OPINION
Football will be better for what happened after the siren on Friday night. Did it overshadow the result? You betcha. But that’s not a bad thing.
When Jack Ginnivan made his comment on Brody Grundy’s post about seeing the Swans in 14 days it was cheeky and, yep, probably a bit disrespectful. But boy did it make the build-up to the Hawks’ semi-final against the Power far more interesting.
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That’s what Ginnivan does for the most part, and the game is richer for it. Especially the viewing public.
Love him, or hate him, we should be rapt he’s prepared to put out a statement like that in public, if that’s what he’s actually thinking. From there, we grab the popcorn, the Hawks either win, and he looks a million dollars, or they lose and he eats a bit of humble pie.
If he’s prepared to say it, his team is prepared to back him and the consequences be damned, good on them. More of it I say! Who doesn’t love popcorn?
Is it any surprise Port whacked his comment straight on their whiteboard and used it as motivation? Absolutely not. That’s a consequence. Another one is Hinkley doing and saying what he did. Should he have? Probably not. Hinkley clearly regrets his part, but he didn’t exactly unload a torrent of vitriolic abuse. He just reminded Ginnivan of what he’d said really.
Hawks skipper James Sicily reacted and went in to bat for his young teammate, as a good captain should, and coach Sam Mitchell backed his players in his post-match media conference. They framed it as a powerful, older man being caught up by the actions of a young player and it being embarrassing.
Sure, maybe it is embarrassing, but Ginnivan isn’t exactly a debutant who hasn’t ever peeked above the parapet. He knows he’s provocative. When you provoke, there’s a reaction and this time it happened to come in the form of Ken Hinkley. An emotional man in an emotional game.
All of it is natural, human reactions to comments or actions involving football. If none of it happened, today, and over the next few days, we would’ve opined about a finals classic, but the reality is what happens next weekend and the weekend after would have drowned it out.
By Round 1 next season, this semi-final would have been a distant memory for anyone who isn’t a Hawks or Port fan, only briefly revived when the two teams meet next.
But now? Well now, anyone who knows anything about football will be salivating at the prospect of a Hawks-Port re-match. The AFL should lock them in for Round 1 and let the whole thing stew over the off-season. Jack Ginnivan, Ken Hinkley, James Sicily and Sam Mitchell might just have started the next great football rivalry. Who knows?
Football will be better for it.