One-Eyed Richmond Forum
Football => Richmond Rant => Topic started by: one-eyed on December 17, 2015, 06:49:37 PM
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Tigers refuse to play ball with local media
Nick Ansell
Cairns Post
17 December 2015
EVERY so often in this job you find reason to pause and quietly query the rationale of the media types that control the direct accessibility to the players that you, our most valued commodity, the reader, wants to know more about.
After establishing the Richmond Tigers AFL club would be in Cairns this week for a pre-season training camp I rustled down a number of story ideas I intended to pitch to the club’s media manager in the hopeful event of securing a few one-on-one interviews.
Sadly, the Tiges’ had other ideas.
Still hurting after Melbourne’s saturation coverage of the alleged recent chopstick affair involving star player Dustin Martin, a Richmond media staffer informed me on Tuesday they had no intentions of doing any official media while in FNQ and as such they had declined all requests, including mine, for any player interviews.
That’s despite me giving the club all assurances I had no intention of rehashing old news about Martin, news that in fact would hold little relevance to our readers in this part of the country.
So, as the Tigers’ went about their open training session yesterday morning at Cazalys I instead found myself on the boundary, thinking about all the wonderful stories I could have filed about the yellow and blacks had the club given me just five minutes access to players before or after the session – surely not too much to ask considering they are here for six days.
If given the green light to do so I could have provided you with words from emerging midfielder Anthony Miles and his aspirations for 2016, or, something about the arrival of former Blues ball magnet and off season recruit Chris Yarran on his new life at Punt Road under Damien Hardwick.
Cult hero Ivan Maric, now there is a story – once regarded as a middle of the road ruckman “big Ivan” has soared to new heights in recent years and is a very intriguing personality.
Let’s not forget Jack Riewoldt, we all know the two-time Coleman Medal winner has a mixed relationship with the media – but gee he’s interesting when he drops his guard a little and opens up.
His softer side was no better demonstrated yesterday just before joining his teammates for their warm-up.
Upon sighting a mother with her two young sons in the grandstand Riewoldt, standing in the players tunnel just below he asked them “where they were from?” and “how school was going?”
That’s an interaction money simply can’t buy. The reaction from the boys from Port Douglas after the two minute exchange was heart-warming. They each smiled at their mum, while she returned the emotion.
It was another “sigh” moment when I looked out at Jack minutes later on the training paddock in the knowledge that would be as close as I would get to having a chat with him for any story this week for The Cairns Post.
Then there is the pre-season training camp itself. The whole concept of the Tigers staging their camp in Far North Queensland fascinates me as I hope it does the reader.
What sort of training are they doing? How do they hope training in the intense heat and humidity of the region will benefit them? What personal fitness benchmarks do the players want to reach over the next few days?
I’m sure there are some very, very interesting answers to those questions; it’s just a shame those inside the club have been muzzled from providing the answers.
While I get the Tiges are under no obligation to provide media opportunities and offer up players for interviews at their own discretion, they do like all high-profile teams have a responsibility to promote the game.
AFL documentaries such as Peter Dickson’s The Chosen Few highlight the effectiveness of what good media access to players, captains and coaches actually does – it closes the gap with fans – the most important stakeholder of them all – and the game is better off because of it.
My lasting impression is that the Tigers might want to spend a bit of time with the media staff from the Brisbane Roar – now there’s a team that likes to engage with both the media and the game’s fans.
I was impressed at both the access the Roar gave the media to its players for interviews and how seriously it reached out to the local community in the three days they were here last week.
So what can I tell you about yesterday’s training session?
The club’s big guns Brett Deledio, skipper Trent Cotchin and Jack Riewoldt all trained well, while Yarran spent a stack of time doing some gut-busting sprints on the far side of the ground with a club fitness guru. Big Ty Vickery did a lot of marking stuff inside the forward 50 while Brandon Ellis looked sharp in some tackling and contact work.
The most interesting part of the session was the appearance of Mark Worthington. The Taipans forward, wearing an official Tigers training shirt spent time chatting with Tigers senior development coach and ex Port Adelaide premiership winning mentor Mark Williams – not a surprise given the NBL player’s previous aspirations of being an AFL footballer.
This piece was never about throwing the Tigers under the bus. That’s the easy view and far from the realms of why it has been written.
You get it. I get it, we all get it. Richmond has its brand and image to protect at all times. That might be the case but our readers and the game’s fans are the ones who are left the poorer this week because of their media blackout.
http://www.cairnspost.com.au/sport/tigers-refuse-to-play-ball-with-local-media/story-fnjpuwrj-1227656601452
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Nick Ansell is a journo who has form reporting dubiously against us.
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Is he a femmo too?
Whinging pillow biter. :snidegrin
Lmao at - My lasting impression is that the Tigers might want to spend a bit of time with the media staff from the Brisbane Roar – now there’s a team that likes to engage with both the media and the game’s fans.
What a farcical standard the media has dropped to
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Awww ... poor little journo didn't get to do his little interviews with the big bad nasty Tigers ... awwww ... :'(
But it didn't stop you from writing a page full, did it?
How many times does he have to mention it in the one page?
Poor journo, so brave ... its just so unfair ... :wallywink
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What a tosser
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yarran= ball magnet :huh :huh
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yarran= ball magnet :huh :huh
Lol I honestly didn't know who he was talking about at first :lol
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gives whats going on recently who can blame us?
since when was Yarran a ball magnet????
the fans are not missing anything as the Club itself is posting interviews on our own website etc.
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And he's a North Melbourne supporter!
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Awww ... poor little journo didn't get to do his little interviews with the big bad nasty Tigers ... awwww ... :'(
But it didn't stop you from writing a page full, did it?
How many times does he have to mention it in the one page?
Poor journo, so brave ... its just so unfair ... :wallywink
Pretends to be some sort of victim to create a story.
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Nick is a dick and Ansells are condoms.
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yarran= ball magnet :huh :huh
on field or off field?
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How much do these blokes want it both ways?
Unrelentingly flog one of our players & by extension our club for it's apparent inaction on an incident the seems pretty murky.
Get's upset when we say nah, we would prefer to just keep a low profile for the moment (in the f!$#ing off season by the way)
Hilariously compares us to Brisbane Roar, who would turn up to an opening of an envelope if it meant some media attention.
Could have just written one sentence, head to richmondfc.com to see what the tigers have been up to. More than enough updates, videos & pictures to follow the proceedings
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yarran= ball magnet :huh :huh
on field or off field?
:lol