Sport represents such a solid part of the Australian culture... and it is so obsessed with it, that during these Tokyo Games the country is more than willing to alter their work and sleep schedules to watch their favorite athletes go for gold, or for any big sporting event where their athletes and teams are on the big stage out of country.. For swimming, the big finals that we in America have gotten to watch in our primetime, the dominance in the pool the Aussies have been having have taken place around lunchtime during the latest pandemic-forced lockdown in their country.
Still, it's safe to say that Australia is a sports-mad country that takes athletic competition so seriously. And as we enter the second week of the action in Japan as the world's athletes continue to inspire us all, it's best that this Summer of Sports post provide more context into this down under love affair.
While its rival to the northeast has more people living there than any other city in the country, the city of Melbourne is often considered the cultural heartbeat of Australia... and it takes on the status of being the undisputed capital of Australian sport - perhaps sport anywhere in the world. With a capacity of 100,000, the Melbourne Cricket Ground - "MCG" - is the biggest sports stadium in the Southern Hemisphere, home to the country's two most popular sports.
For most everyone, especially those living in or within one of the capitals of the sports world - Melbourne and the surrounding state of Victoria, it's Aussie Rules Football, and the Australian Football League. But for those living in the country's largest city, Sydney, as well as up the road in Brisbane & their respective states of New South Wales & Queensland, it's Rugby League, and the National Rugby League. Both leagues will crown their season champions in Grand Finals to be held this month, in the venerable Melbourne Cricket Ground for the AFL, and for the NRL at ANZ Stadium, also known as Stadium Australia & main Olympic Stadium during the 2000 Games.
Aussie Rules first took shape in 1858 when private schools in Melbourne first began to organize football matches just before the captain of Victoria's state cricket team devised a form of rugby football to keep his fellow players active during the winter months. Further development through the rest of the 19th century at the professional and amateur would eventually see Australian football evolve into the most popular sport in Victoria, and later expanding into other states by the time the Victorian Football League came into its own. Its rapidly-growing popularity and growth outside the state ultimately saw the VFL become the Australian Football League in 1990, and the AFL continues to dominate the buzz as its annual attendance rivals that of the NFL, the Premier League and Major League Baseball.
Lost in the popularity of both the AFL and NRL is rugby union, where the original version of rugby football was introduced to Australia in 1864. The 15-a-side game is more widely played across the land, and where five franchises are represented in the Super Rugby competition comprised of Southern Hemisphere sides. As consistently one of the world's top countries in rugby union, the national team known as the Wallabies have twice won the Rugby World Cup and play an annual set of international matches vs. New Zealand for the Bledisloe Cup. Their League equivalent, the Kangaroos, have long been the dominant international side in the 13-a-side variant.
And for that other football: much like it is in America, it wasn't until the '80s that soccer began taking shape in Australia, thanks mainly to the millions of immigrants tuning to multicultural TV channel SBS to watch leagues back home. It wasn't until a dramatic shootout victory in Sydney to qualify for the 2006 FIFA World Cup after a 32-year wait that soccer truly broke through into the mainstream, as the Socceroos have become increasingly competitive at international level. And after years of instability, the A-League has also increased its status in the nation's sports landscape, as has the Matildas women's national team and the W-League, as it prepares to host the 2023 Women's World Cup.
Two decades before rugby's Super League upheaval, Australian cricket was turned upside down when after losing a TV rights battle, media mogul Kerry Packer signed top Australian and international players for his breakaway World Series Cricket competition. Though it lasted only two years, its innovations changed the sport with the introduction of night play, colored jerseys, better salaries for cricketers and helping popularize the one-day form of cricket. It also offered the blueprint for Australia's new sensation of the Big Bash League, the domestic Twenty20 league which debuted a decade ago. And the national team continues to be a source of Australian pride, winning five Cricket World Cups.
Australia holds a bitter & fierce international sporting rivalry with the United Kingdom, and it is best personified by their biannual series of tests known as "The Ashes." It is known as such for that, in 1882 after the Aussies won its first Test in England, a British newspaper wrote an satirical obituary that English cricket had died and that, "the body will be cremated and the ashes taken to Australia." That term stuck even after a small urn containing the ashes of a wooden bail was presented to the English captain... and it has become the symbol of an ongoing cricket rivalry that the Aussies hold a 33-32 series edge with six series drawn, with the next one set for this December down under.
Before the Ashes, the stretch of big Australian sporting events begins with those AFL & NRL grand finals, followed in October by the Bathurst 1000 outside of Adelaide in South Australia, its biggest auto race during the V8 Supercars series. In early November, the country turns its attention to its equivalent of the Kentucky Derby in the Melbourne Cup - its biggest horse race, while domestic golf tournaments also takes place during the warm Australian summer. And as Andrew Bogut and Patty Mills have been successful in the NBA, the National Basketball League is enjoying increased exposure, joining the dominance the Aussie women have had in its sister sport of netball.
For decades, the Australian Open was seen as the forgotten one of tennis' Grand Slam quartet due to it being held around Christmas and its remote location down under, which in turn saw top players skip the event. But a late '80s move to a new state-of-the-art tennis complex near the MCG called Melbourne Park finally put the tournament at the same level as Wimbledon and the U.S. and French Opens. The Australian Open is the largest annual sports event held in Australia, and part of a calendar that also has the year's first Formula One Grand Prix race in March, and the Sydney to Hobart Yacht Race.
The ladder event has been held since World War II, but the most famous yacht to hail from Australia is also responsible for arguably the nation's finest sporting hour. The 1983 America's Cup in Rhode Island saw Australia II led by skipper John Bertrand and later ashamed businessman Alan Bond garner much attention with a new 12-meter boat that garnered controversy over its design. It brought greater attention to this relatively obscure event, which reached its climax on September 26, 1983 when Dennis Conner's Liberty boat started in front. But Australia II came back later on to become the first challenger in the 132-year history of the regatta to win the America's Cup, sparking widespread celebrations back home.
As one of four nations to compete in every Summer Olympiad and its increasing success at the Winter Games, Australia has enjoyed an incredible Olympic legacy spanning 125 years, including hosting the world in 1956 in Melbourne and recently been awarded the right to host the 2032 Games in Brisbane, Queensland. But after its 1976 team returned with no golds from Montreal and only winning 9 medals in Moscow, the Australian government and sport governing bodies came together to create the Australian Institute of Sport and Australian Sports Commission. Its goal: have the nation become more competitive in high-performance sport from swimming and track to rowing and cycling.
Four decades later, that goal has been more than met as Aussie athletes have excelled in the global sports arena. Since hosting the world in Sydney, they have placed in the top 10 in the Summer Olympic medal count, including 4th in both 2000 and in 2004 in Athens -- a pretty remarkable feat considering that its total population of 23 million is a fraction compared to the U.S., China, Russia and the U.K. Along with its recent success at the Winter Olympics. it also frequently tops the medal table at the Commonwealth Games - a multi-sport event for nations in the British Commonwealth held between Olympics, and where it is taken more seriously than in the UK given its sporting rivalry.
The Australian sports culture also expands into other aspects of Australian life: participation rates see cricket being the top participation sport in the nation at 1.3 mill., while recreational activities like bike riding and soccer top among youngsters. The chant "Aussie, Aussie, Aussie, Oi, Oi, Oi" was a popular refrain during the 2000 Games, and is a frequently used one when Australians compete internationally.
As it is in America, the media is a prominent part in Australian sport and not only for the role it played to revolutionize cricket and rugby. A federal law ensures that its most popular leagues and its biggest sporting events are made available to watch by everyone on network television, rather than behind the cable or streaming paywall. As a result, there's significantly more sport shown on its free-to-air channels (Seven, Nine, Ten, ABC & SBS) than is aired in America, though the Australian affiliate of the FOX Sports empire have dedicated 24-hour channels to AFL, NRL and cricket.
Newspapers, magazines and websites also offer extensive coverage of the local sports scene, with major dailies such as the Sydney Morning Herald and The Age in Melbourne leading the way. It's only recently that Australians have embraced the American phenomenon of sports talk radio, joining weekly panel shows that air on TV. This includes the show that became the cult hit of Sydney 2000: longtime radio hosts Roy & HG translated their satirical take on sport into The Dream, and them mixing humor with the action emphasizes the lighthearted take Aussies have with their sporting love affair.
But no mention of Australian sport would be complete without its unofficial mascot: when Australia II won the America's Cup, the victory celebrations in Newport included a flag of an cartoon image of a "Boxing Kangaroo" -- one of the nation's great treasures sporting boxing gloves on a green background. The Australian Olympic Committee later bought the license of that image from Bond, and the flag has been a prominent part of Australian sport as its official battle flag, from being draped outside the Olympic village at the 2010 Vancouver Games to toy of the figure being spotted in the stands. All of this is only part of the fandom of those sports-mad Australians.
- I AM DC
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