Category Archives: AFL

Australia news live: two die after reportedly attending music festival; bushfire evacuation warning for campers in eastern Victoria

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The two men in their 20s reportedly attended the Knockout music festival at Sydney Olympic Park. Follow the day’s news live

Reserve Bank not likely to move on interest rates

Australian borrowers are likely to be spared more interest rate pain this week, following the first Reserve Bank of Australia board meeting under its new governor.

Sydney: 594 auctions with a clearance rate of 71.7%

Melbourne: 159 auctions with a clearance rate of 66%

Brisbane: 82 auctions with a clearance rate of 70.7%

Adelaide: 58 auctions with a clearance rate of 79.3%

Canberra: 64 auctions with a clearance rate of 62.5%

Tasmania: No auctions held with two expected this weekend

Perth: Six of 13 auctions have been held

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Penny Wong refuses to release documents related to Qatar Airways decision – as it happened

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The foreign minister claims public interest immunity over Dfat advice. This blog is now closed

Rishworth won’t confirm adoption of any disability royal commission recommendations, ahead of report release

Families and Social Services Minister Amanda Rishworth has refused to confirm if the government will be adopting any of the recommendations made in the disability royal commission report ahead of its public release today.

I’m not going to comment on any specific recommendations.

Obviously, we need to also make sure people with disability have choice and control.

You never change a country for the better through fear, you change it through hope and optimism and compassion and justice.

That’s what this referendum is about.

This is a body that won’t provide funds, that won’t run programs, that will just give advice to the government, and that experience of past bodies, and issues that have arisen has been factored in by Indigenous Australians when they’ve made this request.

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AFL criticised for promoting series of bets that have 85% loss rate for gamblers

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Analysis of 90 advertised same-game multis from Sportsbet shows only 15% would result in a win

The AFL has been promoting bets that have an 85% fail rate while taking a cut of the losses, drawing criticism from politicians and harm reduction advocates who want such ads banned.

Sportsbet suggests same-game multis during televised coverage, in segments hosted by the former AFL star Nathan Brown. These bets allow gambling on a combination of outcomes such as possessions and goal scorers, and all must succeed before money is paid out.

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Singing the Blues: Robbie Williams’s musical tribute to Carlton player after AFL win

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‘De Koning’s in the air, everywhere I look around,’ Williams sang to tune of Love Is In The Air

Lying in bed, Robbie Williams expressed shock after Carlton’s last-gasp victory over Melbourne in their AFL semi-final on Friday night.

“Wow! Is it like this every year?” asked the singer in a video he posted on social media.

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Geelong Football Club chasing tens of thousands in unpaid debt from Britishvolt buyer

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Money owed by Recharge Industries to the Geelong Cats include unpaid hospitality packages that typically involve premium match-day seating

The Geelong Football Club is chasing Recharge Industries, the company that pledged to resurrect UK’s battery-making ambitions through the purchase of Britishvolt, for tens of thousands of dollars worth of unpaid corporate membership fees.

The unpaid debt adds to the mounting financial stress on the Australian-born firm that received high praise from the deputy prime minister, Richard Marles, and the opposition leader, Peter Dutton, just months ago, but now owes employees significant wages in the US, UK and Australia.

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Retired AFL player Jack Ziebell attacked outside bar hours after final match

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32-year-old North Melbourne player left with facial injuries just hours after retirement match at MCG

North Melbourne stalwart Jack Ziebell was the victim of an attack outside a bar just hours after he retired from the AFL in emotional scenes at the MCG.

The 32-year-old spent the night in hospital with facial injuries after allegedly being set upon by a group of men outside a bar in South Yarra, the Kangaroos said.

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Collingwood condemn racist messages sent to Port’s Rioli after Saturday night clash

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Magpies CEO Craig Kelly said ‘abhorrent and disgusting’ racist remarks were directed towards Willie Rioli

Collingwood and Port Adelaide have condemned “abhorrent and disgusting” racist messages sent to Power forward Willie Rioli after round 19’s thrilling contest between the two clubs.

The Magpies won by two points at Adelaide Oval on Saturday night to surge two games clear on top of the AFL ladder. Rioli kicked one goal from 11 disposals and is set to face scrutiny from the league’s match review officer over an off-the-ball strike on Nathan Murphy.

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Minister orders briefing on $33m grant – as it happened

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New Zealand PM to address media shortly

New Zealand’s prime minister Chris Hipkins is set to address media at 10:15am New Zealand time about the shooting in Aukland this morning.

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AFL should limit ‘full contact practice’ to cut brain risk, Shane Tuck inquest told

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US expert tells long-delayed hearing into death of former Richmond player that NFL has achieved ‘dramatic’ reduction in head impacts

The AFL should consider following the lead of American football in “severely limiting full contact practices” to “dramatically reduce the risk” of players developing neurodegenerative disease, a US expert has told the first hearing of the inquest into the death of the late AFL player, Shane Tuck.

Tuck played 173 games for Richmond Football Club between 2004 and 2013, and later had a brief boxing career, from 2015 to 2017. He killed himself at the age of 38 in July 2020. After his death, he was found by the Australian Sports Brain Bank to have suffered from severe chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE), the debilitating degenerative brain disease caused by repeated head trauma and increasingly linked to long-term exposure to contact sports. It can only be definitively diagnosed after death.

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Senator says she has been ‘excluded’ from writing pamphlet – as it happened

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Patricia Karvelas challenges Littleproud’s Covid reasoning behind the Murray-Darling Basin delays on ABC RN this morning.

“This isn’t a new problem … Your government was in power when a 2019 Productivity Commission report warned that there had been limited progress returning the water to the environment,” she says. “Why didn’t you change course?”

This is a very technical piece of legislation … The 450 is additional to the 2,750 gigalitres of water in the plan, the Productivity Commission looked at the 450 gigalitres, there’s only been 2 gigalitres recovered on the 450 …

Because the neutrality test on social and economic impact on rural communities have not been passed to get more water back out of it – that’s a test the Labor government put in place, that we adhere to that the states agreed to.

He [is] going down a path that’s divided the country and meant that the attention has been taken away from managing people’s cost-of-living crisis, and focused on trying to win a referendum in which he has overreached in conflating a voice with constitutional recognition.

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AFL and NRL teams pay tribute to Hunter Valley bus crash victims as nine people remain in hospital

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Sporting teams, friends and family used weekend to mourn the victims as fundraising effort tops $600,000

Nine passengers remain in hospital almost a week after the horror bus crash in the Hunter Valley as the fundraising effort to support victims and their families tops $600,000.

Sporting teams, friends and family used the weekend to mourn and pay tribute to the victims up and down eastern Australia.

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Richmond AFL player Marlion Pickett involved in theft of more than $380,000, police allege

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Pickett granted bail after being held in custody in Perth overnight charged with 12 offences including stealing and criminal damage

Richmond player Marlion Pickett, who made his AFL debut in the Tigers’ 2019 premiership triumph, has been granted bail after being held in custody in Perth overnight charged over a series of alleged burglaries.

Police remanded Pickett on Sunday – a day after he played in the Tigers’ 15-point win over Fremantle at Optus Stadium – alleging he was involved in a number of commercial burglaries that happened between December and January.

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Property market revival continues; employment minister dismisses wage price spiral fears – as it happened

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Birmingham says cost of Coalition’s jobseeker plan is ‘being worked through’

Asked whether the Coalition would support a lift to the jobseeker payment, Birmingham tells David Speers that Peter Dutton has “proposed an important alternative that would help Australians who are willing to and looking to engage in the workforce”.

We’ve outlined an alternative at this stage, David. We are not at an election and not about to firm government in the next two years.

That clarity should be there before the prime minister entertains a formal state visit to Beijing.

We should expect them to be lifted complete, as we should the tariffs on our wine industry.

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Jacqui Lambie joins thousands of Tasmanians at rally against $715m AFL stadium

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The senator told the premier Tasmanians have had a ‘bloody gutful’ over the stadium and ‘you can stick it up your bum’

Thousands of Tasmanians have voiced their opposition to a $715m stadium critical to the state’s entry to the AFL, a day after the project brought the Rockliff government to its knees.

Australia’s only state Liberal government was thrust into minority status on Friday after two MPs quit, citing concerns over state debt and government transparency around the planned build on the edge of the Hobart CBD.

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NRL joins growing number of sporting codes backing Indigenous voice to parliament

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Major Australian sporting organisations expected to play a significant role in the yes campaign, with AFL and Cricket Australia yet to announce a stance

The National Rugby League is the latest major sporting code to back the Indigenous voice to parliament, joining a growing list of elite athletic organisations campaigning for a yes vote in this year’s referendum.

As the major football codes hold their Indigenous rounds in coming weeks, a long-mooted campaign of support from sporting groups is expected to intensify toward a referendum likely to be held in October – shortly after the AFL and NRL grand finals.

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AFL ‘not doing enough’ to manage concussion and brain trauma effects, wife of late coach tells inquiry

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Anita Frawley tells parliamentary inquiry the AFL was ‘fantastic’ in caring for her family but needs to do more for other players

The AFL is not doing enough to manage concussion and the long-term effects of brain trauma, Anita Frawley, the widow of AFL player and coach Danny Frawley, has told a parliamentary inquiry.

Giving evidence at a hearing of the federal senate committee inquiry into concussions and repeated head trauma in contact sports, Frawley described the circumstances of her husband’s suicide in 2019, and the posthumous finding that he had suffered from stage two chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE), the debilitating neurodegenerative disease caused by repeated head trauma which is increasingly linked to long-term exposure to contact sports.

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AFL Players’ Association claims it has been kept in dark on league’s concussion review plan

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The AFL has not provided a timeline or details on how it will care for injured former players despite pledging urgent action, the association claimed in a submission

The AFL Players’ Association claims it has been kept in the dark for more than six months about the league’s plans to review the clinical care of - and financial assistance for – past players who suffered long-term effects from concussion and other career-ending injuries on the field.

In a submission to the federal parliamentary inquiry into concussion in sport, the players’ association claimed that the AFL has so far failed to provide a timeline or details on what it plans to do to look after injured former players, despite pledging to take urgent action on the matter after its review into the work of its former concussion adviser, neurologist Paul McCrory.

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Laura Tingle becomes ABC staff-elected director – as it happened

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The 7.30 political correspondent will sit on the broadcaster’s board alongside chair Ita Buttrose. This blog is now closed

Report of new gas tax for Australia

The Australian Financial Review is this morning reporting that a new gas tax looms as the government tries to raise revenue to begin budget repair.

Major companies such as Woodside Energy, Santos and Shell and their tax advisers have signed confidentiality agreements with Treasury on the PRRT consultation.

Since Treasury resumed the stalled work for Labor late last year, it has cast the net wider to probe other PRRT areas, such as deductions, in an attempt to raise revenue sooner for the government from the profits-based tax.

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Lions coach Chris Fagan believes Gabba power outage gave Melbourne ‘unfair advantage’

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  • Brisbane 14.9 (93) v Melbourne 13.4 (82)
  • Play halted in final quarter after stadium blackout

Brisbane Lions coach Chris Fagan believes Melbourne were given an “unfair advantage’ as the AFL scrambled to restart their round-two game after a power outage.

The Lions’ 40-point lead was slashed to 11 when Friday night’s contest resumed after a long delay, with the Demons booting five unanswered goals once the lights were turned back on.

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Guardian Australia wins Quill award for investigation into concussion and the AFL

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Judges commended the ‘exemplary’ work of the journalists who ‘helped to trigger further inquiries and an apology’ from the league

Three Guardian Australia journalists have won the Grant Hattam Quill award for investigative journalism at the Melbourne Press Club awards for their investigation into concussion and the AFL.

Melissa Davey, Stephanie Convery and Emma Kemp picked up the award for their work on “the gaping hole in sport’s concussion policies” with judges describing it as “exemplary investigative journalism”.

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