The weekend’s Australian Football League and National Rugby League grand finals were a "fascinating look at the development of modern national football codes and the effect of interstate expansion versus traditional suburban loyalties on newspaper sales," according to Chris Mitchell of THE AUSTRALIAN. The wins by home town favorites "could not have worked better for the media in Sydney and Melbourne." As the country’s "biggest-selling daily newspaper by far," the Monday-Friday Herald Sun still sells 330,000 print copies a day and Victorian Editorial Dir Peter Blunden late last week expected that to increase by at least 30,000 on Sunday and Monday if the Bulldogs won. Blunden said, "Footy is our biggest sales driver throughout the year, and it’s great news for us to have the Bulldogs in the grand final. Over the course of the weekend -- Saturday, Sunday and Monday -- we will publish close to 100 pages of football." In New South Wales, the media had been "barking for a Bulldogs-style performance by sentimental Sydney favourite, Cronulla." Sunday Telegraph Editor Mick Carroll "devoted 28 pages to a preview wraparound of the NRL grand final" on Sunday but "10 pages of the inside sport liftout to the AFL result." At the national daily, Sports Editor Wally Mason "thought both codes would work well for The Australian." He said, "In both codes we have a national grand final so we will do well whatever the result. We don’t need to get our hands dirty barracking for one team or the other" (THE AUSTRALIAN, 10/3).
