Poor old Israel Folau.
He took his bat and ball and went home.
Two million dollars and the AFL is a lot poorer for the effort and we can all say it didn't work.
He tried his guts out and never had the passion so he said.
It is very hard to take up the game if you have never been introduced to it
We can all talk about Myke Pyke and what a magnificent effort he put in during the grand final and right through the last couple of years.
All you can say is fair enough on that one.
Karmichael Hunt is never going to win a Brownlow medal and he will eventually be pensioned off by the Gold Coast for the simple reason he is not up to the standard of skill required.
He is a great tackler, can kick a ball and is as tough as nails, but he is not an A-grader, B-grader or even C-grade footballer.
He is just useful.
Folau was never useful.
He was an embarrassment to his team-mates.
You build your team around a few players, but you could never build anything around Folau.
He has walked away and he was still owed four million dollars.
But he is a great athlete and he will go back to rugby league and play very, very good football.
Did it work? No one knows.
Did they turn up last season to watch Greater Western Sydney? No.
Will they turn up in the future? Probably not.
The league have got a bit of a problem.
Sydney went and won the premiership this year, but no one is going to go and watch the Giants.
If you want to watch a good football team and you want to watch a team that has got passion then watch the Sydney Swans as they are the real deal.
GWS, as much as Kevin Sheedy wants to sell them, are going to struggle for the next five or six years and maybe forever.
40 Comments
The biggest winner is the AFL, some of the best marketing i have ever seen, whether it worked or not it was brilliant, you couldn't put a price on the free publicity the AFL got, bloody brilliant.. No shame Issy , you challenged yourself, you entertained an idea and had the power of your convictions and went for it, it didn't work you tried, no shame.
ReplyFolau knew this was a waste of time playing a game that no other country likes and will never be an international game,he will go back to League where at least he will have the opportunity to play internationals and world cups,i mean isnt that what every kid yearns to do?to represent your country in a REAL international game?
1 ReplyBack to NRL. That where he belongs.
ReplyIts just money..... nothing else... Folau, like so many has no concept of ANYTHING but money. There is no honesty in this, no truth in what this money-grubber did. With all the claims of higher calling... there is nothing of that here... Pathetic....
Replyof course its about the money! so what.. the AFL and the clubs that players represent are just slabs of meat to use and discard once their use by date is over. Football is a JOB. nothing more, nothing less. we all work ( well most of us anyway) and im sure we'd all love a raise in salary... and if that means a different employer of a different business wants to throw money at you, bring it on. im not for what the AFL tried to do, that was a slap in the face to all the young talent out there, however i feel you got cut iz some slack.. Glass houses
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