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On loss (again), & chicken poo, and what it is to barrack

27/04/2016 By Dugald 5 Comments

chicken poo pic

Late May, 2001, and the familiar Edwardian red-brick of Punt Road Oval: do you know anything beyond what was published in the newspapers of the day?

A Tweet received on Anzac Day from Edstar: I fear we’re only a loss away from another Chickenpoo episode.

Fan dissent. Mick Molloy offered his home-truths on breakfast radio. All in the outer are disappointed and angry, asking questions, looking for answers as how clubs like Melbourne, the Western Bulldogs, GWS and most others have passed us by. There is no unity in a crowd. There is nothing the club can do about this heartache except, perhaps, to acknowledge it, and embrace it, respect it. Mike Sheahan’s confected breast-beating of the club’s 50 best players in 50 years reads as a hollow exercise. Who cares? There is a bigger picture, and all us fans know it. It’s not looking in the rear-view mirror; it’s confronting the here-and-now. It is being honest and truthful, and treating a shared anguish with respect. The only tonic, of course, is with the winning.

If not that, all we can ask for is courage and bravery, and doing something – anything – to turn this around.

Many at the club, and probably many fans, might be critical of the person who dumped a truckload of chicken manure by the front door of the football club’s offices. I offer a counter argument.

If the passion of Richmond fans is one of the club’s great attributes, then this goes both ways. It was direct action, an expression of frustration by one fan about the performance of the team. Sure, it was a public humiliation; but none were hurt, none harmed, none singled out for abuse.

It’s also become part of the folklore of our football club, and of barracking, and of this city and its home-grown sport. It was a Monday morning, after a loss to Geelong, playing away, when the Cats kicked seven goals in the last quarter. Richmond had slipped to four wins, five losses. The unknown driver edged forward to drop his complaint; what was said to be two cubic metres of chicken shit.

But what happened next was revelatory: Richmond beat Fremantle away, then Carlton and Sydney, and a four-game winning streak turned into a season of wonderment. Never mind the impolite end – a 68-point drubbing in a Preliminary Final in Brisbane, to a team twice as good who went on to win the first of three consecutive premierships – Richmond were alive in late September. We were contenders. For the shortest time, we could believe.

A sullen morning in late May, a querulous fan offloaded his complaint. Attention was taken away from the players. A passion was expressed. And the coach of the day, Danny ‘Spud’ Frawley, the son of a potato grower from Bungaree in central-west Victoria, understood the protests potential. He bagged much of it up for his garden.

If anyone knows anymore about this incident, if they were part of the club at the time, could they please contact me (call me on 0425 005 531 or dugaldjellie@gmail.com). I’m curious about it, for a manuscript I’m working on, about the cultural history of barracking.

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Joy was had in being at the game on Sunday night. It was in standing among Melbourne supporters and voicing my passion for Richmond. It was in standing up for my club, for what it might represent, for what I think it is to be a Tiger. I’m not going to go quietly into the night, that isn’t our way. It would prove nothing; achieve nothing.

At half-time a bloke grabbed my arm; his name is Glen, and three years ago, when for a while I had brief access to the change-rooms after a game, I met him among the crowd. Something about him intrigued me. Like me, he was alone, not part of the group. He didn’t look as though he belonged. But each week I talked to him, and came to understand many of the players knew him, and one pre-season he joined the players at their training camp in Cairns, and ran with them. Not much about Glen looked like a footballer.

Three years later we cross paths, and I tell him that when I go on my runs – trying to stay fit, keep lean – I sometimes think of him, a middle-aged bloke like me, trying to keep up with elite young athletes. It doesn’t get any easier.

And I remembered he’s a mechanic by trade, who runs his own business, working on Range Rovers. I joke that all his customers are likely in the crowd. And they wouldn’t be barracking for our boys.

Blue collar grunt, lads, that’s what it is to be a Tiger right now.

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The long arm of the law: John Ford, who played one senior game for Fitzroy, lining up in a combined police team led by Captain Blood (who played 312 senior games for Richmond)

During the game I met with Robyn Meggs and her daughter Emily, to take photographs of them, for a fan profile I wrote on Monday, late into the night when our young boys were asleep. Hopefully it will be published on the football club’s website. Read it, if you can. Maybe stories like this can turn a season. Ordinary fans, with extraordinary stories; stories that acknowledge how so many of us may feel.

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Passions of barracking: Robyn Meggs’ parents, John and Tossie Ford, at the football, watching Richmond play St Kilda, 1977.

Late on Monday night Robyn emailed me some photographs that lifted my spirits. They are black and white, and beautiful. They tell of the history of the game, of what it might mean, of how it can involve us all. One is of her father, lined-up in a combined police team, wearing the Richmond colours and led by our very own Captain Blood. The other is of her recently deceased mother and father, at a game in Moorabbin, in 1977, watching Richmond, barracking as both of them did.

All the passion is with her mother.

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Commentators, ex-footballers, dismissed it as frustration. It was more than that, it was violent and malicious. Unlike when Tyrone Vickery swung a clenched fist at Dean Cox, the ball was nowhere in the vicinity. At the game, standing among Melbourne supporters, it was embarrassing and unforgiveable. Imagine if someone did that to Jack Riewoldt, imagine how we would feel and react.

Memories in football are long. An unreserved apology is a good start, but much trust needs to be earned, again. There is penance to be paid, purgatory. Forgiveness takes time, and a decency.

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A shared public lament: a screen grab snapshot of Tiger despair on Twitter

In the darkness, beneath trees in Yarra Park, walking alone on the grass on the way home, draped in my hand-knitted scarf, feeling sadness in our crowd, watching as a young woman in Richmond colours was pinned to the ground by four police officers and then put in a prison van, I stopped to send a Tweet: I cry for our Tigers, I weep for them, a dream is over. It is lost.

At that moment I encounter Mandy Woodward, and her husband Ken, in the inky darkness, each carrying a cheer squad flogger back to Punt Road Oval, like the burden of Atlas with the world on their shoulders. We stopped to talk, to share our misery, our disappointments. It felt good to be with brethren, to be with people who understand.

All we have is each other. A grief shared, is a grief halved. We’re all in this together.

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On Tuesday morning, before school, I showed our six-year-old boy footage of the Bulldogs’ Jake Stringer bursting onto a loose ball in the forward line, skittling three Brisbane Lions players, turning and kicking a goal. It is inspirational stuff. Our boy was incredulous. He went off and told his mum, in the shower all about it. Listening to him recount what he had seen – what these football god-warriors of ours are capable of – was delightful.

Later in the day I sent a Tweet to tell others about is, especially Bulldog fans, who deserve all the winning that comes their way. Think we’ve been hard-done by? I have a one answer: 1954. If you think our longing is great, imagine theirs. Two Grand Finals, one premiership. Yes, I cheer for them.

My Tweet: @Bulldogstragic showed footage to Mr 6yo this morning, his response: “wow, he’s got jet packs on!”. Then told mum in shower all about it.

Another Bulldogs fan read the message and thought @JStringer9 may appreciate it.

Later that night I looked at Jake Stringer’s public profile on Twitter. On his page he has a photo of his partner or wife holding their child in a kitchen. In the background is a microwave, with a sign above it that reads: ‘If football’s just a sport then the heart is just an organ”.

Fans like us love this passion, we love watching what young men, fine athletes, can do.

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Plans are unconfirmed, but I hope to be at the game on Saturday night. I’ll be standing in the outer, alone, and again standing up for something I believe in.

I don’t want to turn my back; I’m not ready yet to give in.

I want to see leadership, I want to see response to adversity, I want to see responsibility, I want to see teamwork. But most of all I want be there to show an appreciation; for Jack, and Cotch, and Sam Lloyd, and Kamdyn McIntosh, and Bachar, and Dave Astbury, and Dusty, and Titch, and all others selected in the team.

I want them to make us proud, and I want to be there to be part of it.

Tiger tiger burning bright

Email: dugaldjellie@gmail.com

Twitter: @dugaldjellie

Facebook: Dugald Jellie

Postal address: under the railway bridges on Punt Road, in the lowlands.

Dugald 27/04/2016Filed Under: dugald, front

Loss, death, war, and other things

20/04/2016 By Dugald 8 Comments

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Richmond dreaming: the desires, the hopes, the card collection of a six year old.

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Footy pop-ups: Bachaaaar

Saturday morning, in a fog, after a night like that. Count the ways our football team bruise us. The game is brutal, with no respite in the watching. Is it a failure in recruiting? West Coast footballers look bigger, stronger, faster. They boss us. Hope is torn.

Consolations come from cookery, gardening, in being moderately useful.

Kick the ball in a park with Mr 6yo. He talks about changing teams; “in three weeks”. Why three weeks? What does he know that I don’t?

As parents, we encourage independence, personal responsibility; it’s his life to lead. We want our boys to be happy, fulfilled. But what of the buzz word, ‘resilience’? Nothing’s more resilient than following Richmond.

But Richmond footy cards remain on the first sleeve of his album. He’s still his mother and father’s son. He reads out the names of his favourite players, adding emphasis: Bachar Houli, Jack, Dusty, Trent, Ty, Nick Vlastuin.

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Photo trickery: a Tiger recruit, as unfortunately we’ve yet to see him.

The Chris Yarran card looks a cruel joke; a photo-shopped montage.

His favourite non-Richmond players: Nick Nat, Eddie Betts and Nick Riewoldt. Grade 1 schoolyard currency. I’d have them in my team, also.

Monday, after-school kick-to-kick in the backyard – three boys and a ball – and I think of words I want to say to our players, to encourage them. Their confidence is gone, the trust is broken. Fingers are being pointed, names named. There is division, resentments. In the four games this season, I reckon only one player can hold his head high. He had an ill-timed defensive punch in the last 40 seconds of the Collingwood loss; but at least he took the personal responsibility of being there, of putting his hand up, of trying to make a difference.

Too much sideways and backwards passing; moving responsibility elsewhere, putting the pressure on the next player, then adding some.

Sunday night is our crucible, and much needs to change between now and then. All we can ask is that our players play for each other. Block out all the chatter of the football media, the anonymous scorn of the fan sites. Know that we are a club, and all supporters want only the best for you. Take the game on. Be strong, be bold. Fortune favours the brave. It is no time to shirk a contest.

Backs to the wall stuff; we’ve nothing to lose.

 

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Sunday afternoon, after a loss, met with a fan at the Shrine of Remembrance to ask of his Richmond story, then drove to Castlemaine with the family looking for inspiration. Off to see the artworks of Ben Quilty, commissioned by the Australian War Memorial as an Official War Artist to record and interpret the experiences of Australians deployed in Afghanistan.

Three seasons ago when I approached the Richmond Football Club to write for them, in a letter of introduction I mentioned the role of Australia’s official war artist; of interpreting the chaos of battle, giving form to a shapeless pursuit. It was an idea; one I hoped might be of benefit to the players, to the team. I believe in the power of words, in the clear logic of storytelling.

But for whatever reasons, I was never allowed access inside the “four walls”. I remained on the outer, watching with the crowd, lending my voice with all others.

This season, curiously, Richmond do have a writer in their midst – ‘embedded’, in combat speak – as a fly-on-the-wall. He’s documenting a season. His job got harder last weekend; the narrative shifted.

Quilty’s artworks remind of Irish painter Francis Bacon; the imagery is bold, abstract, unsettling, emotionally charged, raw, verging on the grotesque. The most affecting works are figures with blank stares, black splodges that could be exit wounds, contorted male torsos. They seem studies in masculinity, national identity, mortality.

There is brutal honesty in the brushstrokes; no glorification of the horrors of war. It is truth-telling.

 

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Trooper Luke Korman (2012): aerosol and oil on linen, by Ben Quilty.

 

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Trooper Daniel Spain, Tarin Kot: “I had such extreme feelings about the smell, sound, emotions of being in Afghanistan”.

 

Trooper M, after Afghanistan

Trooper M, after Afghanistan

My viewing was curtailed by our two young boys, hanging off me, clutching AusKick footballs, wanting to return to the park for kick-to-kick.

Much of our half-day in Castlemaine was spent in Victory Park, the Botanic Gardens, and by goalposts at Western Reserve. Before driving there, I knew this was where Dustin Martin grew up, where he played football. I visited the town’s footy oval, but it was busy with a car swap-meet.

Late in the day, having our last kick before heading home, an older boy joined us from a nearby skate-park, wanting to have shots on goal. A left footer. He hadn’t tied his laces up; his shoe kept coming off.

Asked him who he barracked for. “Richmond,” he said, “and also Collingwood”.

Asked him if he he’d ever met Dusty. He said he played at Campbells Creek, out of town. As he turned and left to join his friends in the skate park, he called out: “And he once asked my sister out”.

A young man, a boast.

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El Alamein: the last great killing field of Australian men, a forlorn place in a faraway land.

A war story.

Many years ago, before children, I travelled with my partner to El Alamein in the Western Desert in Egypt, to visit the last great killing field of Australian men. I wanted to offer respects through telling their story, of a place that since childhood I wondered about, mostly because of a branch line on Melbourne’s rail network.

Also, my partner’s mother was born nearby in Alexandria; her mother was a nurse during the war. She met her husband, a member of the Polish Army fighting with the Allies in North Africa, in a hospital.

Visiting the Commonwealth War Cemetery at El Alamein, wearing boots and football socks, was profoundly moving. Contemplation among all the neat rows of headstones; perpendicular blocks, each engraved with a ‘Rising Sun’ shield and a string of names, ranks, units, ages and fatal dates.

Most were no older than the 44 footballers who’ll take the field this Sunday night.

Australian men, who had travelled so far to fall in such sparse country, now entombed forever in soil the colour of cinnamon. They were buried as they fought: together, in four plots on the western flank, nearest the front line with the Axis forces. Australia’s heroic Ninth Division comprised about 10 per cent of the Eighth Army’s strength, yet accounted for more than one-in-five of its casualties.

Of the 7970 men buried, 1234 are Australian, with a further 655 chiselled in limestone in a cloister honouring Allied servicemen who “died fighting on land or in the air where two continents meet and to whom the fortune of war denied a known and honoured grave”.

Lest we forget? I deplore the idea of war and am often uneasy about its commemoration – too often the remembrance turns into flag-waving nationalism, turns into xenophobia, turns into misguided loyalties – but I can never forget the young men of the Australian “Ninth Div”, buried in such dreadful numbers in shifting sands in a faraway land.

A mood of melancholia has taken hold, again.

Times like these, I need to chop wood.

Or I need our football team to win, letting the spirits sing again.

I’ll be at the game on Sunday night, my first for the season. It shall not be my last.

Tiger tiger burning bright
Email: dugaldjellie@gmail.com
Twitter: @dugaldjellie
Facebook: Dugald Jellie

Dugald 20/04/2016Filed Under: dugald, front

On the curse of Richmond

05/04/2016 By Dugald 23 Comments

brisbane lions game 075

An idea we hold dear: but toothless on Friday night?

Friday night, and all of us know these emotions – finding defeat in the most improbable of ways; a dull resignation, the disappointment that takes days to lift. But does it really lift at all? Or is barracking for Richmond an emotional scab that adds new layers with each macabre loss?

Oh Richmond, why is it so often thus?

History books say other clubs have had lesser success, but we all know history is bunkum. No other football team in recent times has perfected failure like Richmond. This is not opinion; it’s fact. Look back over the past 30-odd years. We all know what’s happened.

Because of our shortcomings, for so long Richmond has been a popular “second team”. Other supporters have willed us to do well, if only because easybeats are always easier to like.

But after Friday night, frittering away a win with panic, even other supporters have given up on us. They’ve tired of us, tired of the waiting for us to come good.

Western Bulldogs are now crowd favourites.

This is not analysis; it’s the way it is, the way human nature works. People want their “second team” to at least squeak past Collingwood, when they’re down for the count, on the ropes.

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Future centre-half-forward: our Mr Six-year-old with Mr Matthew Richardson at the MCG last year

Our Mr Six-year-old finds my phone by the bedside on Saturday morning. He turns it on, looking for the football score, for the result on Friday night. He loves reading out the scores of all the matches played, announcing each venue, and the home team.

“Aww, we lost,” he says, walking down the hallway.

“But only by one point!”

I am pleased he is pleased by such a narrow loss. What he doesn’t know will not hurt him.

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Richmond supporters remember well out first wooden spoon in the era of the national draft, a recruiting system designed to equalise the competition. For finishing last we got first pick, a leg-up. The brains trust at our club chose a six-foot-seven-and-a-bit ruckman from Adelaide. Two years later he made his debut, played four games, kicked five goals, the team again finished last and our great hope returned from whence he came, never to be seen again.

His surname, it rhymed with ‘flounder’.

Richmond people know of five-year plans, and false hopes, and what it is to be ninth-best when only eight teams make the finals.

We know how a game can be lost after the siren to a team from the Gold Coast, from the boot of a rugby league player.

We know what it’s like to watch the right leg of the team’s star goal-sneak break in the middle of the Telstra Dome on Friday night television; ending his season, and ours. And how it feels to lose to Carlton, then wake up on a Saturday morning to news one of our key-position forwards, recruited from Fremantle, had run into a tram after the game. He was in hospital, in a coma.

It has been death by a thousand cuts, a long and slow humiliation, and frustration.

“The worst 30 seconds of football,” as Paul Roos, in the commentary booth, dubbed our second loss to Gold Coast, keeps repeating itself.

The loss to Fremantle three seasons ago, playing away, after we got our noses in front. And the loss to the Dockers last year, leading all afternoon at the MCG, then a schoolboy error gave the ball back to them, and they won it on the siren. And then last Friday night, and 40 seconds, and Collingwood, and an oh-so familiar agony.

Our loyalties as fans are true enough, but our belief is loosened, our trust weakened, until proven otherwise.

This is not hearsay; it’s an emotional response to profound disappointment.

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tatyoon1

Tatyoon: ground zero for the Dave Astbury Appreciation Society

tatyoon2Many thanks to all who logged comments on the blog last week. Vince Morton, Laraine, Donnie, Skippygirl in the forward pocket, Alison from Chifley, metasayer, Chris, Tiger Tommo, Kate, Yogi and Andy. It’s like the old team’s back together, back on the park, topped-up with a few fresh new players. Please take some time to find and read their comments. All are valid.

I had hoped to write some gentle and kind words about our football team this week, but after Friday night I’ve not been in the mood. The missus got home from her night out distraught by the result, finding me in bed, reading a fan forum, wondering what went wrong; sort of disbelieving about what I had witnessed. Soon as the game finished, I turned off the TV. Was in no mood to dwell, time was better spent washing up the dishes.

She commented about how magnanimous I seemed about the loss. I told her, on past record, it was not unexpected.

Earlier in the day I had Googled Tatyoon and learned in the latest Census it had a population of 326, and the township has only one notable resident, who plays for Richmond and played well again on Friday night.

Eight weeks to go, and if all goes well, I’m off to see his home team play in the Mininera & District Football League. I’ll probably take our two boys along.

I’ll do anything to find a good news story.

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Andy Fuller emailed from Europe, with a brickbat for last weeks’ blog that needs explaining.
“I was a little surprised to see Daniel Rioli criticised in such a manner,” he wrote.

Rioli’s incident stuck out and was obvious to everyone in the stadium as being a mistake. I had initially thought that tiger tiger burning bright could become a viable medium for expressing valid and well-contextualised observations and where warranted, criticism of the team. The players should be respected and not subject to online bullying and harassment, or ridicule (as Hampson has been on Instagram for instance).

I would also be reluctant to name specific players (and thus I didn’t like the specific Rioli reference): but I do think the coaching staff can be criticised if reasonable and based on a pattern of decisions, rather than just one incident.

I replied to Andy immediately, realising the error of my ways.

“I was meaning to add a mitigation to the piece,” I wrote. “But was written in such a hurry, under such duress, in such unusual circumstances, I plain forgot. I did have in parenthesis ‘inexperience’ or ‘exuberance’.”

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Flag bearers: do us proud Richmond, do us proud.

What should have been added to the piece is that Daniel Rioli is 18 years old, was on debut, is from the Northern Territory, and has a family name remembered fondly by many at Richmond. Whatever errors Dan made in that opening game, they hardly mattered. I really wanted to welcome him to the club. I was playing devil’s advocate.

And as I added in my reply email: “Of course it’s debatable if Rioli’s shot was ‘selfish’. Could rightly argue he was thinking of team rewards above personal glory. Just an error of judgement.”

My ‘no criticism’ policy is based on the assumption all players are trying their hardest. “No one goes into games to make mistakes,” said Nick Riewoldt, interviewed on The Footy Show last Thursday night.

And the policy is because so much of the game is about confidence. Taylor Hunt and two quick turnovers last Friday night was a rude reminder. If only I could boost the self-belief of our players. Our code of football is the most complex of all footballs – with so many players, played on such a large arena, and with no limitations on where players can be on the field – so I wish to emphasise how a short-cut to success in any team sport is selflessness.

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Shaun Hampson played one of his better games for the club on Friday night, and looked to lift his effort in the last quarter. More, please. And Bachar was our best, as he often is. And David Astbury and Kamdyn McIntosh were dependable all night. And it’s such a shame Jayden Short’s stellar debut – such a good news story – was overshadowed by the loss.

Defeat is a very cold shoulder.

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In email correspondence with Andy Fuller I posed a philosophical question: what is the best way to barrack?

It’s something I’ve been exploring these past few seasons.

By bending words as sweetly as a faultless banana kick, I have wanted to try and help budge my club’s narrative of defeat. In my middling years I cannot sit on my hands, watching mutely, doing nothing about what might pass on the field. I have loved the game and played the game and found meaning in, but for all my adult life my team – our team – has left me mostly empty handed.

Is blind faith the best way to change the fortunes of a club?

Is openness and honesty the best way to budge a narrative, rather than trusting what goes on behind closed doors, between the ‘four walls’?

Is it better to question and inquire, to offer alternate ways, to think of new methods of going about the business of football?

How have the Western Bulldogs, who lost a preliminary final to St Kilda by four goals in 2010, gone about rebuilding their list to play finals last year, and look to be contenders again this year?

The hour is late, self-doubts arise.

All I can do is barrack, with the best of them, and keep looking for all that is good in Richmond.

Tiger tiger burning (not so) bright.

Email: dugaldjellie@gmail.com

Twitter: @dugaldjellie

Facebook: Dugald Jellie

Simple message: for this Saturday afternoon.

Simple message: for this Saturday afternoon.

Dugald 05/04/2016Filed Under: dugald, front

The winning, oh, the winning

30/03/2016 By Dugald 12 Comments

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Brooding skies, luminous grass: the game

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A player, the crowd, a shared joy.

Artist Kate Birrell, a Richmond fan, sent two watercolour sketches of the night. Fluid interpretations of a game: the grass, goalposts, the cheer squad, the shape of an arena, the players. She added a photograph of her and her son outside the ground in the first quarter (“the ticketek queue!”).

All week, there was heart-warming correspondence. Tiger Tommo emailed from Africa (“the drums have been beating… and people say there are no Tigers in Kenya, only lions”). Boris Kilpatrick from Adelaide, Luke McNiece from Perth, Jess (I’m guessing from Hobart); and an old school friend, Steve M (a Bulldogs fan), from next door to AFL HQ. “Already making its way around the Tiger community at NAB,” he replied, of the return of TTBB.

Good to hear.

Bernadette Ashcroft logged a comment on the website, as did Belinda, and Swish, the upstanding Croweater that he is. “I don’t follow your mob,” he wrote. “But I love coming to this site.”

Football, it’s our common language.

Then this from Rod Thiel: “It’s like I’ve found the missing ingredient to satay sauce,” he wrote. “Great to have you back mate.”

Good to be back, Rod, and even better to have the footy back. Life has returned to normal. Easefulness settles on the city. Friday nights are as they should be.

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Wednesday night, at the cheer squad banner-making, I held a microphone and asked questions to Yogi and Trout and Vince and David Ward. Lot of banners woven among that quartet. Lot of games seen. Upstanding servants of the club.

Then I took a photo of Trout’s car parked outside Punt Road Oval, and sent it as a Tweet.

Rest easy Tiger peeps. Trout is at banner-making. Carlton don’t stand a chance.

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Yellow and black: Trout’s muscle car, on the streets of Collingwood this Friday night?

 

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Thursday night, 7.25pm, the aeroplane lands in Sydney. Been a death in the family. There’s grieving, a gap that cannot be filled. My partner, our two young boys, are happy to be here. Mr Six-year-old knows he can stay up and watch the first quarter. He won the Easter egg hamper at his school raffle (thankfully, gave most of them away). The last day of term. Triple happiness.

It feels right to be watching this game from afar.

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Housekeeping: if there are any WA-based Richmond fans travelling to Melbourne and would like me to write a fan profile on them for the club’s website, please send me an email dugaldjellie@gmail.com These interviews need to be done face-to-face for them to work.

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Watched a delayed broadcast of the game. Then watched it all again with Mr Six-year-old on Saturday afternoon, with pen and paper.

“Dad, what are you writing?

“Notes, sweetie, notes.”

Random musings:

Kane Lambert is a livewire, all hustle, nothing flash or flamboyant; workmanlike. Reminds me of Nathan Foley. High energy. Love the way he gets back behind his mark quickly, looking to open up as many options for himself. He’s always looking to make something happen. Reckon Dimma – like so many of us fans – admire these footballers who have travelled a longer road to reach the big league. With adversity comes fortitude; nothing is taken for granted.

Big Griff in headgear. Nick Vlastuin looks good with No. 1 on his back, looks meant to be.

A highlight of the night, watching Dan Rioli, Jacob Townsend, Corey Ellis, Connor Menadue and Lambert. All contributed. Young players on centre stage – opening night, a big crowd, nowhere to hide – and none are overawed. A night like this = about 10 games of experience.

Freeze-frame the screen and watch where Menadue makes his run from for our first goal. He’s run at least half the length of the MCG to get on the end of Griff’s kick. “He made a long run from the middle of the ground to get that,” says Richo, never one to waste words.

David Astbury was solid (although big Levi did slip him a few times). Looked composed. Good intercept marks. Make a deal with myself: if he plays 10 consecutive games at the start of this season, if he can stay uninjured and keep his form, I’m finally making that long-promised trip to Tatyoon to write a story about his hometown (it’s not actually a town, looking at Google Maps, more like a windblown farming community). David, such an old-fashioned name. Always good to have a Dave in your team, playing down back.

Dylan Grimes, very good, as were Nick Vlastuin and, of course, our man Rance.

More notes on Lambert: his tackles are bear-hugs, he curls up into his opponent, smothers him, makes him bear his weight. Short steps, but no half-steps.

Townsend was superb in his Richmond debut. Excellent at picking up the ball below his knees. He bends his back, stoops to conquer. When he runs he looks like Dan Jackson. Every team loves an inside bloodnut (Lingy, anyone?). Jacob looks the goods.

Sam Lloyd. Some comments on social media about how he only performed in the last quarter. Not true. He made little contributions all night. It’s just the game wasn’t being played on his terms, early. But what of his tackle on Marc Murphy in the first quarter? Inspiring. Lloyd hadn’t been in the game so he made something happen. He charged off the square at a centre bounce, and crunched their captain in a fair tackle. He got himself involved, lifted all around.

Carlton were very good on Thursday night, but we were just a bit better. That’s all you need to be.

Embed from Getty Images

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A TTBB ultimatum this season: no criticism of the players for performance, skill errors. The only exception, acts of selfishness. Football, it’s a team game. All in the crowd play their part, as we expect those on the field to do.

So unfortunately Dan Rioli, on debut, gets a rebuke. When Jack has the opportunity for an unimpeded shot at goal from a blunt angle, always let him take the kick.

A football game is a series of acts, swings in momentum, and this error (selfishness or inexperience or exuberance) cost us. Dan took the advantage and missed his shot. Carlton kicks four consecutive goals and took the lead, gaining the ascendancy.

Football is also a confidence game. We let them get their confidence. Corey Ellis’s snap goal late in the third was very important.

Early in the last, I thought we’d blown it. Then up steps Jack and Sam Lloyd, and the crowd are on their feet, roaring for us, and we squeak over the line.

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Friday night, Collingwood, licking their wounds, rattled, unsure of themselves. Don’t give them a sniff, Tigers. Jump them, and keep running away with the game. Compound their misery. Then after the final siren, all respectfully shake Adam Treloar’s hand without saying a word. Keep an air of dignity.

Every league footballer has ego, each need be acknowledged. The greatest insult is always a deafening silence, a void for him to think about words he has thrown about.

Cannot be there on Friday night. Babysitting duties. Zora Simic is in town, the missus going out. Two academics, a bar, and their night might go anywhere.

But I know where I’ll be. Glued to the television, with my heart at the G, barracking for our boys.

Come on Richmond, make us proud, make our spirits sing.

Tiger tiger burning bright

Email:  dugaldjellie@gmail.com

Twitter: @dugaldjellie

Facebook: Dugald Jellie

Dugald 30/03/2016Filed Under: dugald, front, Uncategorized

Benny Round 1 v Carlton, MCG

29/03/2016 By Dugald 3 Comments

Votes and notes by Dugald. 

All eyes saw the game on Thursday night and all eyes see it differently. What can be agreed upon is Kane Lambert was runaway BOG, for us. The spread of contributors was pleasing. An even-handed effort; all pulling the rope as one.

What a privilege, to cast votes for the esteemed Benny! (the creation of writer-blogger-Sydney-based-Tiger-fan Sean Ross, now outsourced to the crowd). This is serious business; never picked best players before. Never singled out the individual (unless, of course, it’s Dusty and those hips of his).

Drum roll, please.

5 votes: Craig Kane Lambert, for his scurry, for his industriousness, for his courage, for showing all what a journeyman footballer can do with himself, given half a chance. Great stuff; a new benchmark for what he can contribute.

4 votes: Alex Rance, The Rock, ’nuff said. (Did you see the way he confronted Dylan Buckley…?)

3 votes: Jacob Townsend: Bravo, bravo! Bent his back, in-and-under, contributed all night; a fine Tigerish debut.

2 votes: Sam Lloyd, the last-quarter match-winner (two dazzling goals), but watch his game closely and he did much more. Reward for effort. Looks to have slimmed down nicely.

1 vote: Jack Riewoldt. A line-ball between Vlastuin (he looks fine in No. 1), big Dave Astbury (assured in defence, added much composure) and Dusty. But every time Jack gets the ball the heart-rate drops. A smart footballer. Growing in leadership. Fan favourite.

Leaderboards

The Benny
5: Kane Lambert
4: Alex Rance
3: Jacob Townsend
2: Sam Lloyd
1: Jack Riewoldt

Blair Hartley Appreciation Award
3: Jacob Townsend

Anthony Banik Best First Year Player
No votes yet to Broad, Butler, Castagna, Chol, Marcon, McKenzie, Moore, Rioli, Short or Soldo.

Joel Bowden's Golden Left Boot
No votes yet to Batchelor, Chaplin, Grigg, Houli or Corey Ellis – please let us know in comments if we are missing some new lefties from this list.

Greg Tivendale Rookie List Medal
No votes yet to Castagna, Chol, Marcon, Moore, Short or Soldo.


Next week’s votes will come from Father Of The Benny, Sean Ross.

Dugald 29/03/2016Filed Under: benny, dugald, front

Longing, desire, a public declaration

21/03/2016 By Dugald 10 Comments

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Yellow and black, or black and yellow? Tuesday, Punt Road Oval, with Mr Two-year-old.

Tuesday morning: drop Mr Six-year-old at school (forget his bag, return for that), catch a train to Richmond. Meeting Gavin Juchnevicius (Mr Digital) at Punt Road Oval, talking about fans. Players are on the oval, training. See a TV camera on a tripod on the platform at Richmond Station; filming surreptitiously? Carlton spies?

Hedgerow of black JEEPs in car park. I push stroller beneath English elms into Yarra Park, Mr Two-year-old sings “yellow and black” and “oh, we’re from Tigerland”.

Makes me smile.

Going up ramp into the offices, he says: “Dad, sing the North Melbourne song.”

An aunt of his has much to answer for.

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Lot 470: A prized WEG premiership poster

And so seasons turn, and with it come new hopes and desires. From autumn’s equinox, through to a half-point of spring, we hope to travel on an arc that might be remembered forever.

Young men, a game, a shared belief; and Richmond.

Some things go without saying, but need now be said. These men who pull on the colours of our team and show us bravery, courage and honour, we want only the best for them, in football and in life. We want them to succeed at what they do, because in doing so they take us elsewhere. The narrow upset win that’s better than sex, the run for a premiership that might be better than anything we’ve known in our mortal lives. When “our boys” are on song, working as one, when all goes our way, when the crowd at the Punt Road end of the MCG roars in primordial delight, the football is king and nothing else matters. We float into the night, returning to our everyday lives, our feet unsullied by the mud of winter.

We think about what the players have given us; a pleasure, inspiration, the confidence to try and be who we want to be. The football is everything. 

“For some this was a carnival of pleasure,” wrote Manning Clarke, an inveterate Carlton man (boo! hiss!) of the attraction of our code, in his epic saga, A History of Australia. “Two-and-a-half hours of excitement which lived on in the minds for weeks to come.”

This is how it is being a barracker, and how it is being Richmond.

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Beware: football fanaticism next six months

Forget the last three years, and the three before that. On Thursday night it all starts anew. Don’t fear loss. Think only of all the possibilities of winning. Think of the beauty that can be had in the game.

Be proud of who you are, but also humble and magnanimous in victory. There is nothing more boring than a braggart – in the crowd, or on the field.

Think of Anthony Miles, the sort of no-fuss footballer he is, what he contributes to the team and to a cause. Think of Jack, and how he can rouse all around him, inspiring with his passion and courage. Think of Kane Lambert, and the road he’s travelled to share a stage with household names. Think of where each of you has come from, and where you want to go; together, as footballers, as young men, as family.

You share this time in your lives, as we share our time with you. The bond is of mutual benefit.

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Cheryl turns 50!: party pics, including her sister, Maree, a Carlton fan, up for the night from Tasmania.

News from the Tiger tiger burning bright home office: I’m half-way through a non-fiction book manuscript about barracking, and Richmond, and belonging. When I told my brother of this book project, his response: “great, it’ll come ninth on the best-seller list”.

He barracks for Essendon. Pity his year.

Many who have shared their stories with me are part of this book. It is, in many ways, a collaborative project; a group effort, as a game of football must be. On Wednesday I rode my bicycle to the Fitzroy Gardens to meet with historian Geoffrey Blainey (a Cats man) to talk about football. The other month I caught a train to Footscray West and walked to Joffa’s house (Collingwood, of course) for a cuppa tea and more footy talk. It is a broad church, our game. But mostly, I preach Richmond.

I will try this season to write regular short blogs, but no guarantees. We have two young boys, and I need to complete this book manuscript, and blog writing is – sigh – a labour of love. If any benefactors wish to support this project, please let me know. I have approached our football club to see if they might publish a blog – support a writer who supports them – but it’s not in their business plan. I’ve not heard back.

Still, I’ve a handshake agreement to write the fan profiles again – ‘Oh, we’re from Tigerland’ – so that’s good. They pay me for this work. It makes me happy. I hope it makes others happy, too.

I’ve not abandoned my colours, and I’ve certainly not given up on our team. In Nick Vlastuin I have complete faith, and when Dusty or Lids get the ball my heart still skips a beat. And I love seeing how the new blokes go about it; seeing if they can find a way into the team, and then keep that spot.

It’s a ruthless business, football, survival of the fittest.

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Life imitating art: this man is wanted. For a fan profile. Anyone know of his whereabouts?

Close my eyes and I dream of what might happen. It is a long road, but it must be taken. There is no valour in giving up, in opting out. Others have come before you and tried, and the opportunity has come and gone. Chris Newman spoke with tears in his eyes when announcing his retirement. His ache was real and true. Think of Kingy and Jacko and Tucky and Nathan Foley, and how each of them has hurt for the cause, with hearts filled with desire, but how for each the dream fell short. They no longer have the chance. Best they can do now is to join us, in hoping for the best for you.

Our lives are short. Play with a passion and respect for the game; play for each other and in doing so you play for us. Think of the opportunities you have created for yourselves and do not squander them. Make the sacrifices, and all the rewards will come. Put your hand up if you need help. All of us hope for no injuries. Don’t be afraid to ask for assistance in the most unlikely places. Seek inspiration not just from the football, but from all around you. Find beauty in the game. Play with an open heart.

And all season long we will be on the other side of the fence, barracking, believing in you.

Close my eyes and I think if each plays his part, if so much goes our way, on our day none can beat us. All of us know this, and think this, and trust in this. We have seen if before, in the rain and the dry, at home and away, under lights and in the lowering of the winter sun.

Now it is time for us – Richmond – to show the whole city what we can do, and then do it in late September.

We would walk to the end of the earth and back again for you, Richmond.

We will get down on our knees for you, Richmond.

On Thursday night you will mean everything to us, Richmond.

Do us proud Tigers, do us proud.

Go forth and vanquish.

Tiger tiger burning bright

Facebook: Dugald Jellie
Twitter: @dugaldjellie
Email: dugaldjellie@gmail.com

Need a graphic design job done? Contact Rees Design

Dugald 21/03/2016Filed Under: dugald, front

Four ‘n’ four

26/05/2015 By Dugald 3 Comments

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Bachar Houli babaganoush: to be made for the Dreamtime game in honour of Bachar and the “back six” who last Sunday kept a finals aspirant to five goals.

News flash: I’m off to the Dreamtime game this Saturday with Chris Rees – creator of the Richmond Virtual Duffle Coat, Maurice Rioli artwork, the famous Bones McGhie tee – standing in the outer, offering homemade halftime ‘Bachar Houli’ babaganoush. For recipe, details and reasoning, see end section. Join us, to share the Tiger love.

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Richmond v Collingwood: At AusKick on the Saturday morning before last fortnight’s big Sunday afternoon game. All of TTBB’s eldest son’s football clothing comes courtesy of reader Paul Thompson’s mother, who lives in Sale (and was received with many thanks).

Interviewed by Dennis Cometti, in the rooms before the Collingwood game, the four walls closing in as a season faltered, vice-captain Brett Deledio had this to say about Damien Hardwick:

“The coach has been fantastic. You can’t ever question how he treats us and respects us as players. We know he’ll always have our backs and back us in. You could never question Dimma’s love for us and want for us to play better footy.”

On Footy Classified on the Monday prior, Caroline Wilson said she thought Hardwick would lose his job at year’s end. Wilson is an award-winning journalist – on so many issues a voice of reason in football – with a rich Richmond pedigree. Her father, Ian Wilson, was president of the Richmond Football Club from 1973 to 1985, a connection that at Punt Road opens many doors.

Ian Wilson, a club life member, is probably esteemed at Tigerland, for his role in the club’s premiership ‘golden years’. And yet still, in my mind, there is a counter view. Club statesmen like Wilson and Graeme Richmond, for fans like me, fans of a particular age who’ve never really had all the September glory, men like these were also wrecking balls.

In good times and bad, till death do us part, us Richmond people have followed our team. So many flew over to see the game on Sunday night; there were familiar faces in the cheer squad, phone texts chimed all night. Last September, for the final against Port at Adelaide Oval, I was part of maybe the largest interstate pilgrimage in Australian sporting history.

We came by plane, by car, by train, by bus; as a convoy. We left the ground, wearing our colours with pride, regardless of the result. We love our team, our players, our colours, our culture, even our history of heartbreak. However we could find a way, we got ourselves to the game.

Ian Wilson was at the helm of Richmond in good times and bad. As a leader, he cannot only claim the plaudits of the halcyon days. He was also at the wheel during our fall. Ian Wilson presided over the club when it was brought to its knees. Five years after he left, fans were left to rattle tins.

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Jake Batchelor kicked the opening goal late on Sunday afternoon, drifting into the forward line to find himself on the end of what is now commonplace Shane Edwards creativity, a beautiful handball into space, and we could hardly recognise him. He had cut off his long hair for this game. It was an occasion. He now looks like the kind of old-fashioned footballer so many of us admire. Nothing flash. As much as we love Shane Edwards’s flair, and Jack’s pomp, and Alex Rance’s regal demeanour, we always respect a hard-working, blue-collar player; the lot of the toiler.

Jake Batchelor returned to the side in last season’s second half, and along with the then rookie-listed Anthony Miles, played a pivotal role in our revival. But last year, he left his worst game until last. I’m not sure he had a single, meaningful, possession in the final against Port Adelaide. He was subbed off the ground.

Last Sunday he took Titch’s handball and kicked the opening goal, then wheeled from the players and pumped both fists. He was pleased with himself, and justifiably so. This meant more than a goal. Here was sweet redemption. We all shared in his pleasure.

Steve Morris played his season’s best game on Sunday, putting behind him indifferent form that led up to last year’s Elimination final. His has been the most public of career changes: from small defender to lock-down forward. Results have been mixed, but signs encouraging. These past few weeks, he has kept ticking boxes.

None could deny his effectiveness on Sunday, returning to Adelaide where he once plied his trade in the SANFL for West Adelaide (winning a B&F before being recruited to Richmond). He flashed into the television footage, down low and hard, reckless with his body, a human cannon ball. All us Richmond people willed him to kick that goal. Not for us – we wanted it for him, for Stevie, our warrior who made such an impact when he first burst onto the AFL scene.

At a time when the game was still in the balance, still there to be won, when legs were heavy with fatigue and minds weighted with a fear of loss, it was our smallest forward who led hard and straight and with conviction. Morris wanted the ball; he wanted to make a difference. In good times and bad, he took the game on.

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Public opinion, the voice of the crowd, looks to have transformed “the Richmond way”. Gone is the sideways kicking, the slow build-up, the crabbing, the long daisy-chains of handball. Against Collingwood, from the centre, led by our captain, when in doubt we looked to bang the ball on our boot, get it going long and forward and quickly, and see what happens. And what happened is our forwards had a sniff.

The court of public opinion says Damian Hardwick got it wrong by moving Alex Rance – our most confident playmaker, and our best defender – into the centre square. Our back-six looked awry. We coughed-up goals. They got the jump and a blowout beckoned.

But a counterpoint is that this unorthodox move may just resurrect our season. Something needed to change. We needed a catalyst. A shake-up was required.

The team was in a rut; and if you keep doing the same things, invariably the same results will follow.

Public sentiment says the move didn’t work. But maybe it did. Rance was switched back into the backline and all at once every player responded with a greater fluency and assuredness. They became unburdened; liberated, freed of an unknowable constraint.

The move of Rance – an experiment – unlocked something. The players found “a Richmond way” that was daring – maybe even strong and bold – that was all about taking the game on when opportunities arose.

Caroline Wilson had offered a very public rebuke of Hardwick on the Monday before the Collingwood game. For that week, Hardwick’s job may have felt as though it might be measured by the volume of a cardboard box. For a coach, as with a player, it is all about the performance on the field, on match day. If results run against you for long enough, all the office trinkets – the family photos, the mementos, the coffee mugs, maybe even the stapler – get put away in a box and carried home.

In the days of Ian Wilson, that was another of the “Richmond ways”.

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Melamine goodness: A winning plate designed by Matt Stanford’s son (“We’re way past him getting upset when the Tiggies lose – he’s now 9, and playing on Sunday’s himself – but he still loves a win, especially a dominate one”).

Before our loss to Footscray, Richmond fan Matt Stanford sent a photograph of a picture plate his son had made, memorialising a past recent win against the Western Bulldogs. All the colours were there, and the blades of grass, and the shape of the ground, and the final score: 80 to 150. We were almost twice as good as them.

Matt Stanford is a graphic designer, with his own blog, on which (under the headline, ‘The importance of belonging’) he has said this:

I belong to the Tigers. I’ve loved them for almost 30 years of continued, unending heartache and disappointment, but still I belong and always will. That I have paid a membership this year won’t really affect how they play in the slightest, way less than my vote counts in a state or federal election. What they mean to me is almost irrelevant; it’s just that they’re my team.

Matt’s young son is also, presumably, a Tiger. He made a plate that immortalises a game. Like many Richmond fans, I remember that game – where I was, how I watched it – and I remember laughing – yes, laughing – at the skills of Trent Cotchin. He turned them inside out. It was as if he was playing with his own ball. If there were 10 Brownlow votes on offer that afternoon, he got them all. It was the most perfect performance I have ever seen from Cotch.

In the first quarter of the Collingwood game two weeks ago, I stood in the outer with Tigers man Michael Green. No, not that Michael Green; not the former Richmond ruckman and four-time premiership player. This one is a fine freelance journalist – full of ethics and integrity – with a gentle manner, who has a sideline business in baking sourdough bread for his neighbours in Carlton.

He turned to me, as the goals went against us in the first quarter, as all the traffic was one-way, and said it was sad. His lament was for these young and fit men, these fine athletes in the prime of their life, who didn’t look as though they were enjoying what they were doing. For them, the fun had gone out of the game.

In good times and bad, us Richmond people know it is more than a game. It is a passion, a longing, a dream, a hope that one day the wind will forever be at our backs. A hope that one day, we will all be happy, together.

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Tiger togetherness: 18-year-old Connor Menadue kicks a goal and makes a team as one, and he finds himself in the middle.

All of us know how good Shane Edwards has been this year. A TTBB team player, Andy Fuller, wrote a careful and considered piece about Titch and football in North Adelaide, that is worth revisiting in the week prior to the Dreamtime spectacle.

On Twitter, Shane Edwards responded to Andy’s writing, in kind. “Couldn’t be more humbled with the piece you wrote,” he said. “I really appreciate the kind words about me and my family. Loved the art.”

It wasn’t on the field of play, and yet it’s been one of my season’s highlights, so far.

As was the game against Collingwood, with the introduction of Liam McBean and Connor Menadue – welcomed onto the big stage for all of us to see, the FUTURE – with the clutch goals to Deledio, and the leadership games by Cotch and Ivvy and Dusty and Jack.

There’s been disappointment this season, but now there is hope. It comes with Kamdyn McIntosh and his loping stride, with the work-rate and level-headedness of Shaun Grigg, and with Nick Vlastuin and his fearlessness. How old is Vlastuin? I can only see good things ahead for him; wonderful things ahead.

There was Kamdyn’s first game, and the complete team efforts of these past two late Sunday afternoons, and our world has now lifted and our spirits dance.

After Connor Menadue kicked his first goal in league football – wrap yourself in glory, son! – was there any able-bodied Richmond fan not standing in adulation and delight? Such a beautiful kick; so straight and deliberate and elegant; as dramatic as a falling dagger. It dropped into the goals; it broke their hearts and made ours soar.

Can there be a better moment all season? On Monday morning I found myself looking at the footage, over and over again, and freeze-framing the players’ celebration. I look at the image and I cannot help but smile. It makes all us Richmond fans happy. The togetherness of the players brings us together, also. Eighteen Richmond players in a knot of delight, with Menadue in the middle. It is his moment. He made them as one.

In this frame, only Nick Vlastuin stands apart, No. 31, as if marshalling the troops, his back to the centre square, this young man who one day will captain this football club. I believe one day he might also coach it.

Barracking for a footy club, whether you like it or not; it’s all about togetherness, in good times or bad.

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What Brett Deledio said about Damien Hardwick – unscripted, candid, without hesitation – ends any speculation about his tenure. He has the faith of his players, he has their loyalty. They might bare their souls for him, walk through the desert for him, climb the highest mountain for him, go into war for him. It is a symbiotic relationship. He has earned their trust, because they believe he has their best welfare – as players, as young men finding their way in the world – at heart.

I look through the list and think of all the senior team regulars, only Jack Riewoldt might question the motives of his coach. But this is a full-forward’s prerogative. And Jack has shown he doesn’t necessarily need the backing of Hardwick. He plays for the team, and he understands what the game means to us fans.

I love it when Jack speaks on the ground, immediately after a game. Among all the clichés in football, it’s like he’s some kind of truth-teller. It’s as if he plays on our behalf, and he speaks on our behalf, and that is all we need to know.

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Precious goods: a yellow and black Polar Pack for a Tigerish night at the football.

This week, I’m grilling six eggplants on the barbeque – the ‘back six’ I’m calling them: Grimes, Batch, Chappy, Rance, etc – and scooping out the flesh, adding tahini, salt, oil, a squeeze of lemon, for a big batch of homemade babaganoush. It is the Dreamtime game, yes, but I am making it in honour of Bachar Houli.

It is nothing special. I have always made babaganoush when holding a party, and after the past two Dreamtimke flops, I am hoping this Saturday night is a party.

Sometimes it is written in the stars. I have a long history of falling in love with women with Egyptian eyes; it is just the way it is. And likewise, I have a long history of burning eggplants until their skin chars and splits. More recently, I have a history of admiring Bachar Houli, a former Essendon player, as an athlete, a footballer, a role-model, a mentor, a man.

I will pack the homemade ‘Bachar Houli’ babaganoush in my vintage yellow-and-black Polar Pack and bring it to the footy in tubs, with rice crackers.

If you can, please come and join Chris and myself at half-time, on the ground level standing room above Bay M50 in the Olympic Stand, by the aisle that’s right beside the gates to the MCC. All welcome, including any injured Richmond players, or coaching staff in need of half-time sustenance.

Chris will hopefully be wearing his new Maurice Rioli t-shirt. I will be in my Tiger hoodie.

It’s a little soiree that we like to call Richmond.

Tiger tiger burning bright

Email: dugaldjellie@gmail.com

Twitter: @dugaldjellie

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Tiger, tiger (backwards): If Dimma wants a coffee and conversation with a fan I will give him his very own Tiger mug – part of the fundraising merchandise on offer by TTBB.

Dugald 26/05/2015Filed Under: dugald, front

Maurice Rioli dreaming

20/05/2015 By Dugald 8 Comments

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Abstract: Maurice Rioli was a former footballer; a Richmond champion. Matt Corbett, a beef farmer near Byron Bay, contacted Chris Rees, a graphic artist from Hobart, floating the idea of creating an artwork to acknowledge the feats of Rioli; commemorating his story. The project led to Adelaide, and former SANFL indigenous players Sonny Morey and Wilbur Wilson, then to Perth and Maurice Rioli’s son. Approval was sought for the artwork. Chris Rees will be at the Dreamtime game at the MCG, quite possibly wearing his new Rioli iconography. Dugald Jellie will be at the game with Chris, with a batch of homemade Bachar Houli babaganoush, inviting all TTBB readers to half-time nibbles. This is his story about football, and art, and belonging, and a bloke with a prized bull called Richo.

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Football is mostly about the past: about remembering players, games; a single act on an oval that may live on in the mind for weeks or years to come. Anticipation lasts a few days, the game runs two hours, but memories can linger a lifetime.

Maurice Rioli played for Richmond in the 1982 VFL Grand Final. In a losing team, he won the Norm Smith medal for best afield. I was 12 years old and sitting high in the stands. I think of him now and remember his hips, his poise, his balance. Aborigines say if you sleep in the land it talks to you, its spirits sing. To watch Maurice Rioli on the open grass land of a football field was to watch someone on song with the spirits of a game.

As a child growing up in suburban Melbourne, everything about Maurice Rioli was exotic. He was from elsewhere. He was Aboriginal. He was a footballer like few others.

Perhaps it is true that for generations of Australians raised in big cities, a first awareness of our country’s original custodians was through football; through swap cards in the school yard. The Krakouer brothers from Arden Street were a household name. Polly Farmer was from another generation.

We had Maurice Rioli, then Nicky Winmar, Chris Lewis, Gavin Wanganeen, Michael Long, Adam Goodes, Buddy Franklin, and now another Rioli, called Cyril.

Even the name – Rioli – seemed perfectly weighed, balanced; playful. It centres on an ‘o’ – it could be a ball, an oval – steadied by the same vowel and two consonants either side.

He was a centreman; belonging in the oval’s middle, the go-to player, an athlete, delicate skills, and those powerful legs that could roost a ball off a step, or two. Of all Richmond players since, only Dustin Martin has looked to share these two sublime attributes of a footballer: power and grace.

But Maurice was faster, his kicks seemed to spiral further, and he seemed more dangerous. With the ball in his hand, he could do anything.

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“I always loved his name,” says Chris Rees, a graphic artist in Hobart who in football sees deeper cultural resonance. “He played with calmness and poise, and no wasted effort.”

Raised in the stiff westerly winds of northern Tasmania, looking at the Victorian Football League from afar, Chris was at high school when Rioli debuted for Richmond. He had moved across the country, a star for South Fremantle in the WAFL, to try his hand in the big city. Chris heard his name on the radio; saw him on The Winners on ABC-TV on Saturday nights.

“I was in Grade 9 that year and Richmond wins were no big deal,” he says. “We won our way through to the finals without a drama and Maurice was the pivot of it all.”

 

Thirty-three years later, a beef farmer from the back of Byron Bay, Matt Corbett, bought a Bones McGhie T-shirt from Chris and contacted him to suggest he make an artwork for Maurice. Matt is a Tigers man. In his words:

“My prized black Angus bull is called Richo and we have a cocky that sings Tigerland. My 11-year-old is a gun footballer and is considering no other career path than to play for the Tigers. He already has his draft tampering strategy worked out so he lands at Punt Road.”

Chris and Matt exchanged emails about the project, and seeking approval from Maurice’s family for the artwork. It prompted a chain of correspondence, nearly 5000 words. Chris approached former Central Districts Bulldogs player, Sonny Morey, who is the subject of a recent design. Sonny lives in Williamstown, north of Adelaide – he enlisted his fellow-indigenous teammate, Wilbur Wilson, from nearby in Elizabeth Downs. Wilbur eventually located Gavin Rioli in Perth.

What follows are edited extracts of the correspondence.

Chris to Sonny “I want to ask your advice about a new design I am working on – this time it’s Maurice Rioli. Do you think there is any chance they will approve an image of a relative who has passed away used in this way? What do you think of the design? I am trying to suggest Rioli’s indigenous heritage without using art designs I have no right to use.”

Sonny to Chris “The design looks great and the idea has merit – it may take some time to contact his family. You are right in what you stated about pictures and any deceased indigenous persons are not viewed in favour as it’s a spiritual significance. I’ll do my best to contact his family.”

Chris to Sonny “Maurice played for South Fremantle in WA – I will do a version of this design in a red and white South Guernsey, and send it to you shortly.”
rioli_tee_s02

Chris to Matt “Step one is done – the design. Step two is talking to the Rioli family about it. Luckily, one of my recent subjects, Sonny Morey, knew Maurice and has friends and family connections. He is going to show them the design and talk about what I do and why.”

Matt to Chris “Just in from two weeks in the wilderness living off snapper. Love the design. You’ve captured Maurice’s sublime balance perfectly and I love the black, yellow and red. You should be proud of it. I know a cousin of Maurice’s on Melville – Gordon Pupungamirri – who coordinates the Tiwi arts centre. If you need his contact, let me know.”

Sonny to Chris “Have contacted a good friend of mine, Wilbur Wilson, who also played for Centrals and knew Maurice’s family very well. I have forwarded your emails to him.”

Matt to Chris “Maurice’s NT amateur boxing title is one of intense speculation. I’m sure the record keeping of the Golden Gloves in the NT in the late 70s, especially when an Aboriginal man won, was cursory. It’s almost certain he won a state NT amateur title at welterweight.”

Chris to Sonny “You read everywhere that Maurice won a boxing title in the NT, sometimes it says he won the “Golden Gloves”. I’d like to add that on the shirt to his Simpson medals and Norm Smith.”

Sonny to Chris “It’s a pleasure to get these details for you. There’s not too many who are recording any of the Indigenous players who graced the grounds in the 70s. There was Michael Graham and Roger Rigney from Sturt Footy Club, Bertie Johnson from West Adelaide, Richie Bray and Wilfred Huddleston from Port Adelaide, and David (Soapy) Kantilla and a few fringe players from South Adelaide.”

Chris to Sonny “I am not Indigenous myself so I am going forward cautiously, but I do have a passion for footy history. Our original people’s contribution was neglected for a long time, not just in sport but in general. I am working on a Russell Ebert design, maybe my next SANFL shirt should be David Kantilla. A great player and a great nickname.”

Sonny to Chris “Do you watch the Marngrook Footy Show?”

Chris to Sonny “Marngrook is the only footy talk show worth watching. My favourite writer on footy is Martin Flanagan, and he has opened my eyes to Aboriginal football in a big way. He has written a lot about footy in the Top End, the Yuendumu Carnival and the visits up north by league clubs. It does sound like another world to Tasmania where I am, not just another country.”

Chris to Matt “Sonny is a great old fella, turning 70 in 10 days. Related to Gilbert McAdam, he says. He is one of the few old footy players I’ve contacted who is really happy writing email. What I am planning to do with the Rioli design – if it does get a tick to go ahead – is to donate something to an indigenous health-related charity. Once I reach maybe 50 sales I’ll make it 100% for the benefit of the charity, like I have with Robbie Flower stuff for the Aust Cancer Research Fund. It’s all good for the karma.”

Wilbur to Chris “Sonny Morey asked if I can track down a contact for Maurice’s family. I have been able to get a phone number for Maurice’s son, Gavin Rioli, who lives in Perth.”

Chris to Matt “I have Maurice’s son, Gavin’s, phone number. How do you feel about making the call? I am actually phone phobic, and calling the players, or for instance calling Sean Millane, always puts me in a cold sweat.”

Matt to Chris “Made the call to Gavin. Lovely bloke. He said, yeah, dad won a Golden Gloves alright. He said your artwork should be fine. He’s going to talk to his mum and get back to me with a year for the GG and an OK off aunty Rioli for the artwork.”

Chris to Matt “Just got your last email, wonderful! Bloody wonderful! We are halfway there!”

Matt to Gavin “Dear Gavin, below are the two images of your late father, in all his balanced glory. The two versions celebrate his remarkable career with both South Fremantle and Richmond. The image will be available for purchase as prints, t-shirts and stickers. Chris Rees, the artist and a mad Tiger, has a collection of great footy related art. After purchasing some of his other footy art, I asked him if he would do an artwork of Maurice. As a 9-year-old in 1980, I was in awe of Maurice’s balance, power and charisma, and subsequently followed closely the careers of many Tiwi footballers. I hope your family approves of this celebration of Maurice’s career. Chris will arrange for some prints of the artwork to be supplied to your family.”

Gavin to Matt “My eldest boy Izayah is 13 this year and is the Richmond Tigers biggest fan. My second boy is 11 and they are both extremely talented. Both have different playing styles. They play AFL and breathe it, they both also wear dad’s beloved No. 17. My family and I live in Perth. The artwork is magnificent and totally does dad justice.”

Wilbur to Chris “Glad you have been able to talk to Gavin. I wish you all the best with his acknowledgement project. Maurice was a great man and a very good mate of mine.”

Postscript:

Matt Corbett’s son and Gavin Rioli’s two boys all have their sights set on playing for Richmond and are now pen pals. Matt is sending a poster of the design to Perth, on which Gavin and his boys are going to write on it all the football wisdom Maurice passed down to them. Chris’s design has the approval and blessing of the Rioli family, and is available now through Redbubble.com. Funds raised through the sale of the artwork will be donated to the Lowitja Institute’s Career Development Fund, supporting indigenous health researchers.

Chris plans to attend the Dreamtime Game at the MCG. Dugald Jellie would like to celebrate his attendance by holding a halftime party in the outer, with crackers and a tub of his homemade Bachar Houli babaganoush. Details will be provided on this website next week.

Fond memories of Maurice live on, and through Chris’ artwork hopefully will touch a new crowd of supporters.

Matt’s prized bull, Richo, is doing well.

Tiger tiger burning bright

Email: dugaldjellie@gmail.com

Twitter: @dugaldjellie

Dugald 20/05/2015Filed Under: dugald, front, Uncategorized

What we think about, when we think about football

07/04/2015 By Dugald 5 Comments

Noorat

Our religion: four posts, a field, a way of life (in Noorat, western Victoria)

In Noorat this morning, in western Victoria, four poles of PVC pipe stand under heavy skies in a paddock, and there is an understanding of a game, and of a way of life.

Last Thursday night under clear skies at the MCG, us Richmond people came together and after an uncertain beginning – the doubt of the season’s first thirty minutes of football – we shared in another understanding, and another way of life.

It felt like sweet redemption. Like all the disappointments of the early part of last season, like the squandered opportunity of the Elimination Final in Melbourne two years ago, like all those miserable opening round losses to Carlton, like the Ben Cousins debut, like our seasons of mediocrity, had somehow come to an end.

cardboard

Bumped into these blokes before the game #1: full of attitude, didn’t say much.

It was more than a weight being lifted. It was history being expunged.

We toyed with them. We bossed them. We filled their fans with doubt, then bitterness, then disappointment. Us Tigers walked proudly into the night. We’ve floated for days. In four bounces – or was it five, or six? – and a searching run along the wing of the Melbourne Cricket Ground, in all that open space and in the confidence and youth and bravado of a young man from a small town in the far west here tonight to play his first game of league football, before us, the adoring fans, 84,000 faces, chosen for this night by the coaching staff as a mark of belief, the long strides of a gazelle, in this one moment on Thursday night a young man named Kamdyn McIntosh showed us what he could do and what he has and how the game can be played, and this season all at once looks full of brilliant possibilities.

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brandon_batch

Bumped into these blokes before the game #2: my man-crush was complete.

Before the game on Thursday I bumped into Brandon Ellis and Jake Batchelor. Outside Punt Road Oval, with backpacks on, they were readying for the walk through Yarra Park to the ground. I was going home to ready children for bed. Our paths crossed, at 5.19pm, two hours before the season’s first bounce; a fan and two players and an understanding.

Of course I introduced myself. I wished them the best of luck for the night, and for the season. “Knock ‘em dead.” I could have told them all the ways I have admired them, as footballers, and how I once met Brandon’s parents in the change rooms after a game (for that brief and joyous moment in my life when I had access to be there, when I was something more than a fan), but this was not the time nor place.

Jake Batchelor looked me in the eye and offered his hand, and my respect for him only grew. He said he reads what I write and enjoys it. My man-crush, on the eve of this season, by happenstance, it was complete.

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trout

A TV camera, a microphone, and Trout: and so our seasonal rituals of football begin.

Thursday afternoon, before the game, I met with Richmond supporter Luke McNiece, who had travelled from Perth to be there. Two seasons ago he contacted me and shared a story that later I will share with others. Both times I’ve met Luke, tears have swelled in my eyes. Football, as with life, is only enriched by the emotions.

We found an open gate at Punt Road Oval and there behind it was Trout – the spiritual leader of our beloved cheer squad – in front of a television camera, dressed in all his finery, being interviewed by a TV news reporter.

And so a football season begins with this. It makes me smile.

On the walk to a nearby café, Luke and I discussed our anticipation of the game, and how we might respond to a win or loss. In our own ways, both of us were at ease with what might happen. Of course we would like Richmond to win, and to win handsomely, but football is only a part of our lives. It is the most perfect diversion, but it is not everything.

I told Luke how my great thrill for the night was to see Kamdyn McIntosh’s debut. I told him how two seasons ago, when I decided to turn my writings to football – to barrack for my team like never before – for a first time I attended the club’s family day, took our little boy along, and under a blazing sun in the old circus paddock by a bend in the Yarra at Richmond, there was a new recruit introduced on stage and his name was Kamdyn.

Eye of the tiger: Trout's off-season handiwork on his hot pants

Eye of the tiger: Trout’s off-season handiwork on his hot pants

His story stuck. In my imagination he was one to watch. I had confused his provenance (until just the other day I thought he was from the Pilbara in Western Australia, but now know it is Pinjarra), but not his family situation.

The story was compelling. A young man from a big family and a country town at the other end of the country comes to Melbourne to try his luck, to make his name as a footballer in the big city.

These past two seasons I had looked out for his name – on the injury list, on the VFL list – hoping he might find his way. I had wanted for his success. I had hoped he would not be delisted before a chance came to him. And then here it was, at the MCG, on a season’s first game, under blinding lights, in prime-time, our whole world looking at him, a crucible of a man’s capabilities as a footballer, for all of us to see.

Friday afternoon, in the glorious afterglow of the night before, Luke McNiece sent a text. “What about McIntosh?” it read. “Now there’s a story”.

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Two days after the game I find myself walking through a forest near Timboon, carrying a child in a backpack and with others all about, on holidays, and all I can think about is the football. It is not just the football; it is how our team played, how our players performed, and what all of this might mean.

I think about Nick Vlaustin’s courage. I think about Shane Edwards’ liveliness in the middle. I think about Troy Chaplin’s composure across the backline; the return of his confidence. I think of Bachar’s run, and his left foot, and his fearlessness in bottling the ball up when it’s on the ground, and how the fortunes of our club have changed with his arrival, and with that of Shaun Grigg.

I think about Jack’s pack mark, and his crucial goals, and how his partner is away in Tokyo, and about the untimely death of his cousin, and about how so many people say so much about our Jack, but that what all should acknowledge is his utter professionalism as a footballer.

verran

1-0: Tiger’s man Verran Fehlberg, in his recently purchased ‘Tiger’ hoodie (only two left, XL, $65) who last season chronicled our streak of wins with placards, gets us off to the right start last Thursday at the MCG.

I think about Ben Griffiths, and the thrill all us Richmond people have when he has the ball, wondering how far he might kick it, delighting in how it spreads a game. I think about Alex Rance and what a composed footballer he is. I think about how Dylan Grimes sometimes reminds me of Francis Bourke. I think about all the young women sitting in front of me at the game who started squealing when Nathan Gordon came on.

I think about Sam Lloyd, and how pleased I am for him that he’s in the starting line-up for the season’s first game, and how he looks to have slimmed down, and how his leads are impeccable, and how he reads a game, and has a knack for the goals, but maybe now a greater awareness of what else is around. Tony Greenberg says Brett Deledio had been his “training buddy” over summer. I think of this as a perfect fit: two country boys, one from Kyabram, one from further up the road at ‘Denny’, both plying their craft in the big smoke.

I think Sam Llyod, the football journeyman, might find more than a home at Punt Road this season. I think he might make a name for himself.

I think of what a rock Ivan Maric is, and how well-liked he must be in the team, and how appreciated he is. I think what a great story Anthony Miles is. I think Taylor Hunt looks a lot like Brandon Ellis on the field, and that he looks a prudent recruit.

I think of Stevie Morris and what he contributed on Thursday night – the harassment, at least one goal assist, and how he absorbed the play when it was in his area, keeping the ball at his end, slowing the play, often stopping it with a free kick (against), and how this very public career change offers him a wonderful challenge that all of us are willing him to fulfil. The confidence will rise, the goals will come.

I think of a mark Jake Batchelor took, deep in defence in the third quarter, a one-on-one contest with Troy Menzel down the city end of the MCG – the last two men in the world and he took the mark, cleanly, and I applauded his name. In my mind it was more than a mark. It was a test of poise and courage and belief. From that moment on his opponent was as good as done. His night was over.

Of course I think of Dusty, and Trent and his new fatherhood, and Lids and his run, and Chris Newman in this first game of what must be his last season, and Brandon Ellis and what a competitor he is.

I think all us Richmond people must have been thinking about the game in so many ways, wanting to hold onto the thoughts and its joys, watching a replay, hanging onto the moment, wanting for that shared sense of happiness to be experienced over and over and over again. Truly, we wanted Thursday night never to end. And this Saturday afternoon cannot come soon enough.

And I think of all the words I would like to write about Kamdyn McIntosh and his first game: a bruising first tackle, a turnover first kick, the turn of pace, the three shots on goal up to half time, the leaving of Chris Judd in his wake (twice), the stunning goal (“that was BIG,” says Bruce), and the run all of us will remember for the longest time. His first game of football. The ghosts of Dean Polo were rekindled for all us Richmond people. Only this bloke is taller, faster, stronger; more exciting, still.

But these words can wait.

All I can say for now is when he took his second set shot at goal, when all the anxiety was tight inside him, when he was 35 out and dead in front and all the expectation was on him, it was Bachar Houli who came across to offer advice and calming words, giving him companionship in the open cauldron of the MCG.

The shot hit the post. Our club is so blessed to have Bachar.

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Country footy at Easter: the Timboon Demons had a comfortable win over Scotts Creek on Saturday, in the Warrnambool and District League.

Country footy at Easter: the Timboon Demons had a comfortable win over Scotts Creek on Saturday, in the Warrnambool and District League.

Thanks to all TTBB readers who this past week shared kind words about our football club bringing me into the fold this season. It feels like an acceptance, an understanding. As I’ve said to many, I’m proud of my football club for embracing what I’ve been up to. Last season, I levelled criticism at the club when I thought it was fair and warranted. The club could easily have turned its back on me. Rather, it has taken the higher road; it’s shown it has a bigger heart. A gesture of goodwill, it is returned in so many unspoken ways.

It will be a privilege to share the stories of so many Richmond supporters this year. Our story of football, it becomes one, as it was on Thursday night.

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A resounding win against Carlton is good, but it means nothing if it’s not backed up with another, against the Bulldogs, this Saturday. We need a ferocious attack on the contest. We need to be left in no doubt. All the disappointments of this corresponding game last season need be reversed. On the field, there is no room for sentiment. It is a brutal contest; and this Saturday afternoon at the MCG we need to make it all ours.

There is no easy way to win a game of football. There are no half measures. All we can ask for, all we hope for, all we can believe in, is something called total commitment.

Tiger tiger burning bright

Email: dugaldjellie@gmail.com

Twitter: @dugaldjellie

Dugald 07/04/2015Filed Under: dugald, front, Uncategorized

On the Tiger Diaries & new beginnings

31/03/2015 By Dugald 10 Comments

IMG_0357

Roll on season 2015: Jason Mariniello from Richmond Painting 3121 (our favourite house-painters in the whole world) supplied this photo of some Tiger locals who beautified their back roller-door with an emblem they hold dear.

 

Balwyn tigers

Balwyn Tiger: A young and angelic Tony Wilson (better known as a Hawk) before he went to the other side.

We wish them well; we wish them a safe journey.

We wish Tyrone Vickery to stand tall and resolute this season. We wish Anthony Miles further courage in the packs. We wish Bachar Houli’s left foot to be blessed forevermore. We wish all the best for fatherhood for our captain and his wife. We wish Lids to have a safe and healthy baby boy (purely for father-son considerations).

We wish Alex would commit, to us. We wish Jack to run amok. We wish Dusty – our football warrior, our very own Tiger dragon slayer – each week puts his opponents to the sword.

We wish for no injuries, we wish for their rude health. We wish Dave Astbury – a genial bloke from wheat and wool country, playing his junior footy in a land-locked league – we wish he had not dipped a toe into Port Phillip Bay and introduced himself to a stingray.

We wish for a season out of the box; for “our boys” to quietly go about their business in big games under lights, and for the whole city to again consume itself with the story of Richmond.

We wish each player who plays for us Tigers, for this fleeting moment of their lives when they are young and at the peak of their physical fitness, when they are asked to shoulder so many of our desires and expectations, when they become household names and objects of our wonderment – we wish for them to be the best footballers they can be. We wish for their fulfilment. We wish our joy brings them happiness. We wish them not to be burdened by fear of failure, but to be freed by the beauty of the game.

Michael Nichols

Faded glory: Michael and Tamsin Nichols wearing the numbers of Kevin Sheedy and Francis Bourke in a Hawthorn driveway, circa 1977.

We wish them this winter to be angels on our shared field of dreams.

Truth is, us Richmond people do not so much mind every loss. Over the years, we’ve become accustomed to all the ways a game of football can be given up. This, for now, has been our lot in life. It is part of our story. It is who we are. If nothing else, it has taught us humility.

There was no shame last year, for instance, in losing to Gold Coast away in the warm tropics in March, nor in the loss to Geelong in the wet at the MCG. If there is passion in the losing, if there is courage and bravery in defeat, we cannot ask for nor expect anything more. All we wish for is that our boys love and honour the jumper as much as we do.

Our colours are our sacrament, and our belief in them is our belief in you.

We also understand and appreciate the sacrifices. So many of us think so often about the pain, exhaustion, fatigue and the doubt – always the doubt – that comes with such a brutal contest. On the railway line we see you training on Punt Road Oval under the blunt summer sun, and can hardly imagine the hurt that comes with playing this game at such an elite level.

Ann Tommy & Malcolm Block 137 Red Cliffs early '70s

Documentary film-maker, Malcolm McKinnon: “Early 1970s, woollen jumper (with Royce’s number 4 sewn on the back), being allowed to steer my Grandfather’s new Ferguson tractor (the red one, as opposed to the older grey one), Block 137 at Red Cliffs in the Sunraysia.”

We respect you, we admire you. Each and all of you can do things on that football field that raise our spirits and lift our hearts. Not all of you can turn a game like Jack can, but not all of you need to. A punch, a smother, a bump, a shepherd; we see these things, we take note, we know what it means.

Most of all we love it when you have the ball and the ball sings and all are involved and the team plays as one and you are untouchable. It is no time to gloat, but it is a time to savour. When the football is beautiful, life is beautiful. When we take on the game, and when all that we touch turns to gold, there is nothing more perfect than being a Richmond barracker.

We do not know you, but it doesn’t stop us wishing all the best for all of you. Let all of us have a year to remember; a season of pride and honour, and respect, and untrammelled pleasure in seeing what a group of 22 young men can do on a grassed field, where all of us gather to marvel in your exploits.

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Konrad Marshall

Young Tiger: Konrad Marshal, The Age journalist and Tiger fan, playing an under 10s Little League game at the MCG, 1988. (“Note the coloured bootlaces. I always wore them. I washed them the night before every game. I dried them in front of the pot
belly stove, and laced them up anew each week.”)

Olive branches have been offered to Tiger Tiger Burning Bright in this off-season, which is wonderful news. The club hierarchy have given me an opportunity: to write a weekly profile of a Richmond fan, to be published on the club’s website each Wednesday. Please look out for them and spread these stories to all Tigers you know.

My great hope is that in sharing these remarkable voices in the crowd, it somehow makes our football club an even better place. It makes it even more inclusive. It makes it even more accepting. It makes it even more understanding of what it means to be a Tiger.

A football game is nothing without the crowd, and the only crowd that matters for us is a Richmond crowd.

It’s a social project, a community project, that I hope brings people together. I hope also, in the smallest possible way, it may just help the football team we all hold dear.

Football is a game of numbers, and percentages, and set plays, and statistics. But it’s also a game of emotions; it is played in the heart as much as in the head. It’s a game of belief, a game of confidence.

Why couldn’t the stories of us fans make a difference? Why couldn’t our voices in the crowd – our stories of what it means to be from Tigerland – help inspire what happens on the ground?

Every little thing helps, and here is our chance to be in the spotlight, to be on a level playing field with those we go to such lengths to support and see play.

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Darren Crick

Darren Crick (a cheerleader of the Capital Tigers), circa 1976: “It’s not Collingwood, its Parkside. Dad played for Parkside and is a life member, before we moved to Traralgon where he played for Gormandale Tigers.”

Thank you to all TTBB readers who submitted photographs of themselves as children, in their footy jumpers, republished on this blog post. Bob Murphy, the football sage and Footscray’s new captain, said he would find a childhood photo of himself in his Richmond jumper but, alas, none has been forthcoming. If any others have old photos of themselves in their footy woolknit to share (and we always do enjoy the yellow and black a little more, but it’s not essential), please do email them in. See the address below.

 

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Chris Rees, a freelance graphic designer in Hobart who’s other significant half of TTBB, has been busy this past week reconfiguring the website that is our very homespun social project. Thank you Chris, for all your efforts, and for the continued glory that is his Virtual Duffle Coat (which over summer had vice-regal consent!). For both of us, of course, this is a labour of love. Our Tiger T-shirt and hoodie fundraising drive last year was a success (although still two XL hoodies for sale!) and reimbursed all our out-of-pocket expenses for running this website for the past two seasons.

B8_LsIDIcAQK34H

Never a Tiger: Anagram whizz and numbers man Andrew Gigacz as a little Bomber boy (before some fine hand-hewn fence palings) before his latter-day conversion to Footscray.

To keep us going for this year and next, we’ve expanded our range of TTBB fundraising merchandise. Please keep us in mind when next buying a birthday gift for your favourite Tiger. But be warned, some of the items prrrrr.

Andy Fuller in the Netherlands will continue to contribute words this season, and other ‘players’ are likely to join the fray as the season unfolds. And of course, TTBB readers are always invited to submit any Tigerish writings, poetry, artwork, love letters, etc. We like to share (unless, of course, correspondence is offered in confidence).

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This season I will write only the occasional match report. I’ve purchased a three-game membership, so it may only be three games I attend this year. The past two seasons are over, and with it a part of my life. I need to do other things. Find another way to help pay the bills. And I really ought to put my head down and write something that I hope one day our two young children might be proud of. Each of us have our little life ambitions.

John (& Freezer & John's dad photo bombing the pic)

Tiger hero: A boyhood John Carr (@TheHolyBoot) and Freezer and John’s dad photo bombing the picture.

So this season, my offerings will be a traditional ‘blog’; you know, one of those things where people post a few pics and a few words and keep it short and simple. I’m calling it The Tiger Diaries, and it’ll be my unedited musings and stream-of-consciousness about my travels on my bicycle through Tigerland this year.

I hope to find time to visit the cheer squad at its banner making, and see the occasional open training session, and explore a few of the old laneways of old Struggletown.

Please join me from time to time. And make contact with me, and become part of the conversation. We never know where it might lead.

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Wishing all TTBB much happiness this season with whatever our Gods of football bring.

Tiger tiger burning bright (this Thursday night)

Email: dugaldjellie@gmail.com
Twitter: @dugaldjellie

And coming soon to Facebook once I work out how it works.

IMG_7703

Tassie Tiger: A barefooted TTBB with his eldest sister (the one who cares not a jot about football), somewhere in central Tasmania, sometime in the mid-to-late 1970s.

 

Dugald 31/03/2015Filed Under: dugald, front

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The Virtual Duffle Coat
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