TWILIGHT FINAL INEVITABLE - FORMER GREATS
BY STEPHEN BAKER
A number of former champions have weighed in on the proposed move to a twilight Grand Final.
Calrton legend, Anthony Koutoufides as well as Collingwood premiership captain and 1990 Norm Smith Medalist, Tony Shaw believe that the biggest match on the AFL calendar should stay a day game.
Speaking on SEN radio this morning, the former Carlton skipper and 1995 premiership player said that he preferred the game to stay in it’s traditional place.
“I prefer to play at 2.40pm - the way it’s played at the moment,” said Koutoufides.
“Playing during the day was always something I preferred even throughout the season.”
“A day Grand final, to me, when the sun is out and the players are playing at their best, I don’t thnk you can beat it,” he said.
The Carlton legend said he believed that playing a Grand Final would likely have an impact on players’ preparation for the big game.
“Obviously, there’s so many hours throughout the day that you have to wait when you’re playing during the day,” he said.
“You get up in the morning, before you know it, it’s time to get to the ground. Definitely with a night game, you go for a walk and need to do a few things in the morning because you just can’t laze around all day, so it is a different preparation.”
Former champions-turned-commentators, Robert Walls and Tony Shaw said that the move to a night Grand Final was lamentable, but invevitable.
Shaw said he did not support the change to a twilight fixture.
“I’m a bity of a traditionalist so I think it will cause a lot of hiccups in a lot of areas,” he said.
“I think a lot of sports have gone down that track and being a traditionalist I don’t like it, but I think it’s just the way of the world and it’s now all about the dollar in front of a lot of other things in our great game.”
Channel Ten special comments doyen, Robert Walls also said that a twilight Grand Final was the price to pay for the other benefits that broadcast rights money brings to the game.
“(A twilight Grand Final) has to be considered because, the TV networks, they provide so much money that enables them to promote the game, develop the game so it has to come into consideration,” he said.
Walls also said that the change to a night Final was following the trend of sports around the world.
“I think we’re conditioned to watch sport at nights nowadays and that’s the way it’s heading.”
FOOTYHEADS: IS A TWILIGHT GRAND FINAL AN INEVITABILITY?
