The Truth About That Trophy

It appears that we ruffled a few feathers with our story on  the Flexible signage solutions Grand Final (Heading in the Right Direction).

Although praising the day as a whole, and the efforts of all concerned, we highlighted some areas for improvement. Surely that is not a bad thing as the higher we all aim the higher we can carry the game.

We said: “Finally it was great to see that the West Australian ran a story on the final on Saturday but how come the trophy featured in the photograph, was not the one they were playing for that afternoon, even though the caption advised otherwise? This is a minor issue, but again comes down to professionalism.”

It appears that what transpired was Jonathan Cook from the West Australian convinced his editor to allow him to run a photo-story on the Grand Final, for which I think all of the footballing public are grateful, and some also appreciate how hard that must have been.

The photo was all teed up with both captains, but there was a problem. The trophy was at the engravers. So a substitute trophy was used.

Football West issued a press release on the Thursday before the final, with the engraving clearly visible on the cup. The same day that the photo was taken by the West, however obviously before it returned from the engravers.

Personally if the trophy was not available and the people concerned could not arrange for it to be available for half an hour then we would have left the photo out. As stated before it comes down to professionalism. If the paper is giving you that space, and is sending a photographer out there you make sure it is available.

Jonathan and his colleagues at the West have done what they believe is in the best interests of the game, which may be true.

However we feel that unless standards are raised, by those charged with running and promoting the game, and their shortfalls highlighted, football will always play second fiddle to other sports, no matter how often people argue it is the World game.

Clearly the damaging aspect here was not having the correct trophy available when the photo for the West was to be taken, and then Football West unveiling the trophy on the same day, and the fact that a picture of it was run on various websites and even in some publications prior top the picture in the West Australian appearing.