A kid I went to school with walked out of a maths class with a confused expression on his face. Stumped by talk of derivatives, coefficients and coordinates, he asked a classmate: “What language was that?”
For the casual football viewer, watching a game on the box can be a similar experience.
Just as language constantly changes, so too do football tactics, terminology and commentary.
The game is unrecognisable from the early 1980s when a furious Ron Barassi lambasted Gerard Healy with one of the most famous sprays recorded.
“How many kicks have you got? That’s the answer to everything. You give me possessions, and I’ll shut up.”
Such bakes are a rarity in the modern era but if it were to occur, it’d probably go something like this: “How many metres have you gained? That’s the answer to everything. You give me clearances, ground balls and forward 50 tackles, and I’ll shut up.”
There is usually a short lag for when coach-speak enters the football lexicon through player and coach interviews or special comments, nearly always delivered by a former player.
Cross-sport references have become common. Top of the list is the “one wood”, the golf club used to hit the ball the furthest, and used in football to describe the main strength of a player or team. Problems arise if said strength is their use of short kicking to break up an opposition’s defence.
Imagine the confusion among those not steeped in the language of golf when St Kilda coach Ross Lyon awarded his team a “mulligan” after an uncharacteristic loss to Adelaide. (Note, in golf a mulligan is an extra stroke allowed after a poor shot, without a penalty; in footy terms, Lyon was letting his team off the hook for a rare stuff-up.)
Thankfully, the “quarterback”, to describe a counter-attacking defender, is not used as regularly in 2023 after being in vogue in the 2010s when Hawthorn champion Luke Hodge was often credited with such a role.
Thankfully, the phrase quarterback is no longer as prevalent as it once was, when it was applied to Hawthorn’s Luke Hodge.Credit: Graham Denholm
Conciseness is the enemy of much football jargon. Players have become “playing groups”, coaches “coaching groups”. Coaches with strong relationships with their players aren’t good managers but “good man-managers”.
The 50-metre line has become the “arc of 50” or the “paint of 50”. Why say a player is in possession when you can say they have “ball in hand”? It has crossed into cricket where Steve Smith is damaging with “bat in hand”.
A team that moves the ball quickly now has “speed on the ball”. A player with pace has “leg speed”, enabling them to “spread” more quickly from the stoppage. They are “quick across the ground” or “running on top of the ground” as opposed to below it, the supposed domain of the “underground handball”, which bounces on top of the ground.
This column has noted the ground increasingly referred to as the “floor” by some coaches, a logical progression given how many players use “dance steps” to get around an opponent.
Collingwood man-manager Craig McRae with his coaching group. Or, the Pies coach with his assistants.Credit: AFL Photos
Anatomists must be scratching their heads at how footballers evolved so quickly to develop a “back shoulder”, used to describe the starting position of a defender, and can “lower the eyes” to make shorter kicks, when in fact they’re lowering their head to scan closer targets rather than sending a long bomb in the general direction of goal.
Kicks used to be long or short. Now they can be “45s”, not as in distance but in angle from the boundary to the middle of the ground, be a “spot-up” or “hit-up” to a teammate on the lead if performed by a player who can lower their eyes, or be a “dump kick”, which leads to a turnover – I mean – an “intercept”.
Intercepts can be completed by the “plus one”, formerly known as the extra player behind play or an astute defender who, through their reading of the play, leaves their opponent to support a teammate in a marking contest.
The “plus one” is not, in turns out, your date for the Brownlow, but a commonly used tactic if the other team is scoring heavily, or applying “scoreboard pressure”, a variant of which is “hitting the scoreboard”. Given the location of most scoreboards at most AFL venues, a player would most likely have failed to score if they had indeed hit the scoreboard.
Plus one: No, it’s not who joins you at the Brownlow Medal.Credit: AFL Photos
Statements about a team can take on greater importance by adding “football club” to the end. These aren’t dark times for North Melbourne, they’re dark times for the North Melbourne Football Club.
The open side of the ground is now the “fat side”, not the most politically correct term, where teams aim to “transition”, another term which has taken on a different meaning in sport.
“Four walls”, to describe the inside of a club, is the gold standard. Imagine the confusion if this term catches on among officials in the Pentagon.
A team no longer plays badly, they have “failed to execute”. Players falling foul of the law have made “bad decisions”, as if drink-driving is comparable to having pineapple on pizza.
If you’ve lowered your eyes this far, footy jargon can now become your one-wood, so the next time the commentator with the microphone in hand refers to a plus one you won’t be as befuddled as that confused kid from maths.
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