If “Australeague” talks were successful 100 years ago, you wouldn’t have an excuse to hate those other footy codes … We’d all be watching the same game.

It seemingly wasn’t a big enough laugh for the sporting gods to have “blessed” Australia with four rival football codes. No, while Australia’s divided footy landscape alone guarantees that supporters and administrators are often off-loading a sly dig or two at a rival code, history has deigned that every 50 years that friendly banter will erupt into a full-blown cross-code war.

In a quirk of history, the rugby codes in Australia split from each other in 1908 – exactly 50 years after Australian football first came to life in Melbourne (1858).

Thus, in 2008, we’ve seen both the Australian Football League (150 years) and National/Australian Rugby Leagues (100 years) celebrating the founding of their codes and their rich histories.

If only one code had started a year earlier or later, life would be so much easier for the nation’s football fans today.

Adding spice to the mix, it’s a centenary since the Wallabies (rugby union) and the Kangaroos (rugby league) made their first tours of Britain, while the Melbourne Demons, Richmond Tigers, South Sydney Rabbitohs, Sydney Roosters and the Wests Tigers (in a manner of speaking) are all celebrating their founding.

The upshot of it all is that 2008 has witnessed accusations of codes attempting to spoil each other’s celebrations.

That season 2008 should coincide with a time when all four codes are posturing over expansion plans, the fight for fans, juniors, corporate support and television money, what was a “cold war” has come decidedly close to flashpoint.

How each code must envy the position of soccer in most other nations, gridiron in the United States, rugby union in New Zealand, where national dominance lets everyone just concentrate on the football on the field.

The sad reality is – depending upon how you view such matters – that Australian football’s jubilee anniversary (50 years) party in August 1908 almost brought our never-ending football war to a halt before it had even really begun, thanks to a secret meeting between Australian rules and rugby league officials … to merge codes.

Instead of in 2008 hearing about codes attempting to “rain on the parade” of their kindred branch of footy, we could’ve been celebrating 100 years of rivalry between the Collingwood Magpies and South Sydney Rabbitiohs, and watching a New South Wales vs Victoria State of Origin series.