CLANCY OVERELL | Editor | CONTACT
For the first time since the West Coast Eagles were running riot through Perth in the 2000s, it appears that the AFL fanbase have gotten a taste of the type of scandals that rock the rugby league every week.
Richmond’s Noah Balta was handed a $3,000 fine and only just escaped jail for bashing the fuck out of another man in a parking lot last year.
AFL fans are relishing in the soap opera style scandal, and are treating it is as a welcomed break from their usual brand of off-field headlines, which are generally just dark family tragedies and horrific domestic crimes.
But for one week in April, the AFL gets to enjoy the drama that comes with hot headed young blokes carrying on like fucking morons – and can find solace in the fact that the only victims are other young men who appear to in the company of said morons.
Traditionally, the National Rugby League is the winter football code that delivers these kinds of felonies.
From drink driving, to sex tapes to violent interactions with other men at the pub, the NRL has always dominated the dumb bloke scandals – while the AFL is better known for institutional corruption and earth-shattering immorality.
But Noah Balta has given the AFL fans what they want. A condemnable but relatively palatable act of mouth-breathing male stupidity.
“I can see why the NRL fans love this shit” said one Richmond supporter, Burnley Coppin (40).
“It’s such a thrill”
“First you hear the rumours of a player getting into trouble on a night out. Then you get the CCTV footage leaked to WhatsApp group chats. Then you get the furious media speculation over whether the player was in the wrong.”
“Then you realise that nobody cares and it’s kind of funny. And then they have to go to court, where a Judge decides it actually isn’t that funny. Which only makes it funnier”
In an even more NRL turn of events, Noah Balta must now adhere to a night curfew, which means he will can only play in the first three quarters of scheduled evening matches – before he has to drive directly home.
He’s also been handed an alcohol ban, which now paves the way for a court-mandated rugby league-style redemption story.
