What is it about the recruitment to AFL ranks of Israel Folau that causes me to feel anger and not joy? Why do I feel sorrow, not schadenfreude, towards rival codes? Why does not my heart leap but, rather, my stomach turn? What is happening to sport and those who administer it?

In answer to the last of these questions, it’s fair to say that Australian football is now on a course set for sport in this country by Kerry Packer in 1977. It was Packer after all, who, during the fight for cricket’s heart, soul, and best players uttered the famous words to the old game’s fusty officialdom: “It’s every man for himself and the devil take the hindmost.” No doubt the AFL administrators, who seem to carry that mindset, will relish comparison with such a figure. And it’s all in the name of sport.

Well, I say this is exactly what sport is not about. It is what modern business and, increasingly, modern sports administrators are about. There is a world of difference. This is actually what I want to get away from when I turn to sport because this is an expression of values that fly in the face of sport. I will try and explain that, and answer the other questions I’ve raised at the start of this column, by posing some further questions. For a start, is this about fair play?

No it’s not, and if you don’t agree, have a listen to the views of Brisbane coach, Michael Voss. Clearly, Folau has been bought for a price he hasn’t earned. It is an affront to a group of professionals who have been honing their skills for a lifetime that one who hasn’t, and who has given this game nothing, should suddenly be among the biggest earners of those who play it.

I’m also inclined to question the fairness of it as it affects followers of rugby league. The various football codes in this country have their own languages and cultures and are, in a way, like nations. The idea of one, with more financial muscle than another, stomping in, flexing its muscle and undermining its neighbour, I find offensive. It is the way to war. And remember, one day there might be a bigger war: it might be soccer doing the same thing to Australian footy and the indigenous game could be on the receiving end.

Another question: how does this fit with a quaint old concept like “love of the game”? The AFL likes to feed off concepts like “love” of football when it suits. Of course there’s absolutely no love in this relationship. This is as close to love as prostitution is, and with all due respect to those engaged in the world’s oldest profession I suspect there’s not a lot of love in it. Israel Folau has absolutely, totally, unequivocally, and any other word that pins down one hundred per cent precision, not come for love. He has largely come for the money. And football folk are expected to feel proud and thrilled. Leave me out.

Although he does go into it with his eyes wide open, perhaps the greatest unfairness in this will ultimately be perpetrated on Folau. Many good judges say that, at 21, he has no hope of becoming an elite-level AFL player, and that he will adequately serve the AFL’s purposes simply as an ambassador. If that turns out to be the case, a talented sportsman will have been bought out purely to wear a sandwich board for a game to which he has no emotional connection. He may squander the best years of his life in another sport to become a salesman. Is there not something both tragic and obscene about this possibility?

But what about the fact that ours is The Greatest Game, you ask, and that Folau will be an important evangelist for it? Well, if it is the greatest game let that very fact do the talking. And I pose one last question: why does the greatest game need to pay big money for cheap and nasty stunts?