WATCHING St Kilda mark '08 is akin to going back to vegemite on toast after having bacon and eggs for breakfast. So says commentary wunderkind and thinker of the year runner-up Anthony Hudson about the team that only a few short years ago thrilled the grease off the plates of footy followers everywhere with their attacking flair.
Not content with the full English, Huddo also recalled the superdogs with sauce he woofed downed at Waverley while watching the Saints take on Geelong in 1983.
Now Anthony is, by any definition, a trim man whose diet apparently consists of nothing but bacon, eggs and superdogs served swimming in sauce.
If only Huddo had realised back in '83 that he'd actually invented the Atkins diet. Still, Jennifer Aniston's loss is football's gain.
2. Kinda like Jurassic Park
JUNE. Month of the comeback. Old man Jeff Fenech beat the wrinkles out of even older man Azumah Nelson; reasonably old man Fraser Gehrig is coming back from a crook finger, and very old men Devo, Def Leppard and Cheap Trick are all coming back to rock the grease off the plates of footy fans everywhere.
But the comeback most talked about -- if not quite realised -- is of course that of ex-champion and thinker of the year runner-up Ben Cousins.
Unfortunately, Cousins will not be reincarnated as Blue nor Roo after both Brett Ratten and Dean Laidley ruled him out of their club's future plans. It seems that Ben, while generating a truckload of respect, is receiving only a thimble full of love.
This scenario is one The Four Points is, sadly, only too familiar with. In fact, if T4P had ten cents for every time it heard the words: "You're a really nice column and all -- and I really respect you -- but, do you think we can just be friends?" it would have about as much as Cousins' old team is paying for a win on Friday night.
3. A hard rear-end by any other name
STEELE Sidebottom. Quite simply, it is the best name in the history of the world. Young Sidebottom is just one who has impressed eagle-eyed talent judge and thinker of the year runner-up Kevin Sheehan for his work at the 2008 AFL NAB Under-18s Championship, which is currently underway.
Others such as Kade Klemke, Ranga Ediriwickrama and Tom Rockliff have also shown enough promise to keep Dennis Cometti in the chair for years to come.
Just imagine: Rockliff might scale the heights of greatness; Sidebottom might turn the other cheek; and Ediriwickrama might . . . he might . . . um . . . turn out to be a very fine player.
Well, The Four Points never pretended to be fit for live commentary.
4. Not so instant karma
FIRST, a bit of history. St Patrick was a Roman, born in Britain, who was stolen by Irish raiders as a slave when he was in his teenage years.
On Wednesday, player manager Ricky Nixon outlined his plans to afl.com.au to set-up a type of draft for young Irish footballers keen to turn their hands to the soon-to-be world game.
Now, is it only The Four Points and thinker of the year runner-up Alanis Morissette that can see the irony in this situation?
Of course, the increasing international reach of Australian footy holds true to the prediction of ex-coach and thinker of the year WINNER Kevin Sheedy who, according to reports, credits his capacity for lateral thought to some bloke called de Bono.
The Four Points think he sang on de Joshua Tree.
What to look out for on afl.com.au this Thursday:
Buddy wonderful to be here
It's big, it's beautiful, it's Buddy. Lance Franklin will be answering your, the fans', emails in the first of the Buddy@ series today. Are we fair dinkum? Buddy oath!
Rome wasn't built in a day
And neither was Stats City. It took Matthew Hardy and Justin Rodski at least a day and a half to pull this week's ep together.
Identified flying objects
Bombers, Eagles and Hawks and the men responsible for their safe flight into finals (or early end-of-season trips) are all up today.
Selections, shocks and scandals
Will we see another high profile omission from the team lists for this weekend's matches? Find out first with the teams at afl.com.au.
The views expressed in this article are those of the author and not necessarily of the AFL.
