Australian Politics Forum

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The Courier Mail can reveal that Coates was paid $482,040 in his role as AOC president last year, which is slightly ahead of Prime Minister Julia Gillard who earns $481,000

We got plenty of silver medals - being 2nd in the world isn't that bad is it?

Guildford wrote on Aug 6^th, 2012 at 5:58pm:

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The Courier Mail can reveal that Coates was paid $482,040 in his role as AOC president last year, which is slightly ahead of Prime Minister Julia Gillard who earns $481,000

wow , not bad. we'll win a few yachting and shooting gold medals and all will be well.
wheres that archer fairweather when we need him

Things are not fixed forever!

There will always be ups & downs, in pretty much everything, anyone can think of and that also applies to Australia's performances, at the Olympic games!

what the heck are these coach's getting???????.

very few PBs in the pool one where we really expect the best..

and I call it lack of discipline..and thats due to the coach..they are dealing with mainly kids.. when I looked at our swimming coach's they are all over weight and old.. what sort of example are they to a bunch of hormonial teen ages...

also its time to teach our HERO'S how to lose... if getting a silver medal is called losing..

I have never seen so many pouts in my life..

dont forget all these poor nations have members of the OC..pretty sickening really.

I don't thnk its a funding issue, though it could mean that money could be better spent.

Remember when Coates ranted and raced a few years ago when funding was going to be cut for the Sports Commission. Rudd caved and gave them even more.

Look at countries which are performing well nowadays, like South Korea and Japan.

soren - excellent posting.

I've been trying to copy this but, for some reason, cant...so google "Polish Cycling Team"

It's the team photo of the year!

One dumb movie did more for Australia's image overseas, than all our perceived Olympic Glories.
Perhaps we should focus a little less on sports, and more on intellectual and cultural endeavours.
Of course, Crocodile Dundee was not "high" culture, but it put us on the map internationally, like Borat did for Kazahkstan, which I believe is ranking higher than us at the olympics too, lol.
Sport is a great pastime, but I think too many take it too seriously, and I agree with Cods, that the poor sportsmanship of the bad aussie losers, is a terrible example for our youth.
The Olympics have become far too self important and way too big, with gold medals for synchronised farting the next would be olympic gold medal event.

mozzaok wrote on Aug 7^th, 2012 at 2:06pm:

What kind of 'intellectual and cultural endeavours' should more money be spent on? (There's already millions being spent on universities).

The Heartless Felon wrote on Aug 7^th, 2012 at 2:01pm:

I've been trying to copy this but, for some reason, cant...so google "Polish Cycling Team"

It's the team photo of the year!

Soren wrote on Aug 7^th, 2012 at 10:31am:

Attitude.

we're all in this together.

AUSZEALAND in 9th place

486410_400429213349945_1551168861_n.jpg (22 KB | 50 )

This article goes some way to explaining what's wrong with the "great sporting nation".

I see he failed to mention fun. Sports should be about FUN, shouldn't it?
............................................................

Why Australia must fight the widening wealth gap between pro and community sports

The hysteria surrounding the failure of Australia’s Olympic team to win its expected haul of gold medals, and the resulting break-out of national hand-wringing, has triggered an avalanche of analysis.

Where has it all gone wrong? Do our athletes need to train harder, or are we to blame for setting completely unrealistic expectations upon our athletes? Or is there a deeper problem with our national sporting culture?

Indeed, if you look beyond the Olympic athletes, beyond the high-profile professional competitions, you’ll see that many local sporting clubs and organisations are doing it tough.

They’re finding it hard to attract players, even harder to find volunteers, and their facilities are getting run down.

Part of the problem is a growing rift between Big Sport and community sport, with the elite and professional bodies swallowing up the lion’s share of available resources.

High profile professional and elite sport gets preference from all levels of government, from the top down to local councils, not to mention the exclusive attention of the media.

The elite competitions usually justify this disparity by invoking the ‘role model’ argument. According to this theory, watching our sports stars succeed on TV is not just passive entertainment – it’s inspiration, and it encourages us to get off the couch and into the gym.

It’s sport’s version of trickle-down economics – but like trickle-down economics, there’s little evidence to link the theory with reality. The Government’s 2009 review of sports funding, the Crawford Report, questioned the link between elite success and grass roots participation. Moreover, the Crawford Report argued the number of Olympic gold medals that a nation wins should not be the only indicator of a healthy sporting culture.

According to the Crawford Report, sport is about more than medals – it’s about participation, healthy lifestyles, and the social benefits that accrue from being involved in organised community sports.

With this in mind, the Crawford Report suggested that sports funding programs should provide more support for mass participation sports – the games most Australians like to play, such as cricket, the football codes, netball, golf, hockey and so on.

In the fight over sports funding, the loudest voices always win. And the loudest voice in Australian sport is John Coates.

The AOC, which was seeking over $100 million a year in extra funding at the time, went into overdrive to discredit the Crawford Report. AOC President Mr Coates labeled the report “insulting, “disrespectful” and “Un-Australian”.

In response, the Federal Government increased its funding for Olympic programs, and most of the report’s recommendations were quietly forgotten.

Coincidentally, in recent weeks another example of the tension between Big Sport and community sport has quietly opened up in Sydney’s Inner West.

Professional rugby league club Canterbury Bulldogs is locked in a bitter battle with semi-professional soccer club Sydney Olympic over the right to use Belmore Oval – and unsurprisingly, the big professional club is winning. The two clubs are supposedly sharing access to the ground, yet it’s the smaller club which is being forced to relocate its home matches, while the Bulldogs continue to train at Belmore during the week. This is having a severe impact on Sydney Olympic’s home match revenues.

Ironically, the experience of another local soccer club in the Canterbury region could provide an example of how community sport can start competing more effectively for government resources.

Last year the Hurlstone Park Wanderers Football Club decided it was sick of waiting for its run-down council-owned facilities to be upgraded. The Hurlstone Park Wanderers decided to stop behaving like a community sports club, and to start behaving like an advocacy group.

The club started a campaign called ‘Space to Play’*, complete with a web site and an on-line petition. It cultivated the local media, engaged the support of other high-profile soccer personalities, and held a day of action to promote its cause.

Before long the club had secured a new junior-size playing field, with new change rooms, an amenities block, and a commitment to investigate new drainage for its existing field. The ‘Space to Play’ campaign showed what can be achieved when community clubs get political.

If one club can have such an impact in its local area, imagine what could happen if all community clubs across the country joined together, and found their voice? If Australia is to be the Great Sporting Land that it purports to be, nothing short of a revolution is needed.

The exclusive focus on elite competition at the expense of local clubs and participation needs to be turned on its head. We need to watch a bit less and play a bit more. We’ll all be healthier, and probably a bit happier.

And guess what? With more people competing, we might even discover some more talented athletes who’ll go on to win Olympic medals.

http://sportbizinsider.com.au/news/category/community-sport/why-we-must-fight-the-widening-wealth-gap-between-pro-and-community-sport/

We're up to 4 gold now. :)

I bet that buuuuurrrrns you haters up inside.

We're doing good as a nation, like I said we don't have to be in the top 12, who cares.

But I still think there is far too much money spent on elite athletes compared to grass roots sporting clubs.

Have a look at the timeline from Beijing 2008 and London 2012.

Use the slider on the bottom to make comparisons.

The haters are the media who have unrealistic expectations and the people who cry over silver and bronze medals.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/datablog/interactive/2012/aug/02/london-olympic-medals-2008-2012-compared?CMP=twt_gu

Go Sally and Anna..its good to see deserving winners rather than giving any time to those spoilt brats in the pool.

adelcrow wrote on Aug 8^th, 2012 at 5:14pm:

Go Sally and Anna..its good to see deserving winners rather than giving any time to those spoilt brats in the pool.

Both quiet achievers, they go about their business and get the job done without the bragging and chest beating.

The swimmers act like spoilt brats. Swimming Australia needs to take a long hard look at the swimmers and why they should be given so much funding, especially considering some of the competitors draw media attention to themselves for all the wrong reasons.

Ex Dame Pansi wrote on Aug 8^th, 2012 at 11:49am:

we are the greedy country: the howard era is responsible for this!!

THIS IS WHAT POLITICAL HISTORY WILL PRINT AS TRUTH!!

I'm always hearing the haters say the swimmerss act like 'spoilt brats" but I haven't seen anything to back up the assertion.

Is it a particular incident? A particular swimmer? All the swimmers? Does it apply to divers and water polo players too?

C'mon haters - give me something to go on here.

Ex Dame Pansi wrote on Aug 8^th, 2012 at 5:58pm:

adelcrow wrote on Aug 8^th, 2012 at 5:14pm:

Go Sally and Anna..its good to see deserving winners rather than giving any time to those spoilt brats in the pool.

'Quiet achievers' huh. Did you see Pearson's interview a few days ago? Obviously not. Chest beater indeed!
And good on her. She has earned the right to talk herself up.

BatteriesNotIncluded wrote on Aug 8^th, 2012 at 6:11pm:

Ex Dame Pansi wrote on Aug 8^th, 2012 at 11:49am:

we are the greedy country: the howard era is responsible for this!!

THIS IS WHAT POLITICAL HISTORY WILL PRINT AS TRUTH!!

Interesting that you should politicize it.
I was thinking the other day, Australia's two most successful Olympics - Sydney and Athens - were both under Howard's watch. Could Howard be responsible for it? He's supposed to be responsible for everything during his time according to the neo-Marxists, hell, why can't he be responsible for our best Olympics?

... wrote on Aug 8^th, 2012 at 6:15pm:

Haters??? because someone has a different opinion to you?

Just the swimmers.

Surely you've seen the after race interviews, the tears and excuses.....twitter, sickness, the winner trained harder (that's the truth), stayed up too late, facebook.....wha! wha! wha!

There's no need for it. So you came second or eighth, big deal. Own it, it's no disgrace.

The tax payers should not be paying for this. I hope they funded the celebrations themselves.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w-Ip_M2fvCs

Ex Dame Pansi wrote on Aug 9^th, 2012 at 7:48am:

... wrote on Aug 8^th, 2012 at 6:15pm:

Haters??? because someone has a different opinion to you?

No, haters because any mention of anything sports related induces a spasm of hatred. AFL or NRL players seem to be your staple, but once every 4 years, you're presented with a smorgasbord of athletes to level your envy and spite at.

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Surely you've seen the after race interviews, the tears and excuses.....twitter, sickness, the winner trained harder (that's the truth), stayed up too late, facebook.....wha! wha! wha!

They came within a whisker of fulfilling their lifes dream. WTF do you expect?

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There's no need for it. So you came second or eighth, big deal. Own it, it's no disgrace.

When you're at the top, it's a long way to fall.

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The tax payers should not be paying for this. I hope they funded the celebrations themselves.

maybe not, but hardly the fault of the athletes is it?

Is Steph Rice still out shagging every member of the Dream team or is she taking a day off? ;D
I see there are a few athletes wives in London looking for her.

Fair call.

I did have a little giggle at the paper today saying Stephanie Rice and Kobe Bryant may be *ahem* "dating".

Her date may be involved, but I'd suggest whats going on there is nothing so...traditional as "dating".

adelcrow wrote on Aug 9^th, 2012 at 5:54pm:

Is Steph Rice still out shagging every member of the Dream team or is she taking a day off? ;D
I see there are a few athletes wives in London looking for her.

Apparently she's been having a good time with someone's husband, yep someone in the American Basketball team.

Ex Dame Pansi wrote on Aug 9^th, 2012 at 6:17pm:

adelcrow wrote on Aug 9^th, 2012 at 5:54pm:

Is Steph Rice still out shagging every member of the Dream team or is she taking a day off? ;D
I see there are a few athletes wives in London looking for her.

Apparently she's been having a good time with someone's husband, yep someone in the American Basketball team.

And the Aussie taxpayer is footing the bill for Stephs Olympics sex tour ;D

Steph will make an excellent pollie when she retires from swimming...she has all the qualifications ;D

Australian Politics Forum
http://www.ozpolitic.com/forum/YaBB.pl General Discussion >> Chat >> Olympic blame game http://www.ozpolitic.com/forum/YaBB.pl?num=1344239920 Message started by Guildford on Aug 6^th, 2012 at 5:58pm