AFP, published on Monday June 01, 2020 at 1:17 p.m.
Fill the stadiums despite the camera with an effigy of you in cardboard: the good idea turned into a bad farce in Australia, with a famous serial killer appearing in the stands of a rugby league match.
The Australian Federation (NRL) wanted to mark the blow when it resumed last weekend, behind closed doors, after several weeks of suspension of matches due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
Inspired by an idea already applied for football matches in Germany, she offers fans to pay 22 Australian dollars (13.5 euros) to have a full-size cardboard effigy printed in the stands .
But pranksters hijacked the device by sending photos … unusual. For example that of Harold Shipman, nicknamed “Dr. Death”, an English doctor convicted in 2000 of having killed 15 of his patients.
We saw his portrait on Sunday in the stands of the match between the Penrith Panthers and the Newcastle Knights … when he committed suicide in detention over 15 years ago.
Lighter, Australian viewers were also able to distinguish in the stands the portrait of Dominic Cummings, the adviser to British Prime Minister Boris Johnson who found himself at the heart of a controversy for having bypassed compulsory confinement.
The controversy prompted the NRL to announce a reform of the system. “We are reviewing the control process of + Fans in the Tribunes +. The weekend was a test and tests are done to resolve the problems,” the League said in a statement.
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