ALTHOUGH Brisbane wasn't big enough, in the end, for Leigh Matthews and Jason Akermanis, it's somehow heartening to know that the world is. The two protagonists are now based at either extremity of AFL life on Australia's east coast and normal transmission has been resumed. Both are still talking, although not necessarily to each other, and when they talk people listen.

Matthews got things going recently with his comments about Adam Goodes' tribunal reprieve on the eve of the Lions' game against Sydney. The dual-Brownlow medallist was given the less-than-complimentary description of "protected species" by a man who didn't win a Brownlow but who has done everything else there was to be done in the game.

As though stung by his old coach's momentary headline-grabbing ascendancy, within hours Akermanis was involved in a "testicle grabbing" headline-grabber of his own. He, too, had a dual-Brownlow winner in the cross-hairs.

Matthews, within his role as a coach, is a remarkable media performer. His knowledge of the game and thoroughly earned reputation, combined with a shrewd intelligence and ruthless streak, make him as formidable an interview subject as there is in Australian sport.

I know this only too well. Soon after Matthews returned to coaching in Brisbane, he told me he'd forgotten what a relentless interrogator I could be. It was perhaps less a compliment than a warning. Subsequently he seemed to decide that attack was the best form of defence. A couple of on-air exchanges that followed left me feeling as Barry Cable, Keith Greig, Peter Giles, Ken Hunter, Neville Bruns and a few others might have felt in earlier times in a different arena.

The impression from this distance is that in Brisbane Matthews is rarely, if ever, challenged. For a number of years there, as the mastermind of three straight premierships, he has been free to hold court. He clearly enjoys it. He can, and does, use the media, apparently unfettered by journalists asking annoying questions.

There is an upside for the media. Week in, week out, Matthews delivers; he says something. Frequently, the frankness of his observations shocks even the most seasoned watchers of the game in its heartland. The comments about Goodes were a perfect example.

Once upon a time, for a player to make such a provocative, match-eve remark about an opponent would have been seen as a needless, stupid mistake. That might still be the case. "You don't give them ammunition" has long been the game's mantra. Matthews meditates, or pre-meditates, to his own mantra.

The fact that an arm of officialdom, in this case the tribunal, had given Goodes a reprieve in the preceding days, and that it was the player's second recent incident of such good fortune, provided an opening.

Perhaps Matthews felt he could unsettle Goodes; more likely he felt he could soften up the umpires.

Until recently, such an implied criticism of the tribunal from a coach would have warranted an AFL sanction. These days, coaches are permitted to comment on judicial outcomes within reasonable limits.

His was the sort of comment that ought to have the AFL pondering the wisdom of granting more rope to coaches. At a time when umpires and tribunals are being treated with ever-less respect, it's not what football needs.

For his hard-nosed cynicism, though, Matthews earned scarcely a word of criticism. Akermanis, on the other hand, was a much more inviting target. Aka, of course, has form. Lots of people think he has shot his mouth off more than once too often. If there's an issue in which he becomes embroiled, it is now customary for the majority to assume he is wrong. So it was this week over his entanglement with Robert Harvey.

What happened was that Akermanis complained, as he lay on the ground amid a pack that Harvey had taken the opportunity to apply pressure to his most sensitive spot. His comments were audible through the umpire's microphone.

It was the sort of angry response to an opponent that must occur many times in every game. That was the sum total of Akermanis' active involvement.

The incident was highlighted the next night on Channel Seven's news and was also given an airing on Channel Ten where Akermanis was a guest on Before the Game. He was surprised when the incident was shown but joked along with the panel about it.

Akermanis, like Campbell Brown last year when he was asked whether Chris Judd had eye-gouged him, played down the incident and ensured the reputation of one of the game's icons wasn't sullied.

Yet, presumably because the complainant was Akermanis, the accused Harvey, Aka was again the bad guy. Sometimes it doesn't pay to have white hair, a black beard, and an opinion.

In the end, Lethal and Aka could co-exist in one place no longer.

Now they express their respective views from different points of the compass.

Those views are often provocative and invite opinion. It shouldn't be assumed, though, that either one is always right and the other wrong.