjoy team sports of any kind.

Even though I have been a rugby league fan for some 40 years, I disagree with the National Rugby League’s decision to restart the professional season in late May. It is irresponsible, fraught with risk and seems to be done for the sake of TV rights, betting agencies, and advertising contracts (not forgetting contractual obligations with players and coaches).

As is often demonstrated, the NRL cannot control what goes on in the lives of young athletes with high disposable incomes. What’s worse is the sense of entitlement the season re-launch implies. It may not be so well known that all amateur and semi-professional footballers (and netball players), were stood down in March. There are no signs at all of those competitions resuming any time soon.

We all may deeply resent the forced curtailment of our chosen sport/hobby/social activity. But it is being done for noble reasons, demonstrated every day with a notable drop-off in new COVID-19 cases. This weekend will be the first big test (in Queensland), as some restrictions are eased. For our part, we may visit Queen Mary Falls, located in a national park some 40 kms from home, just inside the 50km maximum travel allowance. As it’s in a national park, the dog will have to say home. He won’t like it, but rules are rules, eh?

As for the Morris no-show, several people who follow the tradition suggested Morris folk dance in their own driveways, just like on Anzac Day. Accordion and bells at 5am, LOL!

Here’s Nicole’s Murray’s song, Let Winter Begin, about that very magical moment from a southern hemisphere perspective.Let Winter Begin

Canned muzak takes away listener choice

Today I’m keen to vent my displeasure at the seemingly inescapable intrusion of canned music – known as muzak. Background music in public places was once described by violinist Yehudi Menuhin as ‘pollution of the mind’. Menuhin, the consummate classical soloist, led a campaign in the late 1960s to have muzak banned from shopping malls and other public spaces. Muzak is a company set up in the 1950s which produced pre-recorded background music and sold it to shopping malls, restaurants and other public spaces. Muzak was sold to Westinghouse in 1981, then to the publishers of the Chicago Sun-Times and sold again to Mood Music in 2011. Although often known as ‘elevator music’ for its pernicious blandness, Muzak (the company) never actually sold it to lift companies. Muzak was so pervasive in the 1960s and 1970s it became a lower case term for light music of generic sameness).

For my part, I endured it all day every day when employed by supermarkets. There’s a lot of difference, let me tell you, between sub-consciously listening to what Alistair Cooke called ‘audible wallpaper’ while doing a 20-minute shop and being forced to listen from 8.30am to 5pm, five or six days a week. In 1975 I wrote an offensive song about muzak. I didn’t play guitar then, so a friend helped orchestrate my first foray into songwriting and performed it at the Brisbane Folk Centre. There were references to Herb Alpert and the Tijuana brass (This guy’s in love with you), Andy Williams (More), Acker Bilk (Stranger on the shore) and Henry Mancini (Moon River).

From my memory of working in retail, Muzak’s selection of the month was delivered as a reel of tape and was then wound into a reel-to-reel recorder securely locked in a box on the wall of the office.

Fast forward to 2019 and our ears are constantly assaulted by bland music, wirelessly emanating from tiny speakers tucked into the roofs of establishments ranging from coffee shops to football stadiums. I’m not privy to how the music at sports venues is broadcast, but let me give the NRL and even the Intrust Super Cup organisers a bit of feedback – and I mean that literally too.

Various codes of sport feel compelled to fill in any break in play with partial renditions of songs, at peak volume. At the Intrust Super Cup final at Redcliffe, the volume was so deafening, the choice of music (hip-hop, pop, rock, reggae) so ad hoc, that just about anyone within earshot of us began berating the invisible DJ.

The music starts when play has broken down (for an injury or a penalty), and is abruptly cut off when play resumes (just as you were getting in the groove). A snippet of Van Halen or ACDC, bless them, adds nothing to the game, especially when the music is reverberating around metal and concrete grandstands.

Mood music seems to have gone up in standard since my days of listening to Up Up and Away for the seventh time in a working day. Muzak’s 2019 owner, Mood Media, offers a wide range of genres to its clients and I have no doubt about the quality.

My main argument with unsolicited music streamed in public places is just that – it is unsolicited and, rather than put me in a good mood, it does the reverse.

We were having dinner at a city restaurant recently which streamed its own brand of muzak, distributed around a relatively small space. It was not my imagination – the volume increased as the night wore on. I was going to ask someone to turn it down (have been known to do this). But on a trip to the loo I realised the same music was being streamed through all the neighbouring restaurants.

A barista once showed me where his canned music came from – it was one of a set of CDs called Café Music. I asked him did it not get irritating for those who work there.

“After a while you don’t notice it,” he replied. And that is just the point. Mood music is in the background – able to be heard but not intended to be listened to.

George Winter, writing for the Irish Times, described his experience of ‘aural Polyfilla’ while having coffee in a shopping mall.

“Muzak pollutes the air, befouling the connections between one rational thought and another until I begin to think that it probably would be a good idea to buy a tie-rack for the cat.”

Winter recalled October 1969, when Yehudi Menuhin addressed Unesco’s International Music Council.

“Our world has become a sounding board for man-made sounds, amplified to suffuse and suffocate us,” Menuhin said, in part.

The Council had muzak in mind when it denounced “the intolerable infringement of individual freedom” and asserted “the right of everyone to silence, because of the abusive use, in private and public places, of recorded or broadcast music.”

Winter concluded with the observation that as Ireland had banned smoking in pubs, why not ban muzak too?

He cited Professor Stuart Sim’s Manifesto for Silence, where Sims comments on background music not only in malls and restaurants but in pubs.

“It is a deliberate policy on the management’s part. The noise helps to create a frenzied, over-stimulated atmosphere which promotes evermore frenzied consumption.”

Prof Sims’s 2007 manifesto, subtitled Confronting the Politics and Culture of Noise, makes an urgent demand for silence. In the introduction to his book, he sees it as a tussle between those who want more noise (as in the oft-repeated anonymous command of ‘make some noise’ when attending footie games) and those who want none.

“Lifting the ban on mobile phones on planes has opened up a new front in this conflict,” he wrote.

If you have ever been to sacred spaces like Uluru, Notre Dame, the Vatican or the ancient cathedral at Assisi, unwanted background music becomes apparent by its absence.I have oft times wondered if the people you see on trains and buses with listening buds in their ears are (a) listening to something they want to listen to or (b) shutting out the madding crowd with meditative music.It could all be completely wrong, because those on the outside cannot know what is being heard on the inside. That’s the beauty of choosing what to listen to and when.

Academic studies have been done on whether or not students write better essays when listening to music. This survey, trialled with 54 psychology students, concluded that it disrupted writing fluency, although those with music training and/or high working memory wrote better essays with longer sentences.

Likewise, studies have been done to examine the effect of background music in open plan offices (used to mask ambient sound and background conversations). Hmm, is that accountant over there listening to Céline Dion or is he wearing noise cancelling headphones?

As a songwriter, the biggest problem I have with unsolicited background music is that they never introduce or back-announce the track. So on the slight chance a song might sound familiar; you are never going to know. The upside for songwriters is that if your music is used as ‘aural Polyfilla’, the royalty cheques will keep on dribbling in. As I added up my royalty income for the October 31 tax deadline, it became crystal clear I am not and never will be one of those.

The Sound of Silence https://youtu.be/NAEppFUWLfc

PS: As this essay argues, listening to music should be a matter of personal choice. So click or don’t click on this splendid rendition by She Who Sings (aka Laurel Wilson), of Un Bel Di Vedremo from Puccini’s Madame Butterfly. https://youtu.be/WCQEhgpb-qM

Odd socks stamp out mental health stigma

My choice to wear a matchless pair of socks today was a deliberate tribute to Mental Health Week. Odd Socks Day is just one of the many events sponsored through October to remind us that one in five Australians suffer a mental health disorder in any 12-month period.

I’d never heard of Odd Socks Day, but spotted a flyer in a café somewhere and tucked it away for future reference. It’s a national anti-stigma mental health campaign now in its fourth year, using odd socks as a metaphor that anyone can have an off day.

Despite the fact that the majority of people visiting GPs are consulting them about mental health or psychological issues, those with physical ailments are not confronted with the same level of discrimination, stigma and social shame.

Young people are particularly vulnerable to stigma. Research in 2016 uncovered some alarming facts about stigma and what an obstacle it is to people trying to recover from a mental illness. Headspace found that 26% of young people aged 12-25 would not tell anyone if they had a mental health problem and 22% would be unlikely/very unlikely to discuss it with their family doctor.

Fifty-two percent of young people (12-25) identified with having a mental health problem would be embarrassed to discuss the problem with anyone and 49% would be afraid of what others think.

The Royal Australian College of General Practitioners recently found that 62% of people (via the traditional 10-minute consultation), were seeking support for mental health disorders.

The most common mental health ailments likely to afflict people are depression, anxiety and substance abuse. Sadly, many people struggling with depression use drugs and/or alcohol to self-medicate, often with negative results.

In my former work life, the notion of taking a ‘mental health day’ was anathema to your average hard-bitten journalist, for whom the deadline reigns supreme. But in recent years the previously taboo subjects of depression and suicide are now being freely publicised and debated. The hidden cost of not properly dealing with workplace mental health problems is now an $11 billion problem for Australian commerce. There is now an argument that $1 spent on mental health services equates to a ROI (return on investment) of $2.30. So why aren’t we spending?

If there is one indicator to show how stigma and mental health ratio is shifting, it is the NRL ‘casualty ward’, which lists rugby league players and their injuries. Through the season I recall at least six players said to be having counselling for ‘psychological’ or ‘personal’ issues, the latter covering a range of non-physical traumas. Dragons half Ben Hunt spoke candidly to the media this year about seeing someone to help overcome a slump in confidence. Armchair critics (virtual bullies) did not help Ben’s situation, with a steady stream of vitriol posted on social media.

Suicide is often the end-game for people fighting ongoing battles with mental health disorders. Australia’s standardised statistics on suicide are not as high as some (11.7 per 100,000 people). Lithuania (28.6) and South Korea (26.3) head the World Health Organisation list, but Australia is nonetheless in the list of 10 countries with a suicide rate in double figures and has been for a decade.

In Australia, men are three times more likely to commit suicide (17.8 deaths per 100,000 people) than women (5.8 deaths per 100,000 people). More than 75% of all severe mental illnesses occur prior to the age of 25, and youth suicide is at its highest level in a decade.

The telling statistics revealed by the Royal Australian College of General Practitioners clearly show that the system is under untenable strain.

Author Jill Stark wrote about it in a Sydney Morning Herald opinion piece – ‘What happens when the answer to R.U.O.K is no and there’s nowhere to go?’

Stark wrote from a first person perspective, after fronting up to a GP with what she suspected was an acute recurrence of anxiety and depression. She was handed a form to fill in – a routine step in such a consultation, so the GP can make a more objective assessment of the patient’s mental health state. As Stark related, she scored 25 ‘mild to moderately depressed’ and was prescribed medication (after first being asked if she was suicidal).

The answer was no, but on the way home Stark reflected that should she indeed want to kill herself, she’d been prescribed with something well-equipped for the job.

As Stark bluntly pointed out, the time for wristbands and hashtags has passed. Doctors need the financial support Medicare can bring by allowing longer consultations for patients with complex psychological problems.

“As a matter of urgency we must stop rationing psychological services to 10 subsidised sessions per year,” she wrote.

So that was Jill Stark, wearing her odd socks in public. Bravo.

People like Jill who are having an acute mental health crisis need expert support at least once a week for as long as the crisis lasts.

The Black Dog Institute reminds us that 45% of Australians will experience a mental illness in their lifetime. One in five mothers with children younger than two will be diagnosed with depression. At 13%, depression has the third highest burden of all diseases in Australia (burden of diseases refers to financial cost, mortality, morbidity etc).

The World Health Organisation (WHO) estimates that depression will be the number one health concerned in both developed and developing nations by 2030.

That gloomy prediction was no doubt behind the WHO’s decision in 2013 to introduce an eight-year plan to change the direction of mental health in its 194 member states. The plan’s main objectives are to:

strengthen effective leadership and governance for mental health;
provide comprehensive, integrated and responsive mental health and social care services in community-based settings;
implement strategies for promotion and prevention;
strengthen information systems, evidence and research.

Global targets and indicators were agreed upon as a way to monitor implementation, progress, and impact. The targets include a 20% increase in service coverage for severe mental disorders and a 10% reduction of the suicide rate in member countries by 2020.

These are noble aims, but as the WHO observes, it requires effective leadership and governance to implement meaningful change.

Odd Socks Day is one of the rare light-hearted efforts to raise awareness of mental health. Grow, the organisation behind the campaign, runs an in-school peer program that helps young people support each other through their issues.

The overall cost of unmanaged or mismanaged mental health in the Australian workplace is approximately $11 billion a year, according to Dr Samuel Harvey. Dr Harvey, a Black Dog Institute consultant, leads the workplace mental health research program at the school of psychiatry for the University of New South Wales. He was the lead author for research published in The Lancet which found that workplaces that reduce job strain could prevent up to 14% of new cases of common mental illness from occurring.

Quite clearly, we all need to pull up our socks, odd or not, and change our attitude. If only 35% of Australians in need are actively using mental health services, we need to do more than ask R.U.O.K.

Resources: Lifeline 13 11 14, beyondblue.org.au

FOMM back pages:

An eye for an eye – sports injuries and brawls

The news photo of rugby league player Dylan Walker’s fractured eye socket made me feel anxious, like I get when I have an eye infection or it’s time for the annual glaucoma test. If I cover my left eye with my hand, I can navigate my way around the house, but that’s about it. No reading, watching TV or movies; definitely no writing, although I know vision-impaired people who have found ways around reading and writing.

What the auld aunties called a ‘gleyed ee’ or lazy eye was diagnosed in the late 1940s. I don’t remember wearing an eye patch when I was two, but I’ve seen the photos. It didn’t work. I say this only as an explanation if you passed me in the street and I did not say hello, it is possible you passed by on my right side.

Yes, so a serious injury to my left eye would probably see me lining up for the blind pension, although as I understand it, the aged pension replaces the (non-means tested) blind pension when the recipient reaches retirement age. An essay for another day, perhaps.

Last week the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare and Flinders University produced a report on eye injuries in Australia. The report shows 51,778 people were hospitalised due to eye injuries in the five-year period, 1 July 2010 to 30 June 2015. Two thirds of these were males. Falls (35%) and assaults (23%) were the most common causes of eye injuries. The most common type of eye injury was an open wound of the eyelid and periocular area (27%).

However, the report also showed that 86,602 people presented to an emergency department with an eye injury in the two-year period, 1 July 2013 to 30 June 2015. Only 1% of these cases (866) were admitted to hospital.

Sports-related eye injuries were seemingly uncommon by comparison, with just 3,291 males and 595 females reporting that the injury was sustained while participating in a sporting activity. However, information on what activity resulted in the injury was not reported for 69% of cases, so this is likely to be an under-estimation.

Of the known causes, more than one-third (37%) of males were participating in a form of football when they sustained an eye injury. Trail or general horseback riding (12%) was the most common sport-related activity resulting in eye injury reported by females. Over half (55%) of the sports-related cases resulted in an orbital bone fracture.

Such was the case during the Melbourne Storm-Manly rugby league game when a melee turned into a serious scrap between Manly’s Dylan Walker and the Storm’s Curtis Scott, with Scott throwing several punches, one of which broke Walker’s eye socket. Scott was sent off – red-carded as they say in soccer. Walker was given 10 minutes in the sin bin (for throwing a punch) and then had to be assessed for a head injury. Manly player Apisai Koroisau was also sent off for 10 minutes for running in and throwing a punch at Scott.

The National Rugby League (NRL) has been cracking down on such behaviour – Scott was the first person to be sent off for punching since 2015. All rugby league players know if they throw a punch they will at least be sent to the sin bin; angry flare-ups in recent years have tended to be of the push and shove variety.

But whether you follow rugby league or not, it was a bad look, for the sport and for all sports. Imagine the conversations over breakfast.

“Right, that’s it,” says Mum, whose son Billy (8) has been pestering her to play footie. “If you want to play sport you have two choices – soccer or table tennis. Those league blokes are thugs.”

Discussing the Manly/Storm fracas on the Sunday Footie Show, former Jillaroo Allana Ferguson commented: “If they did that in King’s Cross on Saturday at midnight and someone was injured they’d be off to jail.”

She makes a valid point.

A study last year by Dr Alan Pierce from La Trobe University found that repeated concussions in rugby league players have a long-term effect. He compared 25 former league players in their 50s with a control group of a similar age. The men carried out cognitive tests to measure memory and attention spans and dexterity tests to assess motor skills.

“What I’ve found is that the responses of retired rugby league players were significantly different to the healthy controls with no history of head injury,” Dr Pierce told the ABC.

The NRL took steps in 2015 to introduce mandatory head injury assessments (HIA), where players who have suffered a head knock have to leave the field for 15 minutes and be assessed by a doctor. If found to be concussed, they are not allowed to return to the field that match. An NRL injury surveillance report by Dr Donna O’Connor found that head injury assessments increased from 210 in 2015 to 276 in 2016, largely due to strengthened concussion guidelines. Sixty-six per cent of these cases were cleared to continue playing in 2016, compared to 54% in 2015.

If you have seen the excellent Will Smith movie Concussion (about brain injuries in American football), you may well ask why it took the NRL so long to act.

Cheek and eye socket fractures are common injuries in rugby league. They come about through (accidental) contact in tackles, as big bodies collide. Sometimes it happens through ‘friendly fire’ collisions with teammates.

Such was the case with Broncos forward Josh McGuire, whose injury in 2011 required surgery and he is now effectively blind in one eye.

Sports Medicine Australia says the incidence of sports-related eye injuries is low, but severity is usually quite high, as injuries to the eye can result in permanent eye damage and loss of eyesight.

“Research has shown that 30% of sports-related eye injuries in children have the potential for permanent loss of eyesight.

“A blow to the eye from sporting equipment, fingers or balls can lead to injuries ranging from lid haemorrhages or lacerations, corneal abrasions, retinal detachments and hyphaema (bleeding inside the eye) to permanent loss.”

Rugby league is rated a ‘moderate’ risk sport (in relation to sustaining eye injuries) compared to high-risk categories including baseball/softball, basketball, cricket and racquet sports. Any sport that involves small projectiles moving at speed is considered high-risk.

Our family GP once told me most serious eye injuries he had encountered were caused by squash balls and champagne corks.

If you lose an eye, the alternatives are an ocular prosthesis (a glass eye) or an eye patch, the latter having a bad press courtesy of movie bad guys. Think John Wayne’s bullying Rooster Cockburn in True Grit, Adolfo Celi’s menacing Emilio Largo in Thunderball, or John Goodman’s itinerant bible salesman Big Dan Teague (O Brother Where Art Thou).

If it came down to it, I’d opt for a good quality prosthesis, although the price (from $2,500), makes a $10 eye patch look like a bargain.

I’d make it a different colour just because I love that line in the Paul Kelly song about falling for a girl with different coloured eyes.

In the meantime, I will keep wearing Australian Standard safety glasses when I mow the lawns or use the brush cutter. You should too.

Rugby league vs State of Origin

Dear readers, it’s time for those of you who don’t like rugby league or sport in general to get back to posting cat and dog photos on Facebook. Today we ask the unthinkable: why not scrap this faux State rivalry called State of Origin and let footie players get back to their own teams?

Each year at this time, professional rugby league players face a massive conflict. If you’re good enough, fit enough and have that perceived ‘spark’ you’ll get picked for State Of Origin.

Kick-off for the first of three State of Origin games is this Wednesday evening. It’s Queensland vs New South Wales, although not really. You can be born and bred in Cunnamulla, but if your first senior game was played in Dubbo, then by default you become a NSW representative – a “Cockroach”. Likewise for the Queensland team. If you played your first senior footie for Brothers in Brisbane, you’re a Cane Toad.

But as Brisbane Broncos Chairman Dennis Watt says, “It’s always part of every player’s dream to play for their State and play for their country. If they get picked, nobody says no.”

Mr Watt says the State of Origin period (May 31-July 12) is a difficult management issue for the Brisbane Broncos, who have six senior players in the Queensland team for State of Origin I.

“It’s a big impost on the club but also an opportunity for younger players coming through.

“The fear is that top players will be injured. Traditionally we (Broncos) have not done well through the Origin period, with the exception of 2015.

“My other fear is that the junior players will eat too much at the buffet,” he quipped.

A touring group of 45 players, coaches and support staff left Brisbane this week, flying to Auckland for the match against the New Zealand Warriors. The group included 20 players from the Broncos under-20 team, who will also play on Saturday. All travel, accommodation and ancillary costs are covered by the NRL.

“The downside of State of Origin is that we are missing some of our best players,” he said. “We haven’t been playing great footy for 80 minutes (this year), but there’s a bit of grit about the team.”

Mr Watt, a former newspaper executive, says he is enjoying the challenge of helping Broncos chief executive Paul White oversee the construction of the Broncos’ new $27 million headquarters at Red Hill.

NRL.Com’s New Zealand correspondent Corey Rosser, previewing Saturday’s game at Mt Smart Stadium, seemed to be predicting a Broncos win. He reminded readers of the Warriors 30-14 loss to the St George Illawarra Dragons last week, while Brisbane scored six tries against the Wests Tigers to win 36-0.

Six Broncos players and Warriors veteran Jacob Lillyman will miss the Round 12 match in Auckland due to State of Origin commitments. The Broncos will be missing Darius Boyd, Corey Oates, Anthony Milford, Josh McGuire, Matt Gillett and Sam Thaiday. Also missing from the squad is hooker Andrew McCullough (injured).

Halfback Ben Hunt returns from injury, joining utility player Benji Marshall, who has had limited playing time for the Broncos in 2017. Newcomers or players who rarely get a run include Jai Arrow, Jonus Pearson, Jaydn Su’A, Travis Waddell and George Fai (making his first-grade debut). The Broncos named Tevita Pangai Junior, Jamayne Isaako and Joe Boyce as reserves.

We were at Lang Park stadium in Brisbane on May 13 for the ‘double-header’ rugby league event. We got there at 5.15 and the first game between The Gold Coast Titans and the Melbourne Storm had already started. The crowd, which later swelled to 44,127, was already vocal. There were conflicting cries of “Go Billy, Go” or “Hayne Train.” If you want a quiet Saturday night out, don’t do it to yourself.

It is interesting how a football stadium becomes a microcosm of the broader city. There were a few “pre-loaded” young blokes intent upon drinking themselves into a stupor, a few young women wearing heels and nightclub clothes instead of the ubiquitous Broncos fan jumpers. There were also happy family groups behind and in front of us, one woman willing to take our photo ‘in situ.’

“Don’t try posting that to Facebook from here, mate” she advised. “Everyone’s on it and it will take ages to upload.” She was right. The Titans made an unbelievable comeback and beat the Storm 38-36.

Then we were between matches. The Manly cheerleaders came on the field in tiny white shorts and halter tops and did a dance routine. Many people streamed out and thronged to the bar. There were queues for food, queues for the loos and those not otherwise engaged were checking their phones or checking out the tiny white shorts.

When I returned to my seat, the Little League game was in progress. These keen young kids play across a small section of the field at half-time. Even with the under-6 kids, you can spot the future stars. They are the ones who run straight and hard, tackle properly or who show footwork and pace. One particular young lad crossed the goal line four times. There are a few different age categories of mini league kids between 6 and 10. Hard to know which is which when there’s no commentary, just a seemingly muddled group of kids getting carved up by the three or four who know what’s going on.

“Go, son, go” came a shout from somewhere behind me, “Go! You beauty.” (as the kid scored between the plastic goal posts.

Then Manly (boo) and the Brisbane Broncos (yay) ran out for the main match. We were up and down like that Whack-A-Mole sideshow game. Every few minutes we were standing, flipping back our seats back while someone struggled their way to the other end of the row, carrying four dribbling beers in a plastic tray. This went on all night, even though drinks are expensive at Lang Park (sorry, Suncorp Stadium). She Who Listens to the Radio While Watching Footie shouted “Why don’t you sit down and stay sat.” I pointed out that as she had headphones in her ears, the remark may have been louder than she thought. “Good,” she mouthed.

Despite a dismal first half, when Manly piled on 14 unanswered points, one of the best coaches in the game (Wayne Bennett) must have said inspiring words at half-time. The Broncos came back from a 14-0 deficit to win the match 24-14.

As 44,127 people were being squeezed like toothpaste out of Suncorp Stadium’s various exits, I had that panicky feeling like when you’re about to go under anaesthetic but nobody has given you pethidine yet.

If you don’t like crowds and noise and can’t afford decent seats, you’re far better off watching rugby league on TV, or listen to the game on ABC Grandstand. You’ll get a better word picture of the game and even details often missed by Nine’s commentators like who replaced who from the bench (and why). And you’ll never hear discussions about whether players should wear their socks up or down.

Shut up, Gus!

Bread and circuses

broncos-vs-raiders — Photo by JunkByJo https://flic.kr/p/5ai8X8 (How quickly faces change in the NRL: Broncos vs Raiders 2008 (l-r) Carmichael Hunt (AFL), Michael Ennis (Sharks), Darren Lockyer (commentator), Denan Kemp (Australian Sevens), Dane Gagai (Newcastle), Nick Kenny (retired)

Not for nothing did the Roman Empire invent the phrase ‘bread and circuses.’ This unbeatable public policy formula was coined by a Roman scribe in an attempt to arrest the decline of heroism among Romans. It means a government soothing its anxious tax payers by providing food and grand spectacles, in this context, the footie grand final.

In Roman times the serfs gathered in vast public arenas, encouraged to give the thumbs down to beaten gladiators. Today we have the less life-threatening ‘Mexican Wave’ and the lone dickhead yelling something incomprehensible during a minute’s silence to honour a fallen comrade.

At a base level, keeping the people dull-witted by swamping them with heroic spectacles (the Olympics, the Ashes, the Melbourne Cup, the World Cup, the State of Origin, the Tour De France, Wimbledon, the Australian Open, the FA Cup, the Grand Prix…) can and does work.

Some might say it stops us analysing what is wrong with the world and how best to fix it. It might even be where a lot of the money that could be used to fix what’s wrong with the world is spent.

There’s nothing like Grand Final weekend to focus the mind on just how much money is spent organising, promoting and playing professional sports. We’ll talk about the Australian Football League (AFL) final in a bit, but for purely parochial purposes, let’s look at the National Rugby League (NRL) grand final.

There’s a reason 4.4 million people tuned in to Channel Nine last year for the 80-minute plus overtime contest between the Cowboys and the Broncos (the Cowboys won 17-16 in the ‘golden point’ overtime period, remember?). It comes down to the cost of actually attending the game. Tickets at Sydney’s Olympic Park this year range from $45 to $375. If you drive there, a standard parking fee of $25 applies. So even if Mum Dad and the two kids drive to the game and snag the cheapest tickets, it’s still a $300 day out by the time you factor in petrol, pies and burgers, chips, beer and whatever memorabilia is sold to you on the way in (and out).

Bu that is small beer compared to the Victorian Government’s decision to declare a new public holiday for the AFL Grand Final. An economic impact study by PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) estimated the costs of the two new public holidays (the other adds Easter Sunday to Good Friday as a gazetted public holiday), at between $717 million and $898 million. But as The Age reported, the Grand Final Eve holiday accounts for up to $852 million of the costs. PwC estimates the new public holidays will result in increased public holiday wage payments of between $252 million and $286 million.

Notwithstanding, this weekend offers a veritable feast of footie, especially if you follow both codes (AFL and NRL), and you can watch the games live on TV for nothing. Last year’s AFL final between the West Coast Eagles and Hawthorn drew 3.9 million viewers for the Saturday afternoon game. At $180 to $399 for a reserved seat at the Melbourne Cricket Ground you can understand why.

Well, there’s no such thing as a free lunch. Footie finals means enduring saturation level advertising. At $130k minimum for a 30-second TV ad, advertisers nevertheless throw buckets of cash at the time slot to ensure its viewers know that their brand of car, beer, burger, mobile phone, betting app or hipster beard styling product is the best.

The stars of the show get well looked after. The 34 Melbourne Storm and Cronulla Sharks players (including four interchange players from each team), collectively earned about $7 million this year. That includes $4.27 million to most valued players in both teams; the highest paid (Storm captain Cameron Smith, $1.1 million), has a 72.3% success rate for kicking goals – more on this later.

I cite these more than adequate wages ($205,882 p.a. on average), not to irritate musician friends who customarily play four-hour gigs for about $100 per band member. No, footie players at this elite level deserve to be well paid for keeping themselves in top notch physical and psychological health and for learning how to stick to the script in after-match interviews:

‘Just happy to get the two points, mate’ or ‘we stuck to the game plan and saw out the 80 minutes’ or ‘Thanks to (sponsor) and (sponsor) and can I just say g’day to my Auntie in Cairns.’

So did you know that 53 NRL players earn more than $400,000 a year and a handful of those earn more than $1 million? Give them a break. It’s a short-lived career – 15 years at best. For those who invest and take the time to plan an after-footie career, it’s a good financial start.

Former Bronco turned sports commentator Gordon Tallis once famously said (amid a heated discussion about whether someone was offside or was that a forward pass) – “Guys, it’s just a game of footie.”

As is our custom, we will have friends over for pies and vegies and a good old fashioned yell at the television set. People in our village are sharply divided into (a) footie fans (the kind that own season tickets and belong to tipping clubs); (b) secret footie fans (those who would like to stay friends with (c) people who think there is something acutely wrong with our otherwise satisfactory level of mindfulness.

Mind you, I have seen hippies come out of the chemist shop clutching Lotto tickets, so nobody’s perfect.

She Who Yells at the Television says footie is great escapism and better, there’s a beginning, middle and end.

One’s level of interest in the Grand Final (if one has an interest at all), is predicated on whether the team you follow made it into the match.

This year our interest is academic – the highly accomplished wrestling team (the Melbourne Storm) versus the western Sydney outsiders, the Cronulla Sharks. As the late Jack Gibson once said: “Waiting for Cronulla to win a premiership is like leaving the porch lamp on for Harold Holt.” (Thanks to Roger the dentist for reminding me of this gem SWYATT)

Last year 82,000 people came to Olympic Park to watch the grand final and this year will be no different. A sold-out stadium is good business for those all-essential broadcast media deals. The NRL annual report detailed the five-year deal signed on 27 November 2015.

The Australian Rugby League Commission, Nine Network, News Corp Australia, Fox Sports and Telstra signed agreements to provide free to air television, pay television and mobile coverage of Rugby League for five years from 2018. The deal is worth $1.8 billion to the NRL, which makes gate takings of $57 million in 2015 look relatively modest.

I was going to write about (live) betting on footie but She Who Edits says no, it is stupid, immoral and leaves players open to temptation.

But, did you know you can get odds of 151-1 on no try being scored in Sunday’s match? Imagine!

The Rugby League Project records show that in 1986, the Parramatta Eels beat the Canterbury Bulldogs 4-2 in the only try-less Grand Final to date. Michael Cronin (Eels) kicked two penalties from four attempts, Terry Lamb (Dogs) kicked one from two.

Take the two, Cameron, take the two!