SOUTH Australian Premier Mike Rann has hit back at suggestions from across the border that Victoria will cruise to a comfortable victory in the Hall of Fame Tribute Match.
On Wednesday, Victorian Premier John Brumby donned the Big V and predicted a win to the Vics, but Mr Rann disagreed and said it was time Victorians accepted they no longer owned the game of Australian Football.
“I saw Mr Brumby’s comments and he’s predicting a Victorian victory by 27 points - this is like the Air Warfare Destroyer campaign all over again,” Mr Rann said.
“I’m predicting a very strong victory by the Dream Team because what we’re seeing finally, after 150 years, is that it’s starting to sink in that it’s the AFL and not the VFL. I think the balance of power in footy has changed.”
Dream team skipper Andrew McLeod presented the Premier with his very own guernsey to wear to the match at the MCG on May 10.
McLeod encouraged footy fans from across the country to join the Premier in making the journey to Melbourne next weekend to cheer on the talent-laden Dream Team side.
“There’s a bit of pride on the line. We’ll probably see the Victorians come out soon, talking up how good they actually are, saying that they are the number one side and have been for 150 years,” he said.
“We, as a Dream Team, have to get behind each other as the rest of Australia, or the world, and give them a bit of a football lesson.
Mr Rann, who has allegiances to the Port Adelaide, South Adelaide and Salisbury Football clubs said it was important South Australians embraced the Dream Team as their own.
“There’s not a day in my life where I don’t walk down the street without someone winding down the window and yelling ‘go Panthers’. Sometimes they say other things as well and I’m sure you know what I mean,” Mr Rann said, with a laugh.
“I’m a Port Adelaide ambassador as well and that’s what this is about - the whole state getting together and getting behind our Dream Team.
“It’s a great celebration of footy and I think that it would be great if, on the 150-year anniversary of the start of the VFL, that we demonstrate to them that it’s now the AFL.”
Mr Rann predicted an 18-point-win to the Dream Team, while McLeod, not surprisingly, preferred the margin to be 23 points.
McLeod will wear his traditional number 23 guernsey in the prestigious match, while Mr Rann was contemplating just where else he could wear his brand new number one guernsey.
“I think Don Dunstan, on the 100-year celebration of the Norwood Football Club, wore a Redlegs guernsey into Parliament and the speaker told him off, so I’ll have to keep that in mind,” Mr Rann said.
“I’m not sure the public are ready to see me in a football guernsey yet anyway.”Tickets for the Hall of Fame Tribute Match can be purchased online via the ticketmaster website or by calling the ticketmaster phone booking service on 1300 136 122.
