On this grainy Youtube clip, the voiceover suggests that this is probably the most embarrassing moment of Malcolm Blight’s football career, as commentator Lou Richards incredulously exclaims ‘I think he may have put that through for a point, he’s run the wrong way…he thought that was the goals!’
There is of course a simple explanation for Blight’s error.
At Woodville Oval, where the proud South Australian Blight had kicked bag-loads of goals, and indeed at EVERY South Australian football ground, the point posts were painted red, thus permitting players and officials to distinguish between the ‘goals’ and the ‘behinds’.
Silly Victorians would opine: ‘the goal posts and the behind posts are a different height, and therefore, there is no prospect of confusing the two’.
But one rarely has the time to distinguish the height of the post when running in to an open goal (or what should have been an open goal).
There is, of course, a simple solution to this clear problem. Paint the point posts red. Der.