The image that belongs here has been relocated to avoid triggering feelings of anger, sadness and deja vu in Richmond people. You can see it here but don’t say I didn’t warn you.

Who among us really knew where we were going? And why?

The pessimist said to the optimist “I don’t reckon this can possibly get any worse” and the optimist goes “nah, I reckon it can”.

These blokes have been on our shoulders for decades now.  We know how they work, but we never know who to believe.  We’ve managed them with booze and laughter and dysfunction and dreams of Nathan Brown …. or Harley Bennell.  It’s been a kind of delusional, addictive, glorious, Tiger bipolar.  That’s shaped us all.  

It would be lazy to use a butterfly analogy as a metaphor for the Tigers emergence.  And it wouldn’t sit with blokes like Nick Vlastuin, Kamdyn McIntosh, Jake Batchelor or Dylan Grimes; let alone with Dimma or Dusty.  A butterfly changes from a grub pretty quick.  Plus life in a cocoon is pretty stable.

Nah, I reckon an eel.  Yeah, a shortfin eel.  Swimming in Boomerang Creek. Then she slithers though cow shit, over busted stubbies and through inorganic, industrial waste. She navigates her way, on instinct, past greasy gravelly truck stops and through inner city, resort style lives.  She’s drawn downstream, overland, and upcurrent.  She gets dry and dusty and salty.  Bitten, lost and scared.  She’s seen it all, without ever understanding why.

Then she finds herself a thousand nautical miles away, in shallow tropical waters.  Kind of a fish out of water in an osmotic reverse.  She looks back, gives birth, and dies.

The little fingerling, smaller than a grain of rice and an orphan, takes a blind look around and goes “what am I meant to do now?”.  It starts wiggling, without knowing, towards Boomerang Creek.  Which is a pretty nice place.

You see it?  33 years of pain and misery.  The lost footy tipping competitions, the stuffed up drafts, the busted leg, Spud, the countless slabs and bottles paid to smug mates; like charity, the ephemeral threats to call the Department of Child Protection when you buy your newborn a yellow and black jump suit.  The pity, the scorn, the self-loathing, the Carlton loathing, the failed attempts to kick the habit; to get off this cruel, beautiful luge.  We’ve seen and done and felt and heard it all.

Yeah, its been a long (dare I use the overused?) journey.

Who among us really knew where we were going? And why?  How were we gonna get there? What was gonna happen? Were we ever gonna get home?

But deep, deep, deep in our footy DNA.  The tiny bits that make us all Tigers, we knew.  We knew we’d be OK.  and that we’d get home.

And we’re almost there.

It smells like sweat, eucalyptus, beer and smoke.  There’s a hungover feeling of hope. The narrow urinal is three deep.

Brian Ciccotosto, a broad little bloke; a club colossas, is upbeat.  He’s had one instant coffee too many.  Some punters can’t get enough of his jittery enthusiasm.  Some can’t get far enough away.

Laurie Flanders is low key.  Tough.

The young Tiwi southpaw looks relaxed.  Supremely fit and with a charisma that needs no words.  Few have any idea the heights this kid is going to scale.

Another young bloke, Alec Leatherday, is clearly a gentleman …. already with the first of two national titles.  Today he’s fighting up a division for the vacant welterweight title of Western Australia.

An old SP bookie near the makeshift bar looks like he stepped out of the 1920’s.  He even has a ticket and a pencil under his hatband.  A whippet thin smoke dangles at that angle from his lips as he does a brisk, anxious trade.

2/3 Leatherday. 7/2 Rioli.  But the South Freo blokes have seen this kids hands work.  The 7/2 is belted and when the bell goes, Maurice is fighting at 68.5 kg and evens.  Alec’s at 63.5, and evens.

The first round is a draw.  Leatherday is a boxer.  Rioli is an Athlete.  But with lightening reflexes.  When the bell goes, blokes argue about who is in front and look to the bar.

When the fighters touch gloves to start the second, someone calls out ‘stop dancin’ and start fightin’ Maurice’.

Someone responds with ‘show him how to box Alec’.

The crowd sing a chorus of rowdy joy.

Half way through the round, Leatherday tries an old trick thats served him well.  He rocks forward, springing his weight onto his left toes.  He drops his left glove almost to his waist, shifts his right shoulder back, and his right glove out.  Just a fraction both ways.  Less than a quarter inch.

In his mind, it goes like this.  His southpaw opponent thinks he is telegraphing a right, and counters with straight right.  Alec anticipates this, brings up his left, and delivers the telegraphed right, dead straight and hard.  Whack!  A double stooge.

But it doesn’t go like that.  How was he to know this kids hands moved like a puwatingini ₍₁₎, baked on a road?

Maurice falls for the trap. He does thinks Leatherday is telegraphing a right.  Indeed, he is.  So he retaliates first.  Straightening his knees, he pushes up onto his right toes, and delivers a short, straight, right of his own.

The punch is so fast, Leatherday’s left guard is still at his chest, and his right is still a half inch to the East of his chin when Rioli’s jab lands hard like a riled muntamunta ₍₂₎,  under Alec’s left eye.

Most of the crowd only really see the blur of Maurice’s  left and the right that follow in a whip, and the outcome of the first jab.  A cut on Leatherday’s right cheekbone that looks like it was done with the slash of a cutthroat.  Wide, deep and beautifully neat.  A smile of meat and fat and bone.

The Referee steps in, takes a quick look at Leatherday’s wound and motions to his cut man.

Rioli walks to his corner, where Laurie Flanders quietly offers him a stool and a hand on the shoulder.

Leatherday’s cut man doesn’t even enter the ring.  He just shakes his head with tight lips.

The referee beckons the fighters to the centre of the ring, and holds Maurice’s left glove aloft.

He grins and nods humbly to the crowd, who are mostly already queuing boisterously and heckling, before the bookie by the bar.

Maurice is the Welterweight Champion of Western Australia.  Of course, this is only just the beginning.

1. Puwatingini – Tiwi, western brown snake (male)
2. Muntamunta – Tiwi, hornet (female)