Melbourne stole Adelaide’s Grand Prix – at
huge expensive and of dubious benefit – but now it’s given the city of churches
and strange homicides something back: a good chance of hosting one of the eight
legs of the International Rugby Board’s world sevens tournament.

In the process, Melbourne has shot itself
in the foot, missing out on hosting a glorious annual sporting festival
celebrating the event that was the big success of the Commonwealth Games. And
the joke is that Melbourne wasn’t interested in hosting the sevens because it would
clash with Aussie Rules club games. Myopia, thy name is AFL.

On Friday the ARU announced it was backing
the Adelaide’s pitch to grab the sevens slot that could have been Melbourne’s. The ARU’s first choice was Melbourne – but
the Victorian Major Events Company wasn’t interested. VMEC is the government
arm that throws taxpayers’ money at everything from hot air ballooning to food
and wine festivals.

No roads would have to be closed for a
weekend of sevens. Only one venue would be required. It would attract plenty of
visitors, the locals would enjoy the thing as well and it would be the perfect
way of gently introducing the non-faithful to a real international contact
sport.

So who’s on the VMEC board? On a quick
squiz of the web site, of the eight directors, two have major commitments to
non-rugby codes: Eddie McGuire and John Ribot. You’ve probably heard of Eddie
All-over-the-place. Ribot is a former rugby league professional who now runs a
soccer club.

Good luck, Adelaide. Win the event and I’ll
be one of the many who’ll visit.