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Time to lose the AFL drongos

Mr Dandalooa

Last year, I wrote some pretty provocative pieces about the off-field antics of a small clique of AFL players.

I sometimes use the term rising star, or gun to describe some of the elite in Aussie Rules, but will always refrain from labelling these guys superstars, which is an Americanism I despise.

Leave that term for WWE.

While these guys are talented and I respect what they do as professional athletes, as pro athletes, comes the professional responsibility of being role models and being in the public eye.

And before you start ranting and raving, get over it, these guys, whether they like it or not, are looked up to by little kids wanting to fill their shoes and the like 1000s before them not good enough to play at the top level.

They are role models, it comes with the territory. And with that, means they are in the spotlight and have media responsibilities, as well as community ones, and as such when they enter this high-paid realm of sports stardom, fast cars and fast women, they will be scrutinised on and off the field.

Therefore they forfeit much of the privacy we low-paid civilians take for granted.

Yes, Ben Cousins, the details of your drug problem were profoundly interesting to the public, as opposed to Joe Blogs, hence your little documentary you are making.

One thing I want to profess from the outset here is how much I, like many West Australians are over the clichéd little AFL player who gets paid too much money to play footy, playing up off-field, getting caught with drugs, getting caught butt-naked trashing hotel rooms, crashing cars and doing runners, pissing on pub windows, assaulting citizens and all the other things that get swept under the carpet with respect to their actions towards women.

We are over it.

Remember the hard yards it took to get you to the AFL and how you promised yourself how you would give it your all if you were ever drafted?

There is not a special law for those of you because we live in a country that idolise football or sports stars. Your job in the AFL goes much further than just play good footy. Apart from delivering a premiership, you have those community and media responsibilities I spoke of earlier, which mean you must behave like a professional.

Every week, we read in the media about yet another drongo playing up, causing embarrassment to his club, to his fans, more importantly to his family, bringing the AFL into disrepute. Get over yourselves, while little 20-year-old princesses may be awestruck in your presence when you’re pissing it up on a weeknight during the season, the end of the day you’re not doing yourself any favours.

This season, I think I speak for a lot of footy fans here in WA and elsewhere, when I say, please, stick to what you do best and let’s not have the continuous barrage of degenerative stories portraying a desperate AFL player again in trouble with the law.

Get over yourselves, it’s time to get real.

How long do you reckon Brendan Fevola will last at Brisbane before he plays up?

Come on look at his history. Despite a clause in his contract that could see him terminated for any indiscretion, I doubt very much the Lions will be so forthcoming in relinquishing Big Bad Fev after paying all that money.

I’m not saying I am perfect, far, far from it, and I’m not saying these guys need to be machines. But I am saying that if we are going to continue holding AFL players up on a pedestal, then they need to come to the party and fulfil their end of the bargain.

Would we accept our politicians behaving the way some of these drongos behave?

Would we accept our Olympians doing these things? How come we never see our NBL players in the news for these antics? Or our professional soccer players?

As soon as they get the message that it’s not on, then maybe we can move the sport forward and have it live up to the big business it could be.

It is after all big business, and with the big pay packets that are out there for these players, big drongos with big drug and drinking problems not being held accountable for their actions, are driving away big sponsors … and big support.