Week two of the AFL finals is coming, but the biggest sporting event in town on Wednesday was a press conference at Etihad stadium to promote the first Ultimate Fighting Championship night in Melbourne in November. Etihad opened it to the public, 6000 registered interest and about 1800 came to whoop and holler. The press consisted mostly of locals who drawled sycophantic questions in subconsciously affected quasi-American accents and were still going after an hour. The fights of the woman most had come to see, the sassy Ronda Rousey, last on average something like 35 seconds.

UFC, Rousey told Ellen deGeneres, is "striking and grappling together, judo but with hitting". The aesthetic of a UFC bout is a cross between the bottom of an AFL pack, mating centipedes and the business end of a porno. Victory is obtained, if not by knock-out with fist or knee, by "submission by armbar". Its stage is an octagon enclosure, illegal in this state until the election of the Andrews Government. But UFC has a massive following on pay TV, with the internet the biggest state in the world.

Fighters like Ronda Rousey (left) have helped the sport generate millions in revenue and tourism Credit:Getty Images

UFC falls into that Las Vegan area, more neon and tinsel and special effects smokey than grey, between sport and entertainment. In it, everything is gilded and magnified and exaggerated. On Wednesday, you would variously have learned that Rousey was the "world's dominant athlete" this year (Sports Illustrated) and the "greatest fighter in the world" (Rousey), and that UFC will pack 70,000 into Etihad (UFC president Dana White, but uncertainly). That is, if they will pay $468 for a ringside seat, no exaggeration, or $100 to sit at binocular distance.

You might also have discovered that Rousey recently beat Serena Williams in a contest for greatest female athlete. The voting constituency, surprise, surprise, was a pay TV audience. Of a field of 32, five were non-Americans, including Australian basketballer Lauren Jackson, who went out in the first round. In UFC, as in geopolitics, there is America and not America; Australia, New Zealand and Canada are lumped into one sub-branch.