Dennis Cometti and Port Adelaide’s John Abley enter Hall of Fame

Dennis Cometti and Port Adelaide legend John Abley are the final entrants into this year’s Australian Football Hall of Fame.

Dennis Cometti, left, in the Channel 7 commentary booth at Telstra Dome with Bruce McAvaney in 2007.

The induction of Dennis Cometti into the Australian Football Hall of Fame on Thursday night to cap a stellar class of 2020 is, to borrow from the master commentator himself, centimetre perfect.

The West Australian, who played with and coached West Perth, had a remarkable ability to deliver a perfectly timed one-liner mid-match that added humour and insight to match commentary.

“Comettisms” became part of the vernacular for many Australians when discussing games or players.

Brownlow medallist Tony Liberatore may have once entered “a pack optimistically and emerged misty optically” but the clear-eyed observers on the Hall of Fame selection panel were in no doubt as to Cometti’s contribution to the game.

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The 71-year-old joined Port Adelaide Magpies defender John Abley, a highly decorated player of the 1950s, as the final inductees in a unique year for the Hall of Fame.

That pair, alongside Lions Simon Black and Jonathan Brown, St Kilda’s Lenny Hayes, Eagle Dean Cox and Port Adelaide and Collingwood star Greg Phillips round out this year’s inductees.

The seven inductees along with 2020 Legend John Kennedy Snr will be celebrated again at next year’s Hall of Fame celebration, after his year’s function was cancelled due to coronavirus.

Cometti kicked 70 goals in 38 games for West Perth over four years and later coached them to 32 wins and a draw from 65 games between 1982 and 1984.

A music lover, he was inspired to pursue a career as a disc jockey when listening to shows broadcast from Los Angeles.

A remarkable career as a broadcaster that continues today with Triple M began in 1972 with the ABC, with Cometti also enjoying a three-decade long career on television calling matches.

The key to calling, he said, was to view matches as a blank canvas and choose the moments to “get in there and show your personality”.

He formed a formidable team in the latter stages of his television career with another great of Australian sports broadcasting, Bruce McAvaney.

To hear the pair in discussion about all sports – not just Australian football – and the insights and knowledge they shared about the nation’s great athletes usually took listeners far beyond what the most in-depth of Wikipedia entries might detail.

Cometti is a member of the AFL Media Hall of Fame. He is also a member of the MCG Hall of Fame. So, too, the Sport Australia Hall of Fame.

As a keen harness racing and thoroughbred follower and caller, he might appreciate that his entry into the Australian Football Hall of Fame completes an exceptional quadrella.

John Abley trains with Port Adelaide Magpies in 1957.

Abley was an outstanding defender for Port Adelaide who held down full-back for over a decade and was named in that position in their greatest ever team.

He grew up in Melbourne and played a season with Hawthorn’s reserves before heading west to Adelaide, where he was part of the legendary side that won six premierships in succession between 1954 and 1959.

Abley, who died aged 80 in 2011, earned All Australian status on three occasions after starring in national carnivals and was inducted into the SANFL Hall of Fame in 2002.

Former teammate Geoff Motley said few people contributed more to the famous club than Abley when paying tribute after his death in 2011.

“He stands tall in relation to his contribution in the golden era of the Port Adelaide Football Club,” Motley said.

“He will never be forgotten and nor should he be. He was unbelievably respected, but he was unbelievably quiet. John’s loyalty to Port Adelaide never waned through his life.”