In the spirit of the game, the last line of defence is always marginal
Greg Baum | The Age | July 22, 2008
I'VE got 600 words to write here. OK? I said: OK? It's about the way Joel Bowden deliberately rushed two behinds in the dying seconds of the Richmond-Essendon clash at the MCG on Saturday, so running down the clock and preserving a narrow victory for the Tigers, and whether this was in the spirit of the game.
I'm down to 550 words now and still I haven't gone anywhere. In fact, it's now only 540 words and I still haven't said anything.
What's the problem? As far as I know, it's not written anywhere that a column has to say something, only that it has to fill to the end. I could stall in some other way: whack in a little picture of a football, make the byline bigger.
It'd be the same as footballers who kick the ball backwards, or fake a cramp, or pull up their socks and throw imaginary pieces of grass in the air (what DID happen to the 30-second clock?).
Like that little feint with the brackets? Seven more words down. Bit more than 400 now, and counting.
But instead of doing something with the lay-out, I've chosen instead to waffle, say the same thing over and over. I reckon I'm in front this year, so I'll leave it at that, OK?
Well it's not, of course. But the solution is not reflexively to make a rule about it, like a nanny state.
These things have a way of working themselves out. For a start, this topic is not going to come up every week. For another, if I wrote about it in these sort of circumlocutions every time, you would soon stop reading it and the editor would soon stop running it (300 and getting anxious).
It's the same on the footy ground. Remember flooding, how it was going to ruin the game and how everyone wanted to bring in new rules to stop it? Geelong fixed that.
Taking too long over a set shot at goal? Not a problem: in fact, booing Matthew Lloyd has become a ritual. Running into umpires? They did make a rule, imposed long suspensions, and were made to look ridiculous.
A Bowden rule stands to have many loopholes, since it would have to distinguish between types of rushed behinds, those blatantly conceded by a besieged defence and those that come off fingertips or ricochet from a pack in the goal square. As if the umpires are not under enough pressure now. And, for that matter, defenders.
Besides, however rules are framed, sportsmen will work in the margins; it's their job. And they think on their feet. The problem most seem to have with Bowden's tactic is that he thought of it and they didn't. It was open to Essendon deliberately to concede a 50-metre penalty, but no Bomber thought of it (can't be long to go now, surely?).
Sportsmen also calculate risk, over and over. Bowden's plan entailed risk. His first rushed behind reduced the margin from six points to five, exposing the Tigers to the possibility of defeat if they screwed up. And he could not have known exactly how much time remained.
Earlier this season, teammate Jake King walked the ball through when Richmond was leading the Bulldogs by 19 points. Three quick Bulldogs goals later, seeming victory had dissolved into a draw (someone blow the bloody siren).
Some team are happy to rush behinds because they pride themselves on the goals they score directly from kick-ins. So be it. It would be a mean-spirited game that imposed a prohibition on the last line of defence because of what might happen 200 metres away.
Here's some working rules. (1) Don't find yourself behind with seconds to play. (2) Don't complain if you haven't manned-up. (3) Don't show your face if you've been outsmarted by Richmond. (4) And don't … (siren).
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