Possible Ban on Alcohol/Junk food sponsoring

More than 4 out of every 5 Victorians would support the ban of sponsorships from alcohol and junk food companys and organisations according to a new survey(http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/05/04/2889408.htm), something that is very similar to when their was a banning on tobacco sponsorships in the 1980s, a new survey has found that over 4/5 Victorians would support this action. I for one disagree with this, even though it may have a bad effect on the public, the amount of money they pour into the game far outweighs the publicity that the alcohol and junk food companys get, and in the end it is really up to the consumer on what they purchase isnt it?

On the other side of the arguement the benefits of bringing something like this in is pretty strong, the local clubs will no longer be exposed to these products and would probably result in less consumption overall, but without the sponsorships where will the money come from to support the clubs?

In the end i think this survey will fall on deaf ears and wont progress anywhere because the money loss from losing these sponsorships would be to hard to replace, but you never know what will happen in this day and age.

FIFA World Cup 2010

With the Fifa 2010 world cup starting next month, interest in the socceroos will increase and those nights staying up late to cheer Australia on will be back, im sure we all remember the World cup in 2006 where the Socceroos managed to get to the round of 16 only to lose to Italy in what was a controversal penalty late in the game which resulted in a 1-0 scoreline. Now i pretty much dont follow Soccer much, apart from maybe the finals series of the A league, but whenever the socceroos play it catches my interest, and im sure that Australia will fight its best in this years World Cup even though we again have drawn a tough pool of teams including Germany, Serbia and Ghana, so im sure we are banking on beating Serbia and Ghana to get ourselves through to the round of 16 again.

One day i would like to think that the FIFA World Cup will be held in Australia, and Australia is currently bidding for the 2018 and 2022 World Cups, As we do have a large amount of grounds around the country we could easily accomodate the World Cup, as we have had the Rugby World cup aswell as the olympics held in Australia.

I for one hope that Australia can atleast get to the semi-finals of the World Cup.

The Perfect Storm

The biggest salary cap rort and possibly the biggest in Australia which has now damaged the NRL code. The Melbourne Storm have been caught cheating. They will lose 3 minor premierships, 2 premierships(2007,2009) as well as having to return 1.1million dollars worth of prize money, and a 500,000 dollar fine on top of that, many predicting the storm wont recover from this. How could a salary cap breach such as this go on for so long un-noticed, with reports suggesting it has been going on for over 5 years, which dates back to Waldrons days of heading the Melbourne storm, Waldron has also resigned from the Melbourne Rebels(The new Super 15 team) almost instantaneously after the storm were found out. I for one think that the Melbourne storm will diminish after this incident, if i was a fan of Melbourne i surely wouldn't be now, and there have been people already dumping their jerseys and paraphernalia outside the Storm office. How will the club function if they don't have any supporters or sponsors? I also predict that a lot of the Melbourne players will leave Melbourne after this because if it were me i wouldn't want to be apart of a club that does things like this, i think we will see alot of the Melbourne top players move to other clubs, or other sporting codes. Now no names have been named on which players have been involved or who has received extra money on the side, but it isnt hard to put 2 and 2 togethor when you have people like Greg Inglis, Billy Slater, Cameron Smith, Brett Finish, Brent Kite, Cooper Cronk, the list goes on. The amount of high quality players that are at Melbourne does seem fishy. In my mind, Melbourne storm is done for. Bring in the Central Coast!

Personally i think this is the death of melbourne.

Bingle/Clarke Saga Comes To An End, Roosters V Rabbits

Bingle/Clarke Saga Comes To An End


After reading this blog post by my classmate Alistair(here), it got me interested into researching more on this cricket related scandal. As of today it seems that the relationship has come to an end as you can see from this news post(here). This does suggest that Clarke does not want to deal with anything that would hinder his cricket career and poses the question on high profile sportsman's relationships, would they run out at the drop of a hat if things got tough? be that as it may its a little different then a normal persons relationship when it turns into a media frenzy when something such as this happens and it turns to be bad publicity for Clarke. Im sure most of you know but just incase, this all came about after nude photos were released by AFL player Fervola and once the media got a hold of it, the public eye turned to Bingle and Clarke, Clarke soon after that left his teammates in NZ to come back to Australia to sort the situation out, until today they had been avoiding the media but Bingle had been seen without the engagement ring which sparked rumours of a seperation. as the second link states both Clarke and Bingles manager's made announcements of the pair's seperation, which concludes the saga
Roosters vs Rabbitohs



Arch rivals since foundation, my favourite upset of the weekend. Mostly because my team is the roosters, and the fact that the Rabbitohs always talk up their team before round one starts and it generally ends in disappointment, and this year, the talk was about the Rabbitohs forward pack and it so called being the best in the league this year. Well, not only did the Sydney Roosters prove that they were wrong, but they smashed them. 36-10 the final score as new Sydney Recruit Todd Carney had a huge hand in the victory. Coach Brian Smith of the Roosters has definately had a large impact on this Roosters outfit, and it is definately for the better. Smith has a reputation for instant recognition for improvement as soon as he acquires a team .

Thats my team!

With the token summer sports coming to an end(Cricket) we look forward to the start of my personal favourite of sports, the NRL, with the AFL season starting as well. Just 1 week out from the Rugby League season starting i am sure all the football hungry fans are readying up their tipping competition/fantasy leagues as well as looking at what games they are going to go to or watch. I know for one i have already had a look at the roosters line up(my favourite team) and we have our rivals the rabbitohs for the usual first round clash, and i myself am extremely excited.


Issues in and outside of the NRL

Issues to do with NRL players off the field are becoming increasingly concerning, im not sure if all of you are aware, but the latest scandal within the NRL is the drug charges on Newcastle Knights player Chris Houston, and i mean, i enjoy the football as much as the next guy but it is hard to produce a positive image for the sport when frequently players are in the news for all the wrong reasons, for two years running there has been major incidents just weeks before the season has began, previously it was Manly Sea-Eagles player Brett Stewart was pinned for drunken assault on his girlfriend and fellow teammate Anthony Watmough was also caught up in drunken antics. Manly were sure to avenge this atrocity from last year and start the year in better fashion as you can see from this report

For two years in a row now the NRL has started the season in a bad fashion due to off field incidents, but the fan base generally seems to remain loyal as it is a high-entertainment value sport.

Problems on the field in the NRL

Personally i cant see to many problems with rules and laws made for on the field in rugby league, one thing i would like to touch on is that of slowing the play of the ball down in the last few minutes of a game where teams deliberately delay play sometimes by minutes or more reducing any chance of fair game to which the opposing team could win the match.

An introduction

Hi everyone, Im Ryan and this is my sports blog.

Sports have had a large impact on my life from the early ages, from the age of six where I picked up and played soccer for the west pennant hills lions for four years, while soccer was not my favourite sport, I still enjoyed the competitive aspect of it, as profound as that may sound. After playing soccer for a number of years I was introduced to baseball as a lot of my friends from soccer had moved across, or were playing both sports, little did i know that this move would be one that would change my life in my early teens. My local club team stayed consistent throughout the years, with a number of us being selected into representative teams as soon as we reached the under 12’s bracket, For the next four years I would continue playing club baseball for the Greenway Giants and representative baseball for the Ryde Hawks.

At the age of 16 I was selected to play for one of the two teams from Australia to compete in the World Boys Championship in Japan, this was probably one of the best experiences of my life, even though the intensity of playing 3 levels of baseball caused me to burn out and need a break, it was a great experience nonetheless. Below is a picture of my team in Japan against one of the two Chinese Taipei teams.

Well that is enough history of my sporting experiences lets move on to what my blog entries will involve, it will provide up to date facts and important news, scores and match rundowns to do with major sports within Australia that I am interested in, mainly including the NRL as its my favourite spectating sport, with small sections on the Super 14 rugby union and the AFL.

I would like to pose a question to you readers out there, what makes a certain sport more popular than another, what makes a sport good? Nicholas Christenfield from the Department of Psychology from the University of California says that to satisfy the fans of the particular sport, it must contain an appropriate, spread out level of grace, violence, strength, brilliance and excitement, what is your opinion?