David Leggat: On the uncertainties of sporting life

These must be strange times to be an Australian reared on the certainties of sporting life.

Things that once could be counted on are no longer.

Today, teams from Perth and Sydney will contest the AFL grand final at the Melbourne Cricket Ground. Tomorrow night, Sydney's Stadium Australia - that's the Olympic stadium to you and me - will host the NRL grand final between the Brisbane Broncos and Melbourne Storm.

For the first time no Sydney club has made the final. And you think Sydneysiders are happy about that? About as happy as Melburnians are at today's participants in - to them - the only sport that matters at their beloved "G".

Once upon a time there were two bankers in Australian sport: a Sydney club would triumph in league's showpiece, in the same way the likes of Carlton, Collingwood, Hawthorn, Essendon or Geelong would be chanting their songs of triumph holding the Aussie Rules trophy aloft.

Even after doors were opened to places like Perth, Adelaide, Brisbane and Auckland, the power remained in The Big Two for a time.

Not any more. The Swans beat West Coast by four points in last year's AFL final, so this is a repeat.

And as for the NRL, the Storm have been to one final, in 1999, and won it; the Broncos have won all five of their trips to the big show, so there's sure to be a first time loser.

The Storm were runaway minor premiership champions. They've won nine of their last 10 games.

They have brilliant footballers like Greg Inglis and Billy Slater, and while you need foundations laid - and that's done by workhorses not glitzy boys - to win teams need gamebreakers.

What of the Broncos? There's a suspicion they are hitting prime form at the right time, after four successive losses, they've won five of their last six.

They demolished the Bulldogs in a swaggering second half last weekend, from being 20-6 down at the interval. For Inglis and Slater, read Justin Hodges, Darren Lockyer and Shaun Berrigan. It will be prop Shane Webcke's final game for the Broncos. He's a rarity in that no one has a bad word about him.

Sentiment rarely wins games, players do, but there might be a measure of emotional backing for the Broncos through the Webcke factor, if not from Sydney neutrals.

Neutrals? Not on your life. They'll back the Storm in spades. Broncos equals Queensland equals State of Origin. Geddit?

A couple of winners? West Coast to reverse last year's result, and the Broncos.

* Walter Hadlee's remarkable life ended in Christchurch yesterday.

One reflection. This year, Christchurch Boys High School marked its 125th birthday. A book on the school's life was done.

In the process of penning a chapter on sport at the school, I spoke with Hadlee about his recollections of life there.

They remained vivid. He had a 90th birthday gathering at the school. In a quiet moment, he had looked out a window across the drive at what he called rooms 2 and 3, but which had long since been renamed.

And he remembered a function in those rooms in 1931 for three old boys about to leave for England with the New Zealand team, Curly Page, Ian Cromb and Bill Merritt.

And he remembered as if it was the previous week that Page had looked at the pupils, including first XI players, and told them there was no reason boys in that room could not be on the next tour of England, in 1937.

It was a life-changing moment for Hadlee. "It hit me like that," he said, "and I did everything I could to make that tour."

He did. And the next one in 1949, which he captained and which remains one of New Zealand's finest touring teams.

The playing, selecting and administering the game are all ingredients in the story. It's a bit of an old fashioned term, but he was the patriarch of New Zealand cricket.

Oh yes, and three of his five sons played for New Zealand.

By the most demanding standards, a fine innings.