The Examiner’s Rob Shaw, Josh Partridge, Brian Allen and Ben Hann unpack and discuss the sports news across Northern Tasmania.
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00:00 Welcome to Episode 44 of the PressBox Examiner's weekly sportscast.
00:11 We're going to begin with an apology this week.
00:13 Sorry, there was no episode last week.
00:16 We did record one, but it's no exaggeration to say there was some dramatic developments
00:20 within hours of recording it that kind of made it a little bit obsolete.
00:24 So you can either quote Cricket Tasmania and put it down to an administrative error, or
00:28 you can quote the Greater Northern Raiders and call it a monumental mistake.
00:31 Anyway, some huge developments going on this week in football, cricket and soccer, and
00:36 we're going to start it off with football.
00:38 There's quite a lot going on this morning around the stage with the Tassie Devils.
00:42 These two boys have been all over it.
00:43 Ben and Josh, talk us through what you've been up to.
00:45 Well, I'm going to pinch this off you, and we'll just go, I don't know, sort of chat
00:49 with Jack Riewoldt last night at the launch of the Tasmanian AFL team.
00:54 Yeah, the vibe at the Launceston site was fantastic.
00:58 I mean, it truly was historic.
01:00 We were kind of joking around saying, "Oh, we've just been a part of history."
01:03 Well, we have, and it was really good to see the room that was full of, it had kids as
01:07 well, it had people of all ages that were just so excited by the fact that Tasmania
01:11 are finally going to get the AFL team, and it is now officially the Devils.
01:15 So speaking to Jack last night, he revealed that once you sign up as a foundation member,
01:20 which 75,000 people have, you will get your name on the training facility at Rosley Park
01:28 when they build that.
01:29 So that was something that I found really interesting, because it wasn't really something
01:32 that had been kind of brought up with the foundation memberships in the past.
01:36 But after last night, we've obviously been out at Campbelltown this morning, Ben, so
01:40 talk me through what we did this morning.
01:41 Yeah, there's obviously been a lot happening.
01:45 Today we were at Campbelltown footy oval for a bit of a reactionary sort of thing.
01:52 I think what's been clear out of all this is having a name, having colours, having logos,
01:57 all that sort of stuff, it makes it a lot more real for a lot of people who might have
02:00 been a bit on the fence about sort of whether they're actually behind this or not.
02:04 And I think they voted with their fingers, I suppose, tapping on the phones and signing
02:10 up 75,000 is well past any goal they had at all.
02:16 Obviously the Warner Brothers agreement has been all smoothed out, as it turns out.
02:21 O'Brien didn't actually confirm whether Warner Brothers explicitly said they didn't know,
02:25 but he hinted that maybe they were unaware that the Tasmanian Devil was in fact an animal.
02:31 So that was a bit curious.
02:34 But yeah, I think what it has shown is, yes, that was really monumental.
02:39 It was historic for the club, because I think seeing it, being able to touch it and use
02:45 all the other senses except for just hearing about it, really has given it the boost that
02:50 the Youngs needed, obviously, just five days out from an election.
02:53 What's your take on the whole thing, Brad?
02:54 Yeah, like I think for me, a lot of the stuff last night was kind of when you was coming.
03:01 I don't think it was very surprising.
03:03 But the thing that got me, I think, is this 75,000 founding members part.
03:11 I think that's an incredible amount of people.
03:15 I know it's only $10, so there's a bit of an appeal.
03:20 But that's, yeah, basically, I think in context, there's obviously a lot of excitement, but
03:26 this thing isn't a sealed deal sort of thing.
03:30 It's far from it.
03:32 The biggest worry is with so much effort being put into a project that might not happen.
03:39 So as a footy lover, seeing the 75,000 founding memberships gives me really good hope, because
03:47 I want to see it all happen.
03:48 I have said this before, that's a major drawcard for me coming here from Victoria in the first
03:54 place is to sort of be a part of all this and see the Tassie team get up.
03:59 So as far as I can say where it sits, we've got Tasmania's Labour leader, Rebecca White,
04:06 wants to renegotiate the deal with the AFL, which is all about the taxpayer dollar.
04:11 And as we well know, the idea being that too much money would go towards this stadium and
04:17 not towards other things like health.
04:19 And yeah, obviously, there's that idea that we have the two stadiums here that already
04:24 have AFL games played at them.
04:26 So there's a lot of just watching a lot of the coverage of it as well.
04:31 There's a lot of when they potentially get the team.
04:35 And I think that obviously the elections this weekend and we'll see what happens.
04:40 But apparently, there's a lot to be worked out in terms of how do these governments get
04:47 majorities, working it out with independents and such.
04:50 Was there any mention made of all of that last night?
04:53 So they've been pretty stringently apolitical about this whole thing.
04:56 They go, "We can't wait for decisions out of our own hands to keep making progress, keep
05:02 going forward this.
05:03 The AFL have been very clear that all this stuff needs to happen.
05:06 That's what they agreed with the government to do.
05:08 We don't expect any of that to change."
05:10 I think, put this into context, they were looking for 40,000 members by October.
05:16 So that's 75,000 by the next day.
05:19 I think probably shows just, I don't want to bring my own politics into this, but I
05:26 think it just shows you how popular the idea of having a footy team in the state is.
05:30 And I think that might influence how this election ends up going.
05:35 I think this result is exactly what they needed because it provides the validity behind their
05:40 claim that this is something that Tasmania wants.
05:42 I think it's fair to say we'll know a lot more after Saturday's election.
05:46 Yeah.
05:46 Just to run through everything else that's happened this week.
05:48 So it's been a huge week on the sports desk.
05:51 We had the kickoff of the statewide soccer competitions at the weekend.
05:55 I went to Riverside Olympic versus Launceston City on Friday night.
05:59 It ended up being a tragic evening.
06:02 27 minutes into the game, there was a crunching tackle and Riverside winger Will Fleming had
06:07 his leg broken.
06:08 Poor Will, we laid him on the pitch for about an hour before an ambulance arrived and he
06:12 was taken to hospital and everything was confirmed the next day.
06:16 My reflections of the whole incident are that what could have been quite a divisive incident
06:24 between two fierce rivals has actually ended up being quite a unifying moment.
06:29 One of the real positive things to come out of it was the first person who went to Will's
06:34 aid was the Lonnie City assistant coach, Nathan Pitchford.
06:38 And Nathan stayed with him the whole time.
06:40 Will's an ex-Launceston City player, so they were clearly very concerned for him as well.
06:46 And the reaction that we've seen on social media since then has been really positive
06:50 between the two clubs, both wishing Will the best and obviously that's what everyone hopes
06:56 for is that Will comes out of this okay.
06:57 So eventually the game was abandoned.
07:00 There were more games on Saturday and obviously everything carried on this weekend, but that
07:04 just kind of dominated the weekend.
07:06 Yes, so I was going to say, there is now going to be a replay.
07:09 Yes, that was confirmed yesterday.
07:10 We don't yet know.
07:13 So the other player involved in the incident was red carded.
07:15 We don't yet know if that red card is still going to stand.
07:17 I think the referee came to the right decision.
07:20 I think everyone agreed that on the evening that it was the only thing they could do.
07:24 Will's health was the priority and I think they made the right call, but it was a very
07:29 difficult evening for all concerned.
07:31 And I think also that spoke volumes of Will as well.
07:34 I think he, when you spoke to him afterwards, he made sure that the player who tackled wasn't
07:40 really held accountable for it and all that kind of thing.
07:42 And he just said it was something within the game and it wasn't malicious and all that
07:45 kind of thing.
07:46 So it shows, I guess, the quality of Will the person he is.
07:49 Absolutely right.
07:49 And what was a horrible incident, a lot of positives have come out of the way Will's
07:53 reacted, the way both clubs have reacted.
07:55 It was a tragedy, but it's generated a lot of goodwill, I think.
08:00 And it will be interesting when the game is eventually replayed.
08:03 I will move on to cricket and going back to the reason why last week's sportscast didn't
08:09 go out was what happened to the Greater Northern Raiders just soon after we recorded it.
08:12 We were talking about them playing in the finals.
08:15 They were subsequently kicked out of the finals due to an administrative error with the ladder,
08:20 which had actually been wrong all season, but nobody had noticed.
08:23 So it's fair to say the Raiders weren't particularly happy after that.
08:26 So that all happened.
08:27 But then we had the positives of the Cricket North semi-finals, which lead up to the grand
08:32 finals.
08:33 Fill us in on all that, Brian.
08:34 Yeah, I reckon this could be one of the great grand finals this weekend.
08:37 We've got Westbury and Riverside.
08:39 Westbury are going for a four-peat.
08:41 The Premier ships are a pretty similar side to the one of last season, the Bett Launceston
08:46 Lions, to the grand final.
08:47 They've got great leadership guys like Daniel Murphet, Ollie Wood, Jono Chapman, Kieran
08:56 Hume.
08:56 And then we've got a Riverside team that's arguably regenerated.
09:04 We've got Ben over here, who's been bowling well as a recruit.
09:07 But then some of the young guys are just doing really well.
09:11 Like Cooper Anthony's scored a century over the weekend, and that was match winning.
09:15 He's a guy that's also been great at all the Raiders level.
09:20 So he's got high-level experience, but he's come back into Riverside's team.
09:25 And he's scored two centuries this year.
09:28 So he's doing well.
09:30 But then you've got Aidan O'Connor, which is obviously the obvious story.
09:34 He's a guy that's highly touted, and hopefully plays test cricket for Australia.
09:40 And he's been to the Under-19 World Cup in South Africa and won with Australia recently.
09:45 So he shapes up as maybe the one to end this four-peat for Westbury, because he did get
09:54 six wickets in the semifinal.
09:56 But the thing about Westbury is they can never be denied.
09:59 They've just got crazy depth, really good experience.
10:02 It's really hard to pick.
10:05 Maybe O'Connor comes in and sort of flips things.
10:09 But otherwise, I think this could go either way.
10:11 It's fair to say, though, I think Riverside would have been quite pleased when Raiders
10:15 did get knocked out of the Tasmanian Premier League.
10:17 If only we had somebody in the room that maybe could give us some insights into how
10:21 Riverside were feeling at the time.
10:22 Oh, look, I think, yeah, it's obviously a happy accident for Riverside.
10:28 They can't be denied.
10:30 Westbury also benefit out of it, I think, is probably the level I would say.
10:33 Daniel Murphy and Johnny Chapman come back and so does Saseka Jayao-Singh as well.
10:37 They certainly benefit out of it as well.
10:39 I think from my perspective, Riverside, I should say, are obviously coming into the
10:46 game in really good form.
10:48 Haven't lost since Christmas except for that grand final, which was against Westbury in
10:51 that T20.
10:52 So I think the teams are really evenly matched.
10:55 It's a 3-8 game.
10:57 And yeah, I can't wait from my own personal perspective, but I think from a world's
11:02 perspective, it's a really high level game of cricket, which I think is the most exciting
11:07 thing.
11:07 So we've got all of this and we haven't even mentioned the Jackjumpers being in an
11:10 NBL grand final and Tasmania are about to start a Shepparton Shield final.
11:13 That's how busy we've all been all week.
11:15 That should give us something to talk about next week.
11:17 Thanks for tuning in.
11:18 See you next week.
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