- Leigh Matthews has left Channel Seven for Channel Nine
- The big AFL will headline a new football show
- He has worked with Seven since the 1990s
Channel 9 has poached Leigh Matthews from Channel 7, ending the footy big’s long relationship with its home network.
Matthews, 71, has appeared on Seven since the 1990s as a commentator and panellist, but News Corp reports he will headline Nine’s new Sunday night football show in the future.
He is joined by Jimmy Bartell and football reporter Tom Morris in the new weekly programme.
Nine have applied for Matthews’ expert analysis, having won four premierships as a coach and a further four flags as a player.
Last year he was linked with a seat on the AFL Commission but withdrew due to the lengthy process to fill the vacancies.
Leigh Matthews has left Channel Seven for a move to Channel Nine
He will headline a new panel show airing on Nine on Sunday evening
He also works with the 3AW commentary team.
Matthews’ new show will stream live on 9Now on Sundays at 7:30 p.m. The program will be shown after 60 minutes on Nine’s main channel.
Matthews – who played from 1969 to 1985 – pulled off some of the dirtiest acts of his generation, with huge hits on Barrie Cable, Peter Giles and Stuart Trott among the most infamous.
One king hit that left Geelong’s Neville Bruns with a broken jaw was so bad he was convicted of assault.
So it’s no surprise that the forward knew that physicality was just the reality of playing football.
“When I played, you took it as a dangerous game and you hoped it wouldn’t affect you too badly at the time, or later in life,” he recently told 3AW. year.
“Ten years ago, if we said if a player gets a concussion, who is not necessarily unconscious, he won’t play for 12 days, that was unfathomable.
“The game is more dangerous (despite the AFL) if we try to make it safer because the athletes are so fit and powerful that they are like gladiators running across the field and bumping into each other at high speed.”