The AFL have come back swinging and laughing after Meat Loaf called them ‘jerks’ in an interview last week. The singer told reporters that the problems with his performance were brought on by not doing a proper sound check and insisting he sing to a backing track. He also vowed to ‘go out of my way to tell any artist to not play for them’.

Now the chief operating officer of the AFL Gillon McLachlan has responded labelling the performance ‘absolutely terrible’. “He was booked for a national tour, Gudinski the promoter, like promoters do, had his house and everything on the line, and the guy turned up and just couldn’t sing,” McLachlan told media at a briefing.

“I reckon he was absolutely terrible. He’d done a national sold-out tour. He’d been touring everywhere, in fact he’s still sold out all his shows, but he just had one of those days. Maybe he needs a particular temperature for his vocal chords to work, I don’t know.”

But McLachlan did see a silver lining comparing the moment to Angry Anderson’s famous performance at the 1991 Grand Final where he sang in a blue ‘batmobile’. “I think it was so bad it was almost good,” he said. “It makes it like an Angry Anderson moment.”

A poll of Tone Deaf readers had over 500 votes with nearly 60% labelling the performance ‘awful’. Check out our slideshow of the worst sports entertainment ever.

Get unlimited access to the coverage that shapes our culture.
to Rolling Stone magazine
to Rolling Stone magazine