The ABC has attacked The West Australian’s grand final week coverage for being “over the top”, bizarrely questioning the paper’s reasons for being all-in on the news of Fremantle Dockers’ quest for a maiden premiership.
The coverage has caught the eye of the national broadcaster’s media analysis program Media Watch, which this week sent a series of questions about the paper’s motives to Editor-in-Chief Christopher Dore.
“We have noted the blanket coverage leading up to Saturday’s match. Do you think the coverage was a little over the top? If not, why not?” Mario Christodoulou, executive producer at from Media Watch, asked.
Christodoulou said the Media Watch segment would be “part critique, part celebration” of The West’s “legitimate but sometimes oddball” stories in the lead up to the Grand Final.
Thousands of footy fans have flown, driven and even ridden the bus to Melbourne to be at the MCG on Saturday while a further 40,000 are expected to turn the pubs and streets of Fremantle purple, in a show of just how much the game means to Western Australians.
The West has responded this week by bolstering its regular in-depth football news and expert analysis with stories and images of the fans for whom Fremantle’s success means so much.
People like Alan Perriam, whose decision to hop off the heart transplant list so he could travel to the MCG for the game, landed him on Thursday’s front page.
“I get that the lives of ordinary Australians, epitomised by football fans in WA, are completely alien to the ABC’s hopelessly out-of-touch culture warriors sitting around on meditation cushions drumming up conspiracies, but this is the most ridiculous Media Watch line of enquiry ever,” Dore said.
“How outrageous of The West to be wholeheartedly backing in the Dockers. What sort of mindset could even contemplate asking these questions?”
At the same time, other Perth media — notably ABC Perth radio — are also unashamedly backing in the Dockers.
This week, the radio station rebranded to ABC Fremantle and turned its logo purple in celebration of the Dockers making it into the grand final.
It was the brainchild of Drive host and self-described Dockers “bandwagon ticket 1A” holder Oliver Peterson.
Peterson made the call while filling in for Breakfast presenter and passionate West Coast fan Mark Gibson, and said he “turned around and asked for permission” after the fact.
“It went down alright, everyone got on board . . . it’s the number one story in town whether you’re a Freo supporter or not,” he told The West.
“How could you go too far?”
In line with that approach, 34 of ABC Perth’s 50 most recent posts on its Facebook page to Friday reference the AFL grand final or Fremantle Dockers.
The paper has also printed posters of star Dockers for fans to hang on their walls and a grand final eve 32-page souvenir wraparound edition.
Thursday’s posters depicting captain Alex Pearce as half-man, half moose and Pat Voss as his prancing pony moniker were well received by the players themselves, with Voss agreeing to news reporters it would be good to see plenty of them on show at the MCG.
One of the Media Watch questions asked whether the paper’s additional coverage was for commercial reasons rather than the readers.
“Obviously, your readers expect the home newspaper to go big when the home team is in the Grand Final. But is The West’s coverage also influenced by Seven’s commercial interest, given it owns the broadcast rights to the AFL and owns The West Australian?” Christodoulou asked.
He also questioned if The West would “go this big in the event that the Perth Bears reach a grand final” in the NRL.
The Perth Bears are yet to play a game and do not join the league until 2027.
Dore responded to Christodoulou’s series of emailed questions asking if it was a joke.
“If it isn’t, then congratulations, you have authored the dumbest set of questions I’ve ever received in my career,” Dore said in his emailed response.
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