The pious indignation and earnest discussion sparked by former Hawthorn coach Ken Judge would be amusing if it wasn’t so irritating. Judge told the press that committee member Don Scott asked him to tank the last five games of a season in order to get first pick at the next national draft. Well – you could have knocked us down with a sledgehammer! Three years ago, we threw up a hypothetical: the two bottom-feeders are locked on the same score in time-on in the last quarter of the last game of the season. One will get the “glory” of escaping the dreaded spoon. The other will face the “ignominy” of coming last and getting the best picks in the land. The first team to fumble will lose the match. What do you reckon they’d do? After all, there’s a system in place that rewards last place above anyone else.

We’re sure the AFL and its press always suspected this on some level – say, at those times when a team has decided to ditch its most experienced players for the last few games in the guise of “experimenting with youth”.

Arrogantly believing its players and clubs are above temptation, the AFL have a system that tempts football sides to throw matches. The press treat the game as a sacred cow. They write endlessly of its droppings and by-products, but God help anyone who attacks the validity of the game itself and its protagonists. It’s time everyone woke up to the fact that their cattle is human.

Published in Inside Sport, May 2003