This morning the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) chairman Rod Sims confirmed that the consumer watchdog will launch an investigation into the conduct of the AFL surrounding the highly publicized ANZAC Day clash between Collingwood and Essendon, played at the MCG yesterday.

Commenting from his office this morning, Mr Sims said that the ACCC became concerned when monitoring the publicity and advertising in the lead up to the match:  “This year in particular the Commission were aware of the parameters within which the AFL were required to work.  It is clear that neither Essendon or Collingwood are in the best 8 teams in the AFL competition, so on that basis we wanted to be sure that the AFL were not seen to be promoting tickets to the match on the foundation that consumers who purchased those tickets, did so expecting that they would see a high quality match.  Having studied the promotions we formed the view that consumers might reasonably expect, based on what the AFL were propagating, that the two teams in question were serious contenders to play finals football, and that is simply wrong.”

Mr Sims explained that if found guilty of either unconscionable or deceptive and misleading conduct, the AFL could be fined up to $5000.00 for each offence.  “In terms of monitoring the quality of the product we sent two of our investigators, agents Scully and Mulder, to watch the game and their report presents disturbing reading.  Very few of the players were able to hit targets and the basic skill level generally was appalling.  I’m no expert in matters AFL, however, I’m verily informed that the only reason the result was so close was because neither team had the ability to kick a decent winning score”, explained Mr Sims.

Mr Sims went on to say; “We expect to be able to announce the results of our investigation once we have had the opportunity to view the Richmond v West Coast game this weekend and determine a proper reference point for “quality” however if found guilty, the AFL could be pinged up to $5000 for each player that took the field yesterday”.

In an ironic twist, that could see the fattest player in the competition, Dane Swan, the only player avoid sanction after having collected 43 possessions.