The knack of Nash Rawiller produces GOOD when being a South Sydney and Swans supporter in the leadup to a Federal Election produces BAD and UGLY.
Yes, it was only a successful double on an otherwise lacklustre Royal Randwick meeting on Saturday but Rawiller, all arms and legs in saddle choreography more rap dance than ballet, lifted the current area of interest: racing, AFL, rugby league plus politics.
Renowned for getting the best out of mounts, sometimes in extreme circumstances, the jockey guided Grand Eagle from a near impossible position, back in the field, to take the Bookmaker’s Recognition Day Handicap then followed by regenerating Punch Lane into a front-running powerhouse in the Precise Air Handicap.
A week earlier Punch Lane raced more punch drunk under another strong influence, Mark Zahra.
Obviously The Swans are much in need of a Rawiller. What happened after a scintillating first-quarter against The Suns last Sunday? Isaac Heeney was back but only briefly. The Swans “dropped the bit” in the second half to the degree had they been horses, swabs and blood tests would have been initiated.
Injuries have taken a toll but are they getting the best out of what they’ve got? The question could also be asked about the Rabbits, although better than the Bloods.
One commentator remarked that the controversial Rabbit Latrell Mitchell had a strong game, apart from his kicking: twice too long, necessitating two seven tackles, and a couple of shanks. Ten minutes in the sin bin eventuated in a week’s suspension. When is this highly talented athlete going to earn his liberal wages for South Sydney?
Again the diminutive Jai Grey played far above his weight and pay grade. Beaten a couple of times in defence up front while Mitchell, at fullback, was present but hardly a force. Grey continued to spark the attack and saved a try giving support to Jack Wighton, now captain, a position he should retain, in the best decision coach Wayne Bennett has more since his return.
Of course I have always advocated a politician should be judged by his football team and Labor’s Albo is South Sydney but lost his Redfern Oval Rabbitoh status with me over this Qantas and Chairman’s Lounge policy.
Still the Coalition playmaker Peter Dutton changes his mind like the Rabbits under a high ball. Unfortunately, there is no Alan Ramsay, who wrote politics without fear or favour. We were stablemates in “The Sun”, a tabloid newspaper in the good old days when fresh out of the copyboy ranks. Ramsay was an angry young man who became and angry old man but always a great read.
Perhaps he erred with Mark Latham who he tipped to be Prime Minister. In recent weeks Latham has gone down like the Swans last Sunday.
“Labor did to Latham what in a more primitive age was done to heretics,” Ramsay wrote. “It burned him at the stake in front of us all, to the applause of a mostly accommodating media …”
Latham, now in the State parliament, has commendably challenged the dopey ploy to sell Rosehill Gardens, hitting the line like Tom Burgess, now sadly missed with the Rabbits.
Alas he had a discussion on the possible sale at Rosehill recently which led to the Australian Turf Club issuing Latham with a 12-month good behaviour bond following an investigation into comments made by him to a senior ATC official.
The suspension, agreed to by Latham, includes conditions. I am heartened. He is a turf enthusiast and racing can little afford to lose any.
Many figure Chris Waller did a Dutton by switching on the letter sent to Racing Minister David Harris, (“I did not sign any such letter nor do I support the sentiment it implies”), by racing heavyweights about the $3 billion industry under the control in New South Wales of Peter V’Landys.
While opposed to the Rosehill sale, Waller regards V’Landys as “an extraordinary administrator, arguably the best sport has seen”.
However the Australian Turf Club is so poor it has to sell a major asset, Rosehill. Randwick is downtrodden and Canterbury and Warwick Farm verging on derelict. Yet Racing NSW so rich with a real estate portfolio including stud farms, country properties and a training centre. Surely the books and finances deserve independent examination and explanation.
On the positive side horses and those than make them, including Waller, the major hand behind champion Winx, and Rawiller, are as good as ever.
The Winx magnitude was enhanced by her superiority over Happy Clapper, a topliner who died recently. Happy Clapper was second to the champ in five Group one events and was nurtured into over $7 million in prizemoney by Pat Webster, a hands-on horseman of the old school. Like Rawiller, Webster did it his way.
As always thank you Max, Albo has many faults but v Dutton it is no contest, for starters South Sydney with its long history of great indigenous players would never accomodate a racist like Dutton