HOME TOWN UMPIRING

For years I’ve had this feeling that AFL umpires are biased to home teams when games are played between clubs of different states. More specifically, I’ve had a hunch that Victorian teams don’t suffer as much when they play interstate, as interstate teams do when they play against Victorian teams. Now, usually I’m following Sydney or the Dockers and like all fans I believe my team has had the rough end of the pineapple but I thought it was time to look at some statistics for the first 10 games of the season and see if I had any reason for my grumbles or if I’m just a paranoid, one-eyed footy fan.

Something fishy in the water

Last week, I sat back to watch a program on the ABC that had been overdue for 20 years – a documentary on the vibrant WA music scene. It was called Something in the Water and was directed by an Aydan O’Brien (or Aidan O’Brien, depending on which spelling is correct).

I thought it was going to be about current day bands, but my ears pricked up when I saw talking heads spouting on about the late 70s in Perth. The time of The Suburbs. But curiosity slowly turned to annoyance and then outright anger as my band, Dave Warner’s From The Suburbs, was completely ignored. Instead I heard tell how punk acts like The Victims and Cheap Nasties brought original music to cover band city.