What's the difference between Alan Shearer and Newcastle?

The answer of course: Alan Shearer will be on MOTD next season!

For the uninitiated, one of the biggest and oldest clubs, and one with the worst strip as it resembles Collingwood and Juventus, Newcastle United is now almost certain to be booted out, or relegated from, the Premier League, after they had a goalless draw at home against Portsmouth tonight. Their manager of three games now, club legend Alan Shearer, is also almost certain to resume his day job as a pundit on the Saturday night institution of a TV show, 'Match of the Day'. A bit like if when Paul Roos took over towards the end of 2002, finishes bottom of the ladder. In our game you just carry on the next season with heaps of gimme draft picks, but in 'football' it ain't like that, you just get kicked down to the next level and someone else takes their place. Most people get sacked, club owners get tired of it all and kind of wander off. Good for those in lower leagues as it gives you hope; when you get relegated you may think otherwise. It'll never happen to the mighty Gooners!

Tell you what, Aussie Rules (it isn't called AFL, that's the number one comp, all the other forms of the game are Australian Rules football or Aussie Rules) would be a hell of a lot different. Most grades of the game still don't have it; from my time out in the eastern suburbs of Melbourne it certainly made the EFL (or is it the EDFL) worth keeping an eye on. Football Geelong tried to get it up and running in the mid-1990's when the GFL and BFL tied up but clubs (such as the ones I follow, Grovedale and Leopold) got scared and it's gone nowhere since.

What if there were relegation in the AFL? For a start we'd probably have avoided artificial Premierships from the likes of Brisbane, Hawthorn and of course Sydney. Don't think it's ever going to happen in my lifetime however, the game just isn't big enough, far too big a gap between the elite and state levels.


Out of all soccer clubs worldwide, what club would Geelong most resemble?