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The team for the south

Left to right: honorary Tasmanian Drew Morphett listens closely, ABC Gold Cost radio announcer Tim Cox wonders if he'll have a job when he gets back, and Bob Cheek explains that nothing good will happen in Tasmania until we lose the North v South mentality.

 

The team for the north

Left to right: Carlton supporter Tony Benneworth feels right at home sitting next to that other famous Carlton supporter John Elliott, and Margaret Lyndley suggets we can solve Bob Cheek's problem by having an AFL team in both places.

 

The Ron Barassi Senior Memorial Debate 2011

(Continued from Home page) Our two debating panels, provocatively described as "representing the north of the state" Tony Benneworth, former Tasmanian cricketer; John Elliott, former president of everything; and Margaret Lindley, one of the founders of this debate and Weagles supporter (you can't have everything, I suppose) and "representing the south" Drew Morphett "simply the best" AFL commentator; Tim Cox (will that man ever really move?) and that best selling author, fitness business guru, and former state opposition leader Bob Cheek.

Sadly, traditional moderator and VFL/AFL legend Ron Barassi could not be with us as he was attending the funeral of Sean Wight, taken before his time after a short battle with lung cancer. Sean, one of the more successful examples of the so called Irish Experiment, played 150 games with Melbourne.

Tasmanian Cricket Chairman Tony Harrison was subbed in as replacement moderator, a canny move for those of the "let's play AFL football at Bellerive Oval" persuasion.

This debate very quickly descended into a "here, not there" argey bargey.

The various opinions were:
Margaret Lindley reckoned we should not have one but two AFL teams. (One here, one there.)
Drew Morphett pointed out that the problem with York Park lights was that there were "3 Osrams and they're all in the change room."
EVERYONE agreed that this is NOT a government problem.
John Elliott led another unanimous charge the Tasmania SHOULD have a team.
Wait, wasn't this supposed to be a debate?
Bob Cheek pointed out that parochialism is the biggest single impediment to this goal.
Margaret then said that when we get our team it should play half the games here and half there. So the two teams thing earlier appeared to be an ambit claim.
Drew then trotted out his "vision". He "saw" that Tasmania will have an AFL team, and it will be at Bellerive.

This was enough for the moderator, who promptly awarded the "south team" the win.
Drew was then immediately made an honorary Tasmanian by David O'Byrne, Minister for Economic Development.

Before all this madness descended, however, some important stuff happened.

Awards were presented to some deserving young people. More here....

Read about earlier Barassi debates here...