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Rnd 4: An insider’s club – the AFL media cabal

09/07/2024 By Dugald Leave a Comment

Craig Hutchinson, Hutchy, gives the game away. 

“That’s Simon Matthews you see there with the coach,” he says.

Then he can’t help himself, so pleased with what he’s done.

“Smart media positioning, that,” he says. “Hats off to him, I thought that was clever.”

Watch the footage – from the 7 min mark of this Footy Classified clip, broadcast a month ago on Channel Nine – and let’s unpick what’s going on. 

Caroline Wilson, Caro, is in on the act. 

She’s Matthews’ shill – he’s likely her deep throat – the two of them in bed together, backroom dealers, dealing the cards mostly for themselves.

She sets it all up, has been doing so for months, running a soft sell campaign for Simon Matthews in The Age newspaper, and from her spot on the table on Footy Classified. She’s eased her plant into the conversation, put him in the spotlight (ever heard of Simon Matthews before?), keeps aligning him with Brendon Gale (rightly or wrongly, I need to get to the bottom of this) knowing it’ll confer him a status he hardly deserves.

In all my dealings with Matthews, he came across as an ungracious man. 

Rude, belligerent, a bully. One of those blokes who throws his weight around, needs to show others who’s boss. Because he can, because mostly he’s always gotten away with it.

I am not cowered by him. 

If he wants a scrap, he’s no idea who he’s up against.

You can cross a wounded Tiger once, Mr Matthews.

But not twice.

Caro has talked him up to all her audiences. 

Hers has been a long marketing campaign, selling an unremarkable product (look at him on the Footy Classified clip and tell me otherwise). She frames him always as Brendon Gale’s “longtime lieutenant”, his “preferred candidate”, as though this association is a measure of his worth. 

It’s all a PR push, of course. A boys’ club marketing campaign, touting their own interests, which are not necessarily the best interests of the Richmond Football Club; its coach, players, fans, its integrity, and now its future. Caroline Wilson is pulling the strings, Hutchy gets a guffaw out of it, and likely the other two panel members are happy to go along for the ride, because their man Matthews has done them favours, and now’s a time for payback.

Please tell me if I’m wrong.

Matthews sees an opportunity, down at Sandringham Oval on a windy Sunday afternoon at a VFL game – the day after the seniors got flogged by Brisbane by 20 goals – the club’s marketing manager sidling up to the coach, anything to help put himself in the frame.

Least he could have done is take his hands from his pockets.  

All of it is stage managed, a push in cahoots with Caro, and Hutchy – and Matthew Lloyd is likely even in on the act, and Kane Cornes is not stupid enough not to know what is going on, but he doesn’t have skin in this game, and is happy to go along with the hustle. All the smiles, the laughter, it’s so awkward, so fake. And they think they can get away with it – aren’t we clever? – because they mostly always do.

The boys’ club.

They pull the strings to help their man get the job, paid for – on this occasion – on the purse of others.

This is how the AFL media cabal works. 

How it conspires to choose one of its own. 

All gotten fat off the largesse of the biggest game in town.

Caro hardly realises who she has become.

Endorsing a blockhead.

A short while back someone called Simon Matthews tried to become friends with me on Facebook. 

Is he that stupid?

I know of only one Simon Matthews, and he is no friend of mine.

Why would he want to reach out to me?

A few weeks later came an answer. Because he’s vying for the top job at Tigerland. He wants to climb a bit further up the ladder, line his pockets a bit deeper. He wants more. More power, more control, more money, more of everything. And to do that, maybe he thinks he ought to create alliances with those he imagines might help get him there.

I am not one of those people. 

I had an alliance with the Richmond Football Club for several years that ended soon after the breakthrough 2017 Premiership. I was sacked, delisted. Simon Matthews was, ostensibly, my boss, but it’s true to say I wrote for about everybody else at the club except him. I wrote in spite of him, because my memory is not that short.

I could never forget how he treated me; so unfairly, rudely.

Back then I never believed the reason the club gave for terminating my ‘services’, and I don’t believe it now (and I’ll articulate this elsewhere, to demonstrate how self-serving ‘our club’ can be). 

I’ve held my counsel for six-and-a-half years because life is too precious to be dragged down by mean-spirited people. I’ve gone on and done other things, always trying, putting myself up for public criticism, trying to benefit other communities, help other groups in other ways. 

But then Matthews pops his head above the parapet – I have a clear shot, my friends! – and life is also too precious not to stand in the way of those who’ve done you wrong.

Do not reward a bully. 

Do not promote a dullard. 

The club only gets one chance to make the right call at a critical time in its history (have we ever been in this position before, from first to last in four years, a quite spectacular fall from grace?), and Simon Matthews is not the answer.

Not by a long shot.

At heart, I am a generous man.

I give a lot to others, to things I believe in, to causes, to campaigns that mostly have no great financial benefit to me. It is because we all crave for community – it is why we wear the colours, feel a belonging in the crowd – and likely I crave for it more than most.

The reasons for this, they are personal. 

I gave a lot to the Richmond Football Club, to all its people – the players, mostly the players, but also their parents and families, and us barrackers, with all the stories we can tell – because this is what I do, how I thought I might be able to make a difference.

The other week I walked the streets of Dandenong, knocking on doors, looking for a rental home for an Afghan refugee family soon to arrive in Melbourne, when my own housing situation has no surety, no certainty. 

We can all give more, especially to those without a voice, those in the outer. 

Caroline Wilson, if you are reading this, enough.

I’ve got some things to say about you, but not here, not now. 

Some truths. About someone born into Richmond – her father, Ian Wilson, was part of an administration that near bankrupted the club, driven by ego – someone who ought to know better than most how to spell nepotism. 

The first lady of football? 

She is not immune from criticism (though nor is she guilty of the sins of her father), but she is compromised in all of this.  She’s played the game, is protective of her turf, is part of the product, has created her empire, built-up all her boardroom alliances, might never really know what it’s like to be on the outer. 

Could this be called entitlement?

Certainly, her judgement is compromised.  

No football club I’ve ever known has been run as a meritocracy. 

Simon Matthews is a case in point.

Watch the Footy Classified clip and Caroline Wilson does give all us Richmond fans something to cheer about. 

She’s voiced a possible endgame. 

“Simon Matthews is, I think, probably Brendon Gale’s preferred candidate, and he’s set up the succession plan,” she says. 

“But it won’t be his call.”

“But if he doesn’t get the job, Simon, then you would think he leaves.”

Trust me, this is what ALL us Richmond fans should barrack for in our race for the bottom.

It is something I will get behind. Never mind the players, their contract talks, discussions about their worth, whether they have another year in their legs, let’s give Matthews the BOOT!

This club of ours needs some truth-telling. It’s made some mistakes and lost its way, all for the benefit of who?

For those in power, the gatekeepers of its culture, who are mostly hellbent on monetising it for all they can. They are blinded by the beauty of the game, by the bigger picture, a greater meaning.

They are shortsighted by their own self-interests. 

And Simon Matthews is the most shortsighted of them all. 

Someone with his name tried to friend me on Facebook. 

Does he think we’re all that stupid?

Bovver boy Craig Hutchinson on Footy Classified obviously does.

And an endnote. Another YouTube clip. This one made by my brother and I.

It’s a 5-minute little film about the sort of stuff I get up to these days, and I’d be very appreciative if you could watch it and share it with others.

It’s a long way from football, but also it isn’t.

One Richmond fan, who I’ll write about soon, has donated to this cause.

Two other Richmond fans have contacted me recently, offering to donate tools for the sort of work I do now do in schools. They know the worth of community. The value of giving. The contributions I have made.

This is now my greatest contribution to a club: to help it facilitate the cultural change it needs, the handover it requires.

Could you imagine Simon Matthews ever being so imaginative to do something like what I have done?

The clod, he’d have no idea where to start. 

Tiger tiger burning bright 

Dugald 09/07/2024Filed Under: dugald, front

Rnd 3: the good, the bad, and the ugly, of the Richmond Football Club.

17/06/2024 By Dugald 2 Comments

Don’t argue: the people’s champion, on the game’s biggest arena, as depicted by local artist Nick Howson

They stood seven deep in standing room for you, Dusty. 

Clung on the balustrades.

Breathless, in anticipation, awe, respect.

To see you one more time, this time, forevermore. 

Nine deep, Dusty. Not a spare seat in the house.

We all wanted to be there, Dusty.

Twelve deep.

All of us.

For you.

A friend sent screen shots of a text exchange he’d had with a friend of his.

About me, what I’m up to.

“Hey XXXXX is your mate dugald ok? Publicising his feud amidst Dusty week doesn’t seem very rational,” he texted. 

Maybe it’s not, but now is no time to sit on the sidelines. Too much is at stake. The custodianship of our club, for one. Its future is at a crossroads. 

What follows is a text exchange that encapsulates what I am trying to do, and what I might be against. 

One voice in the outer, versus so many vested interests. 

A whole city came to watch you, Dusty.

A crowd in numbers that tell of your worth. Never before and never again will so many gather to see a team sitting so lowly on the ladder, with prospects so uncertain.

It looks such a chasm, getting back to the top. 

And you kicked the first goal and made it look so effortless, as if on script, on cue, and you are mobbed, adored, and all in the stands go crazy – there are tears in eyes – you are ours, everybody’s. 

You will live forever in memory, in folklore, as an idea, possibilities. Of what a footballer can make of himself, what he can be. 

In you is all what’s good about the Richmond Football Club. 

A few weeks back a person called Simon Matthews tried to friend me on Facebook. 

Soon after I learned, through the spruiking of Caroline Wilson, and others, he is jockeying for the top job at Tigerland. 

I have lived a life and met many people, am open to others, and consider myself a good judge of character. In all my dealings with Simon Matthews, the club’s director of communications and marketing, I found him to be discourteous, rude, obstinate, and in one instance, he displayed the hallmarks of a bully.

He didn’t need to be, but was. 

For six years I have held my counsel, moved on to other pursuits, engaged the world in other ways, happy to have no dealings with a man like him. 

But now a snake has moved in the grass.

He’s popped his head above the parapet. 

I am under no obligation to hold my silence. 

For the rest of this season, for as long as it takes, I will prosecute my case against him.

He misjudged who I am, what I am capable of. 

You can cross a wounded tiger once, Mr Matthews, but not twice.

And heaven help all who stand in my way.

Light towers were ablaze, but the spirit waned. 

The game slipped away from us. Bit-by-bit, it was gone.

And Dusty goes into the record books, again, as the only player EVER to have played 300 games who’s lost game number 290, 291, 292, 293, 294, 295, 296, 297, 298, 299, and 300.

This is our lot. We’re on a losing streak, and there’s no hiding from the raw truth.

A legacy has been squandered. For whatever reasons, the club was unable to find a way to rebuild a team at the top of the table. So many little things have gone wrong. But maybe it is also this: the club didn’t have the imagination to try and do things differently.

The strong and the bold? 

More like the timid and the old. 

This is the bad of the Richmond Football Club. 

Here I am, this is me, a long time ago, when I started an association with the Richmond Football Club. So much beckoned. So much could be done. With words and ideas, the stories of others, I believed I could create a narrative for a football team, its club, through an idea of inclusiveness. 

Bring us all into the circle, make us as one.

Did it work? Others can be the judge of that. 

But I know what I did and what I did is this: I did the work. Put in the time. Made the effort. I tried in every way I could. And if @MarkRomage on Twitter has not “heard of me” and suggests I “move on” my reply is this: I have, and I don’t care. 

This is not about me.

This is about the culture of the Richmond Football Club. This is about standing up for what is right. What is fair. This is about challenging a club, how it could be, asking the hard questions, and finding some uncomfortable truths. 

Simon Matthews is one of them. 

Apologies I’m yet to reply to emails that have come my way. I will. Probably in this bye round.

If you choose not to receive the weekly mailout from me, please let me know, or delete the emails, or block my email address. A few have. Notably, all with a Richmond Football Club email address. Have they been told to? 

Again, it’s more of the same. An inwardness. The four walls. A we-know-best mentality. A small-mindedness. Unable or unwilling to see the big picture, to look outside the box, to find other ways, listen to the voices in the crowd.

For reasons only they might know. 

The ugliness of the Richmond Football Club?

Simon Matthews played the man with me. He tried to bully me; the club ridiculed me, and in doing so, it ridiculed us all. Community engagement? It does it on its own terms, when it suits, when it needs to cushion its own pockets. 

There was nothing generous, nothing kind, in so many of my dealings with the club. 

This is a truth, and here is its ugliness. 

People like this, in positions of power, in an organisation so many of us cherish and hold dear, and will do until the day we die. 

I returned to the football on Saturday for a first time, rode my bicycle to the MCG, tied it up, stood in the outer, unbelieving of the size of the crowd, how many had turned up, then found a seat beside two friends who, with others, I long ago invited to my home. 

It is no longer my home – so much in my life has changed – but what I once did, how I contributed to our football club, is there for all to see, and remains steadfast. 

Now is no time for blind faith. 

Only a fool would have blind faith in our club. 

Because it can always do better, be better.

Only a fool never questions. 

There is only one thing that deserves our unequivocal belief, and that is the colours.

Yellow and black.

And Dusty. 

He has our unwavering respect, and always will.

Tiger tiger burning bright

Dugald 17/06/2024Filed Under: dugald, front

R14: Richmond v Hawthorn at the MCG

17/06/2024 By Chris Leave a Comment

I’m going to to attempt the impossible here; to talk about Dusty’s 300th just in terms of a home and away game with 4 points at stake. I love Dusty and what he’s done for Richmond. Others have spoken eloquently about his special qualities and where he ranks in football history. The club handled his week very well and the mini-doco they put out says all that needs to be said.

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Dustin Martin kicked the first goal on Saturday afternoon, and it may well have registered on any seismographs in the East Melbourne / Richmond area. The vast bulk of the 92,000 crowd were Tigers, and this was a dream start for a special occasion.

We started watching on Marcus’s phone until it crapped out. I had planned to renew Kayo but they are now owned by Streamotion who are owned by Hubbl? Or something? Anyway, it didn’t happen. So at quarter time Marcus and Michael and I trotted down to the pub.

Taranto had a massive first quarter capped wth an audacious goal from the pocket. But Hawthorn were flowing smoothly, like a team on a winning streak. They kept us in it for a while by hitting the post repeatedly. Mabior is not a better forward than Tom Lynch, but the ball was being delivered beautifully to him, and he had a real day out. I was genuinely happy to see it. Tom would have been a bit frustrated up the other end.

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Scrimshaw and Sicily took 25 marks between them; a few good ones but mostly just catching aimless bombs. It was a grim afternoon; as the seamless connection we used to take for granted just stuttered and the ball hit the ground again and again. Dusty was so quiet after his goal. Noah Cumberland seemed reluctant to contest aerially. Shai kicked one goal but seemed to saving his magic for another day.

Hawthorn’s Nick Watson kept popping up in dangerous areas but kicked 1.4, so they’ll need to sharpen up that part of the curriculum at his private school. His vibe was “even shorter Tom Papley, plus mullet” so I expect to be annoyed by him for many years.

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Dan Rioli continues to stand up every week, his break out of the middle and pass to Kosi was a highlight. Kosi goaled from right in front 40 out; it would be really great to see this 20 more times this season. Great process / great result.

Apart from injuries, this is my vote for low point of the year so far. Balta & Broad muck it up.

The Hawks just galloped away in the last term. Cumberland was hooked for Kane McAuliffe; probably should have happened sooner. Nank, Vlossy, Hugo, Bakes and Ben Miller all tried hard, Shorty seemed to back in form and the Tasmanians Campbell and Mansell chipped in valuable goals.

I loathe Hawthorn, and I confess I was pretty blue by the final siren. I didn’t consciously turn my back on Dusty’s celebration; but we’d come for a game of football, and it was over. I hope he plays out the season and gets to sing the song a few more times, it’s been a little while.

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Chris 17/06/2024Filed Under: front, tassie, Uncategorized

There’s nothing more tigerish than a wounded tiger

12/06/2024 By Dugald 2 Comments

On a Monday morning, I wrote a series of posts on X (formerly Twitter), about a bloke called Simon Matthews. He works for the Richmond Football Club. I posted a photograph of him, pulled from the club’s website. 

This is who he is.

I’m squaring up to him, letting him know what’s coming.

And yes, it’s personal.

Because Simon Matthews long ago played the man with me. He was rude, disrespectful, ungenerous – to me, to my family, to all who I had written about, all those voices in the outer, barracking for a team – a club – we hold as one. His behaviour came from a position of power. A big bloke, throwing his weight around.

He didn’t have to, not with all I was doing for him, for so many others.

I’m not afraid to stand up to one like him. 

He ought to know this.

Cause there’s nothing more tigerish than a wounded tiger.

It’s how it is and always should be in Struggletown.

Just ask one of finest, maybe our greatest.

Dusty.

Has he ever taken a backward step for the yellow and black?

Readers and contributors and friends of Tiger Tiger Burning Bright – click to enlarge

I am emboldened. By all who joined Chris Rees and I and others at the Cherry Tree Hotel in the backstreets of Richmond before the Dreamtime Game. It was a beautiful crowd. By all who’ve emailed and texted, made contact, offered support. And especially by those who posted comments on my recent Tiger Tiger Burning Bright post. 

If you care to read them, look here: An open letter to Richmond fans (about Simon Matthews, recycling, and this Saturday afternoon). 

Two pieces of correspondence illustrate the range of responses.

One, from Mark Romage via X, read:

@MarkRomage

May 25

Wow! I don’t know you and don’t even think I’ve heard of you, so to read of your contribution to the 2017 flag was a bit of a surprise. You come across as bitter that you got no recognition. 1/2

May 25

I also don’t know S. M, but if BG endorses him, that’s probably good enough for me. I’m sure he wants the club to flourish in his absence. You’re not the 1st bloke to be sacked from a footy club, (what is it you did?) and you won’t be the last. Move on and let Richmond do the same.

The second, from Judith Taylor, was written as a reply to the post, and sent as a comment:

I’m so sorry to hear that you have fallen on hard times, Dugald. I don’t know you personally but I wrote to you to do a story on my dad Jack Lanigan who lived in Port Fairy. You could not get to Port Fairy but you rang him up. I think he told you some poetry. I just wanted to say, I loved reading your stories about how much people loved Richmond. My father has passed away and not having the best time in his final years the 2017, and the 2019 premierships made his life so much happier. He never made it to see the 2020 grand final. But reading your story made me think of him, Jack used to say that football used to bring people together and it meant so much to him. He used to hate the off season. I am still a mad Richmond supporter and going to the first match of the year, down at the Gold Coast I love the Richmond Supporters. We were getting a belting and in the third quarter we all came together yelling and shouting to spur the boys on. For that third quarter when the Tigers made an effort, it was like we were all family.
All the best and I hope things get better for you.
Take care.

This is what I did for the Richmond Football Club.

I acknowledged people, gave them my time. 

I listened to their stories, and then shared them, wove them into a greater narrative.

One of togetherness. 

I telephoned an old man who lives in Port Fairy, to respect his story, who he was, to let him say what he needed to say. And my goodness I gave him the opportunity to entertain me with his poetry!

For no financial gain, no personal aggrandisement. 

I did it because I believe in the crowd, in the power it can harness, in what it can do. Every voice counts. And I know of my capacity to help, on what I could do to help turn the woebegone fortunes of Richmond. 

We have to believe in ourselves, in our abilities to make a difference.

In answering to Mark Romage, this is part of what I did.

And in time I will make contact with Brendon Gale to ask if he does, indeed, endorse Simon Matthews as the club’s next CEO.

And if he does, I will disagree with this decision.

And explain why.

Week-by-week, for this season, I’ll write about Simon Matthews.

And the politics of our football club, how it has chosen to undertake its business.

But now is not the time for that.

Ours is a week for celebration, rejoicing.

A great win away in Adelaide, and a distinguished milestone game for the greatest ever warrior for our footy club. 

Nobody will ever again do what Dusty has done.

It can never be taken from him. 

But a reminder to Mark Romage, and all others: our Dustin Martin once did toy with leaving Punt Road. 

Simon Matthews was implicated, through his brother, the CEO of GWS.

An AFL appointee.

It was in the 2013 off-season, and Dusty caught a plane to Sydney, and all our hearts were in the air, and I wrote an open letter to him, and will never have any idea if he or his manager ever read it, but it doesn’t matter, because the putting down of the words is sometimes enough. 

I’ve not read it again, but others might like to: An open letter to Dusty | dugald jellie (wordpress.com)

This Saturday afternoon I’ll be going to my first game of the season, alone, for him.

Tiger tiger burning bright

Dugald 12/06/2024Filed Under: dugald, front

Season of Equality

29/05/2024 By Brendan O'Reilly Leave a Comment

There is one step the AFL should take right now to show respect for women. Let’s call it The Season of Equality. The women’s and men’s football seasons should be of equal length, with an equal amount of footy air-time. This means that the seasons should not overlap.

Three questions need to be answered if this is to happen. How early can the footy season start? How late can it end? And who will have the first half of the year, the men or the women?

These are tough questions, to be sure, but humans have dealt with worse. Perhaps the seasons could start in early February and end in mid-October. In 2025 this would allow for a 37-weeks of footy. If there are 19 women’s and men’s teams, then each team can play every team once and there can be four rounds of finals. The 18 home-and-away games would need to be squeezed into 15 weeks – an average of one game every six days. The Covid-affected season of 2020 was much more hectic than this. Games could be made a bit shorter if necessary, as they were in 2020.

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After the stunning birth of the AFLW in 2017, the AFL has restricted the women’s time in the spotlight. Their first seasons were very short, but they were completed before the men began. The women had their own time. This year the women will start in August. That’s right, just when the men’s finals are about to start, the women’s season will begin. How will this help the women’s league to get attention? Their season will then run into December – hardly traditional footy territory, to say nothing of the health risks of playing in the heat.

This year the AFL took a very disrespectful step by starting the men’s season two weeks earlier than usual. It will still end when it usually does, at the end of September. But after shuffling the women away from what had been their exclusive late-summer season, they then took some of that time for an even longer men’s season. The technical term for this is rubbing your face in it.

In the brilliant documentary, Girls Can’t Surf, champion surfers speak about their battles against exclusion and disrespect. It was normal for the men to surf at competitions when the waves were good. When the surf turned to rubbish they would send the women in. Then they would say, “girls can’t surf.” When Pauline Menczer became Champion of the World in 1993 there was no prize money and she was handed a broken trophy. The AFL has at least agreed to equal prize money for women footballers, but this is a tiny fraction of footballer’s incomes. As far as salaries are concerned, men will still be receiving six times what the women are on by the end of 2027. This is from a league where the television rights alone provide enough money to pay the men’s salaries twice over. This is before a sponsor is signed, a ticket sold or a membership is paid for. The AFL is awash with cash and it gives the women players loose change picked up from the floor.

Does this look like respect to you? 

Some people will sook about the men’s season being made shorter. They will echo Scott Morrison’s plea that, while women should have equality, it shouldn’t be at the expense of men. Sometimes that might be true. But at other times, men will lose when women get their fair share. Boo-hoo, that’s how it goes. When women were excluded from much of the workforce, for instance, that made it easier for men to get the good jobs. There was just less competition. Then the rules changed and men had to compete against competent women. Men were a bit worse off, in relative terms. But they survived.

In any case, men will win with Season Equality. For the first time in decades they will have a fair draw, with every team playing every other team once.

The footy season should be shared equally between women and men. What could be fairer than that? So, let’s get to work on these tough questions: When can the season start? When can it end? And who will go first?

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Brendan O'Reilly 29/05/2024Filed Under: front

Dreamtime Round 11 v Essendon at the MCG, Saturday 25 May 2024

29/05/2024 By Brendan O'Reilly Leave a Comment

This was an emotional night. I’ve become a teacher since I last wrote for Tiger Tiger which means I’m stupidly busy and preoccupied. I’m part of a program that lets unqualified people loose into secondary schools. Over their first two years they do a Masters in their spare time. So, I’ve been like a lizard drinking and have had a good excuse to lose interest in the footy.

But it’s been a false economy. For one thing, footy is a social currency, and having something to chat to young people about, who might otherwise want to tell you to f______ off, is invaluable. Footy time is time well-spent. Then my daughter went overseas just before the season began and my main footy friend was gone. Then the Tigers have had a shocking two seasons, so another good reason not to bother. Then, two defeats in a row by 100 points or so – who can bear to look? But then, just days before she got back, my daughter messaged me: “Do want to come to the Dreamtime on Saturday? We’ve already got tickets.”

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She got back on Friday night after three months away. On Saturday, my siblings and niblings gathered to celebrate my Mum’s birthday – she would have been 90 last Wednesday. It was a lovely event and Mum would have liked to have been there. It’s been a family ritual for three or four years now and I’m very attached to it. Not least because it was at this lunch in 2022 that one of my nieces asked me about my work and I listed 10 things I loved about it. And then, a week later, I thought, I can’t do this job anymore, it will kill me. So I looked for a new job and got into the Teach for Australia program and my life changed.

I digress, but please bear with me. Following the emotional lunch there was another emotional gathering at a Richmond hotel of a dozen or more readers and contributors and friends of Tiger Tiger Burning Bright and I got to meet these beautiful people in person. This was really gratifying – people were even kinder and wiser in the flesh than on-line. But there was pessimism about the night ahead. Without mentioning any names of the faint-hearted, Dugald Jellie was definitely not going. “I’ve just got a terrible feeling that we’ll get absolutely smashed.” He was not the only pessimist at the party.

Readers and contributors and friends of Tiger Tiger Burning Bright – click to enlarge

I had already decided that, given the bloodbath of our last two games, our roll-call of injured and the absurd fact that the Bombers were second on the ladder (must have had a soft draw and good supplements) anything less than a 10-goal loss would be something to be happy about. But there’s always that tiny, tiny, fragment of hope – maybe it could be better than a moderate thrashing? We beat Sydney after all. And everyone seems to lift for the Dreamtime…

The game started and we were still in it after several minutes. Essendon completely failed to overwhelm us. Midway through the quarter we were still in it. At one point we got in front. And when the quarter time siren went the scores were level. I said, “It doesn’t get much closer than this.” My daughter’s boyfriend, who is a good feller, although he barracks for the Bombers, said “Yep, if they kick one more goal each it will be all tied up.”

Quarter time score: Richmond 3.3.21 to Essendon 3.3.21

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There were signs in that first quarter that Richmond might struggle. I could count only seven or eight of our Premiership players on the park. On the train I had memorised all the players with 40-plus numbers and I had barely heard of any of them. Sonsie, Green, Campbell, Miller, and someone else [McAuliffe? – ed]. Our forward line looked makeshift and bags of goals looked unlikely. But there was great effort when it counted and enough skill to match the Bombers.

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At half-time, when we were still in it, I tapped out a little report on my phone, for want of pen and paper:

Still in it at half-time. Essendon kicked four in a row and went three goals up with all the momentum of a good team playing a bad one. But two marks and goals to Lefau put the Tigers back in it. The second was from an exquisite Baker pass after he charged through the middle of the ground. Dusty has two goals, the first was like 2020, the best goal I’ve seen from him in four years. Shai and Mac are playing very well. Can we stay in it? Could we be in it at the last break?

Half-time score: Richmond 6.7.43 to Essendon 7.7.49

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The answer was, yes we could. Of our three goals in that quarter, the best came from a scorching run down the wing from Shai, followed by a kick deep into the 50 that Martin juggled enough to win the mark or the free, it didn’t matter. It made me think of Dusty’s run from a little deeper in the Qualifying Final of 2017…

The trouble with being still in it at the last break is that it makes you think, we could win this. We really could.

Three-quarter time score: Richmond 9.10.64 to Essendon 10.12.72

And we could have. The quarter seemed to begin with a long Richmond attack and many points. Cumberland was having a bit of a shocker, but if his snap had gone through instead of missing by a foot or less, all would have been forgiven. We were still in the fight, but with ground to make up, when Shai was concussed in a marking contest. In the caring way of the AFL,  he was allowed to get to his feet and jog off the ground with the trainers around him. I’ve read once, in a peer-reviewed neurological journal, that going for a little run after you’ve been doubly concussed will aid your recovery and future cognitive function.*

 * Actually I made that up. It’s not a good idea to go for a light run after a head-knock.

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Even with Shai on the ground, a win was going to be against the odds. Without him, and a goal or two behind, it was going to be really tough. But still the boys tried. Again and again they attacked, but the Bombers defence had improved and Lefau and the others struggled to get clear. Then the Bombers rebounded and goaled and goaled again and their stupid supporters cheered and cheered, like they hadn’t won a Grand Final for 24 years. But the Tigers got one back and it was only two goals and maybe they could get a draw? But time ebbed away… and the siren went and we were out of our misery.

Full-time score: Richmond 10.14.74 to Essendon 12.14.86 

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And the margin was right. Any less and we’d be full of “if onlys”.

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And I’d met up with the Tiger Tiger people in person which was as good as winning a final.

Brendan O'Reilly 29/05/2024Filed Under: benny, front

An open letter to Richmond fans (about Simon Matthews, recycling, and this Saturday afternoon).

24/05/2024 By Dugald 11 Comments

None of this is easy to write. Not now, when the bottom’s fallen from the bucket. A legacy has been squandered, an opportunity lost. What we had has gone, and there’s no guarantee it’ll ever come back.

I write this because of a curious convergence of events.

And because a truth need be told.

But first, the good bits. Chris Rees, a collaborator of mine, a friend to many, a man who’s done so much for the cultural capital of Richmond through his art, he called recently. Said he’s coming to the Dreamtime Game. With one of his boys. From Hobart. Wants to catch up.

I’ve not been to a game all year, but if Chris Rees is in town, count me in. Others feel the same way. We are gathering at the Cherry Tree Hotel in Cremorne (beside the walls of the old Rosella factory) from 3pm, this Saturday.

Please join us if you care. The football brings us together.

We are united by the game.

And a few weeks back there was this. Someone called Simon Matthews posted a friend request with me on Facebook. I know of only one Simon Matthews, and he works at the Richmond Football Club, and he might be many things, but he is no friend of mine.

*

I’ve written not a word about football since I was delisted by the club at the end of the 2017 season. Since then, my life has gone through many upheavals. A separation. Work difficulties. Housing uncertainty. It is a path I’ve chosen, in part, because all of us need to be true to ourselves.

Last Sunday night, my brother uploaded to YouTube a little film that the two of us have made (with the help of Chris Rees, who made the title graphic and animation), about the sort of things I get up to. Community work. Trying to help others.

Here’s a link, and a request: before you read any further, please have a look (it’s 5 min and 50 sec) and if you like it, please share it with others. Pass it along. All my best work is grassroots; I’m hoping this is no exception.

*

I’ve turned my back on football this season.

That part of my life is over.

I’m still a fan, but not for now.

And I didn’t intend to write any of this, until I came across a YouTube clip the other night on Footy Classified, of Caroline Wilson talking about Simon Matthews being a mooted successor to Brendon Gale. The preferred internal candidate, et cetera.

The thought of it makes my blood boil. And this is personal.

Caroline Wilson, in her way, endorses Simon Matthews, and of course she does. Theirs is a relationship of mutual benefit. They mix in the same circles, part of football’s inner club, an elite, scratching each other’s backs, looking out for their own.

In those seasons of writing about football, about Richmond, I did so from the outer, and that was fine, and where I needed to be. By myself, in a crowd. I found those in the football media a curious mix. Guarded, protective of their territory. They seemed incurious, even unimaginative, about so many parts of the game – including the crowd.

But not all.

Those who embraced what I tried to do through my writing, an enquiry, were those who I think are most comfortable within themselves, with who they are. Mentors, teachers. They lower the drawbridge, rather than pull it up.

Greg Baum was one of these, unafraid to include others. As was Richard Hinds. And Craig Little at the Guardian, and Paul Amy, and Francis Leach, and Tony Wilson – all of them happy to share, to embrace, include. And Channel 7 commentator Hamish McLachlan, he once mentioned my name in a broadcast, because he’d read something I’d written, and thought it worthy, and was unafraid to acknowledge. He didn’t have to – but did.

You don’t forget these things, these people.

*

My involvement in the Richmond Football Club, for a few seasons, was essentially a labour of love.

I am a fan, a lover of team sport, and a great believer in the power of storytelling. I had moved back to Melbourne, with a young family, and here was an opportunity, a way I could contribute. I was not a football writer, but I’ve played the game, and enjoy learning about the game; and I know about fire in the belly, fear, anxiety, family, community, and am curious always about what it might mean.

As one Richmond fan once said, what I was doing was ‘subversive’. His word, and it was the right one.

I gave voice to the crowd. I told their stories – one at a time, in various ways – to try coax our club to greater deeds. I believe in the power of words; and hoped that it might help our group of young men be the best they could be, giving them a shot at winning the whole thing.

And that’s what they did.

The players are the ones who made it happen, and none can take that from them. Coaches helped. Earlier decisions of recruiters were vital. Bean counters needed to create financial stability. We needed luck on our side (with injuries, with a readymade ruckman becoming available in the draft). A lot of little things needed to go right.

And they did.

For several seasons, culminating in 2017, I wrote as best I could, with all what I had, to try and have that group of young men believe in themselves, in us. I lowered the drawbridge, to let others cross. Some within the club ridiculed me for this. Maybe I made them feel uncomfortable. Maybe I challenged them. What they could see – in the numbers, the engagement – was something that to them was in part a danger. The voice of the crowd.  

For coaches (Dimma and his “four walls”), for administrators like Simon Matthews, I was someone to be wary of. Football clubs pretend to embrace the crowd – talk of the 19th man, the ‘Tiger army’ – but often it’s no more than a stance. They employ people to engage with the crowd, trying to manage what essentially is uncontrollable; in its size, in all its viewpoints, its variegated nature. They know they need the crowd – its benevolence helps pays the bills, got our club out of financial strife – but they also do all they can to keep it in its place. On the other side of the fence, at arm’s reach, on the outer.  

For those on the inside, people like Caroline Wilson and Simon Matthews, football is an industry.

For people like me, football is community.

*

Some players read what I wrote, I know they did. As did their girlfriends and partners and parents. They contacted me, correspondence was shared, trust was built. And this is so important to any footy club, any organisation: trust.

I travelled out of my way to tell as many stories of Richmond as I could. Richmond people invited me into their lives as I invited them into mine. I gave bits of myself away, so others felt safe to confide in me. I sat at kitchen tables with Richmond people. Rode my bicycle to the homes of Richmond people. Broke bread with them. Joined Richmond people at banner making. Stood in the outer at the Punt Road end with Richmond people. All the while asking questions, giving my time, an acknowledgement.

I made a public spectacle of myself – dressing up, making signs, playing a performative role, the fool! – not because I necessarily wanted to, but because I understood the worth it might offer. To help galvanise a crowd, a club. To get people talking, have them think in other ways. There was a deliberateness in the actions, and oftentimes it was designed to assist the players in subtle and untold ways.

Did it work? We’ll never really know.

I have no interest in corporate writing, or public relations. Truth is what matters, it’s what we carry with us to the end.

My skill was to tell a narrative, to try and harness the power of the crowd.

It was a privilege.

And for a while, it was so much fun.

*

Writer Konrad Marshall was invited into the club – good luck to him – and enjoyed the windfall of a few best-selling books. But ask this, if you’ve read what we wrote: was he generous enough to acknowledge what I was doing – what we were doing – what no club had done before? Did the crowd, and all the stories we entwined, have any role in finding on-field success?

Dimma jumped ship, has got himself a nice pay cheque up north, further feathered his nest, as is his entitlement. He was always cautious of me; that is his nature. Control all the controllables, and all that. But what I know is this: at some point, he embraced the power of storytelling, and there were times when I helped put words in his mouth. Things I’d write, and a day or two later, at a press conference, it was an idea he voiced. I helped give him, and the club, a narrative. Whether he knew this or not is immaterial: it happened.

I sat beside Peggy O’Neal at a luncheon in the week after we won in 2017, as the whole city seemed to celebrate with us, and I asked her how she got involved. Through money, she said. Throw money at a club, and it gets you a place on the table. And one day that got her to the head of the board, and then an AO, and now a plum job as the chancellor of RMIT university, on a salary upward of a million a year.

Lawyers, they’re good at leveraging.

Benny Gale is off to Hobart. Back home, of sorts. A nice gig, and it suits his career trajectory, and I admire Brendon Gale, and he knows it, and I’ve said it, but I’ve always harboured doubts, and sometimes voiced them. It’s frustrated me that he’s never left his seat up high at the game and come and joined the crowd. Once, I invited him to sit with me in the cheer squad. Not so much for me, but for him, for them, for us. I wanted him to experience the football from another perspective, knowing the joy it would give so many who bleed yellow-and-black.

But we are who we are, and this is not who he is.

Also, if it is true he has backed Simon Matthews as his successor, in my reckoning, that’s a misjudgement. I think the club could do much better, I know it could.

But who am I to question? I’m just some mug in the outer.

The music has stopped, the jig is up, and all of us have had a great time, and so many have moved on – are moving on – pockets have been lined with the success, and what so many of us have from those short few years is something money cannot buy.

The fondest of memories.

*

We won a premiership, the drought was over, and I was delisted from the club.

Fair enough.

Once the club got what it wanted, I was surplus to needs.

The club did what corporate entities so often do: socialise losses, capitalise the wins.

It drew itself tighter, made itself smaller, became more insular, erected higher walls – including the total folly of a temporary security fence around Punt Road Oval before the 2018 prelim final – dividing the inner circle, from those on in the outer.

It started to believe its own hype.

But three-out-of-four, that’s nothing to quibble about, that is a fine accomplishment.

But now this, and last weekend. A flogging on Saturday night, followed by a belting at Sandringham on Sunday.

Time has come for change. Nothing stands still in football. But the great disappointment is this: our club was unable to do what Geelong and Sydney have done, find sustained success. It needed to be more imaginative, make bolder decisions, if it wanted a chance to be the first Melbourne-based club to crack that puzzle. Renew at the top.

It could not find a way.

*

Creative types always have been attracted to football clubs – writers, artists, actors, musicians, poets – and football clubs often draw them in, use them for their own purposes, but have rarely wanted to fully embrace what they do. Just ask comedian Danny McGinlay, and how it ended up for him at old Footscray.

The men in suits, the corporate types, they win out.

Simon Matthews is a man in a suit. Football has served him well, as it has his brother, David Matthews, the CEO of GWS. They are part of the AFL ‘boys club’; the inner circle, full of self-interest, lining their own pockets, greasing the connections, yes men, hollow men, good at scratching their own backs.

Please let me know if I am wrong.

Simon Matthews once put me in my place, admonished me, lied to me. He insulted my integrity, my character. In doing so, he also insulted my family, and all who I’d written about, all what I was trying to do, what I believed. He insulted us all. And he did it in a way that I recognise, that has all the hallmarks of a bully, of a boor.

I know his type.

I’ve been around for long enough, am big and ugly enough, to stand my ground, call it out, not be cowered by blokes like him.

It’s what a true Tiger does.

And those who know me, who long ago played footy with me, know I’m willing to play the man – fairly – if that’s what the team needs. Go in hard. And I’ve backed into enough packs, put my head over the ball, knowing others will help me out.

It’s what Benny Gale, at centre-half-forward, did as a player. And I reckon it’s what he needs to do now, as a parting gift.

Simon Matthews threw his weight around. He played the man, with a cheap shot. He put me in my place – he put all of us in our place – without knowing who we are, what we can do.

Yes, he brought me back into the fold, for a while. Not because he really wanted to, but because he needed to. Keep your friends close, your enemies closer.  

For a while, it worked. It suited us both, and it suited the club. But he never truly believed in what I was doing, in what we were doing, and he understood it divested those within the “four walls” of power. I was an outsider, an unknown proposition, a danger, to be managed.

And then a premiership was won.

I was no longer required.

He made the decision, and with it, I can add one more character trait to his resume: coward.  

He never had the heart to pick up the phone, make that call.

Got others to do his dirty work.

And now someone called Simon Matthews has recently tried to follow me on Facebook.

*

I’m going to the Cherry Tree Hotel on Saturday afternoon before the game, to be with friends, and if any who’ve known Chris Rees or myself through our long-ago contributions to Richmond, if they’d like to turn up, they are welcome.

It’s the least I can do. Give others the opportunity, the chance.  

A Richmond man – I won’t name him, he doesn’t need to be drawn into this – he called this week, we talked, and he’s offered me a load of tools from his shed. He knows a bit of what I’ve been through, he wants to help. He said he’d recently lost his job and is soon to turn 60. He understands what it’s like to have your back to the wall.

This week, I published a film with my brother, and it made me think of me and him, people like us, what we do, how we include, and why.

And it made me think also of Simon Matthews, and his brother, the two of them, the chosen ones, the privilege that has come their way, and what they choose to do with it.

I see Simon Matthews trying to position himself for the top job. Photo ops, building bridges, networking. He is welcome to join me, and others, at the pub this Saturday afternoon. But if he does, he better be ready to do some explaining.

Cross a Tiger – a wounded Tiger, a passionate Tiger – and it doesn’t come without repercussions.

I am not that man to go quietly into the night, not without a fight.

I wish the boys well on Saturday night.

Our new coach has been dealt an impossible hand.

This season can be one only of transition.

I’m not following the football this year – my energies need to be elsewhere; with my boys, with other pursuits, with earning enough to pay the rent, with trying to solve a housing problem – but my heart is still in the crowd, and always will be.

I will return to the game someday, because the game has given me so much.

But if you know of any on the Richmond board, let them know this. I will never be back at Richmond if Simon Matthews is in charge. Never. I’ve been around long enough, had enough life experience, to know those who I respect. My advice to the board: make changes, rejuvenate, move Simon Matthews on.

Footballers have no security of tenure – theirs is not a job for life – let him find some humility in a hard choice. Trust me, it’ll be better for everyone. Including him.

And what have I been up to since my football writing days ceased?

Washing dishes at a café in St Kilda.

Building chicken house with children who have trouble in class.

Raising funds through recycling to help welcome and support a refugee family.

I’ve found my peace, away from the game.

And this week, I’ve had the great honour to tell part of my story on ABC Radio. I was asked questions, I answered. I talk a bit about football, but nothing about my experience with Richmond. That’s for another time.

The power of the extra dad – ABC listen

Tyger tyger burning bright

Dugald 24/05/2024Filed Under: front, Uncategorized Tagged With: front

2022: Round 4 v Western Bulldogs at the MCG

21/04/2022 By Brendan O'Reilly 1 Comment

I have decided not to go this game. I am managing my Covid risk, I tell myself. But as it turns out though I can’t go anyway. After two years of the pandemic being out there and affecting everyone else, it arrives in our house. My partner tests positive on Saturday morning and we all have to isolate for seven days. With my partner unwell and keeping to herself in the front room I am busy keeping the household ticking over. It is with some relief that I hit the couch at 7.25 to watch the Tigers. But how much relief will it be if we get crushed?
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I have decided not to go this game.  I am managing my Covid risk, I tell myself.  But as it turns out though I can’t go anyway.  After two years of the pandemic being out there and affecting everyone else, it arrives in our house.  My partner tests positive on Saturday morning and we all have to isolate for seven days. 

With my partner unwell and keeping to herself in the front room I am busy keeping the household ticking over.  It is with some relief that I hit the couch at 7.25 to watch the Tigers. But how much relief will it be if we get crushed?

This might so easily have been the case.  Luckily for Richmond, the Dogs have not been told about “the big sticks rule” where you get six points for a goal and only one for a behind.  They fire for goal again and again as if all that matters is registering some sort of score.  They dominate the first part of the first term and in no time have their first “point goal” and lead 1.6 to 1.1.  Eventually Richmond break away, Bolton marks Riewoldt’s kick, plays on and goals and we’re in front.

Bolton snaps another point shortly after and the Dogs win a free, 30m out, right in front and miss.  Just before the break Naughton snaps and goals and they’re in front.

Quarter-time score:  Richmond 2.2.14 to Western Bulldogs 2.7.19.

I can only think how lucky we are that they didn’t kick straight and bury us. But our attacks, when they’ve come, have been exciting and fluid and have resulted in actual goals.

Early in the second term Picket marks a clearing kick and goals from the 50, his kick straight, high and handsome.  This is a good spell for us, in which luck plays no small part.  Castagna marks and wins a 50 under the new “still-like-a-statue” rule.  Not wanting to make it look too easy he does a weird, play-on snap and goals from 15m out.

We win another of those 50s, this time against Naughton, and Presti, back in the side and looking good, goals from 30 out.  Lynch then plays his best two minutes of footy in the last two years.  He takes a good grab on the wing and gives the footy to Bolton who gives it to someone else who kicks goalward where to where Lynch has run.  He marks and goals and the Tigers are looking very sharp.

Macrae gets one back for Footscray before a piece of Richmond play that brings tears to my eyes.  Cotchin wins a great one-on-one scrap and taps the footy to Balta who takes off like a Clydesdale freed from the plough. 

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He has one bounce and bombs it into the forward line where Lynch tries to mark, can’t quite get it, turns, gathers the loose footy and goals from close range under very close attention from the Doggies’ defence.  It’s old-fashioned Richmond footy, one contest to the next and so on down the ground.  It’s great to see Lynch moving so well and taking his chances and we’re four goals in front.

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The Dogs still don’t know about the six-points-for-a-goal rule and Naughton misses again at the other end and it’s 7.3 to 3.10.  The runner goes out and explains the rule to Naughton who goals from the free kick after Short kicks out on the full.

Half-time score:  Richmond 7.3.45 to Footscray 4.10.34

Richmond have been very good, especially the defence which is without most of our Premiership Heroes except for Short and Broad.  Those two have been good – I’ve been very impressed with Broad over the past two seasons, he plays with a lot of skill and vision and plenty of toughness too.  But the new defenders – Rioli, Tarrant and Gibcus – have also held their positions.

We have our noses in front, but the Dogs’ inaccuracy has put us there.  If they keep getting the ball forward and start kicking straight they will swamp us.  Sure enough the third term starts badly when Bontempelli marks and goals after we’d left him all by himself.  Then Shedda is caught holding the ball and I worry that he’s starting to look slow.  The Dogs go into attack from the free kick but Bontempelli misses.  They’ve now kicked 5.12 to 7.3.

There follows a passage of blood and guts so wonderful that it’s censored.  The Dogs try to switch play across their backline but Baker flies in and spoils, Lynch gathers the loose footy, straightens up and goals. 

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Lynch and other Tigers rush to thank Baker for his work and to check that he hasn’t bled to death.  Channel Seven rush to an ad and so we don’t see the gory aftermath.  But after the ad someone says “he split his head open” and the camera is on him for half a second as he is treated on the bench.  It looks like someone has upended a tin of red ink on his head, then it’s back to the un-bloodied players on the ground.

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Had this been a Shakespeare play rather than the AFL, the King, striding across the ‘G would have gestured to Baker on the bench and said “What bloody man is that?”

Sadly, after this English gets a quick reply for the Dogs who are not going to go away and are slowly learning the finer points of scoring in Australian footy.

Richmond go into attack again, Castagna marks on the 50 and kicks it to Riewoldt who can’t mark.  The ball spills loose, Footscray try to clear it but Bolton blinks through them like a ghost, grabs the footy cleanly, turns in the pocket and kicks it on his left just inside the boundary.  It sails high right over the goal umpire’s head and you wonder is there anything Shai can’t do?  There is some similarity to Dusty’s ridiculous goal at the end of the GF in 2020.  The stealing of the footy, the quick turn, the evasion, the outrageous ambition of attempting a shot from so tight an angle.

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Naughton ices this particular cake for us by missing again and soon it’s 9.4 to 6.14.  They’ve had seven more scores than us – and very few have been rushed behinds – and we lead by eight points.  Castagna has a good chance with an empty forward line in front of him but he misses.  The Dogs kick the footy out on the full, Cotch takes the free and Lynch takes a big grab 45 out on a 45 angle.  He kicks perfectly and we’re still in front with less than five minutes left in the third term.  So, the most pessimistic thing you could say is, we’re doing better than we were against the Saints.

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Baker, back on the ground with his skull fused with superglue, does some great work in the middle and gets it to Balta who kicks long and wide.  It’s not a great kick at all but Riewoldt marks right next to the behind post and kicks the goal.  We lead by 20 with 2.45 left in the quarter.

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Some poor Richmond disposals result in another mark to Naughton but only a rushed behind results.  Again Richmond can’t clear but then Treloar misses.

Richmond attack and Riewoldt marks on the 50 with 16 seconds left.  The siren goes and the umpire kindly explains what he is allowed to do – that is, he can’t play on.  Many, many years ago when Jack was perhaps still a teenager, I watched him on the telly in a game against the Saints.  If I’m not mistaken, he had a kick after the siren from a similar distance that could have won us the game.  And what made me so sad was not just that his kick fell short – I sort-of expected that – but that he kicked a drop punt.  It was well-known, even then, that his kicks just didn’t go that far.  But he didn’t even try a torpedo to get that extra five or ten meters that was required.  And I thought, I know it’s old-fashioned, but shouldn’t players at least know how to try a torp when it’s their only hope?

Evidently, Jack had heard my silent lament and tonight he shapes up to kick a torp.  I don’t think much of the kick off the boot – it looks like it’s going wide and falling short – but in the magical way of the spiral it straightens up and goes much further than it needs to.  It’s a goal and Jack becomes the 21st highest-scoring player in Men’s AFL-VLF history, or something and is mobbed by his team-mates.

And it’s the last change and the Tigers are up by four goals.

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Three-quarter-time score:  Richmond 12.5.77 to Footscray 6.17.53

Dunkley starts the last quarter well by kicking into the point post.  At the other end a ferocious tackle from Toby wins him a free and he goals from close range.  Soon the last term is half over and we still lead by five goals and then Parker, also playing well, wins a holding-the-ball free and goals from 30 out.  Is this the sealer?  Are we safe now, 37 points in front?  The way we coughed up leads against Carlton and the Saints means we can’t relax until there are fewer minutes left than our lead in goals.

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And soon this blessed time arrives, six minutes left and we lead by 38 points.

Then Presti marks a clearing kick on the 50, hands it off to the un-tagged Short who bombs it from 55.  We’re up by 45 points and are running away with it.  Treloar kicks a sad, late goal for the Dogs.  Hunter is gifted a 50 for time-wasting against Baker but he misses from 25 out.  Then, to make all the Dogs feel better, Riewoldt marks and kicks a point after the siren.

Final Score:  Richmond 15.9.99 to Footscray 7.19.61

There are many pleasing things about this win.  Our make-shift defence has done very well.  Ben Miller in his third game has been good and the old hands, Broad, Short and Rioli, have all stood up.  Presti has had a great return to the side, 30 possessions, 10 of them contested and a goal.  Pickett has played one of his best games for us.  Bolton has been brilliant and Lynch and Riewoldt have had their best games in a long time.  Baker has had another very good game and his head-splitting heroics would be immortalised had he lived in a less squeamish age.  Parker has played another good game too, as has Cotch.  I could name the whole side, as is generally the case when Richmond play well and win.

The Dogs’ kicking for goal is what kept us in the game early and perhaps won it for us in the end.  But what really hurt them was how well we used the footy when we had it.

Brendan O'Reilly 21/04/2022Filed Under: benny, front, Uncategorized

Wraps and gaps

03/10/2021 By Chris Leave a Comment

In February I wrote here “Dynasties don’t last much longer than this in general, so there’s every prospect of a dip in fortunes at the very least.” Thanks very much Nostradamus. So, you can blame me for the Tiges nosedive in 2021. But like 2017 and 2019, we did not lose in September.

You can also blame me for the huge gaps in TTBB this season. I have struggled for motivation, for time and sometimes for positivity. The team has had some terrible performances, sure. But in the past I think we would have been on here spewing words to dissect these losses and demand Liam McBean come into the side. I didn’t want to think about AFL footy so much this year. But that’s what this site is all about, so please accept my apology that I just wasn’t able to do it at times in 2021.

During lockdowns, and all the other difficulties and limitations the pandemic has imposed; football and sport generally has played an important part in giving people a distraction and something to look forward to. The AFL has been flexible, shipping games here and there, playing in front of low or no crowds, the show must go on. This meant that for some Melbourne footy lovers, the unthinkable happened: their side played in a Grand Final that they were barred from attending. Not just “tickets are scarce” but – you’re barred. And they couldn’t even congregate to watch together because of restrictions on indoor gatherings.

I am not convinced AFL footy should have gone ahead this year. I do not have a persuasive argument for this case; it’s just a feeling that dogged me through the season. I am in Tasmania, where we have only had isolated single Covid cases bob up over the last year. I could go to local footy, with its small crowds. It felt good to be keeping the flame burning for all the people who would have done anything to be able to stand in the wind and rain and yell ‘ballllllll’.

The AFL with its interstate travel and huge payrolls is so much more than a sport. It’s too big to fail. The stock market would actually take a hit if the AFL was cancelled for a year. TV would have panicked as they did when sports started cancelling in 2020. AFL 2021 was always going to crash through no matter what. I was in the privileged position where I could go to a game, watch the Hobart Tigers lose, come home satisfied and just absorb the AFL on the radio or in the paper. Didn’t watch it much.

I don’t know how we’ll do in 2022, or how I’ll feel when round 1 is approaching. Nostradamus needs to go up on the roof and fiddle with the aerial to the crystal ball.

I do want to thank, from the bottom of my heart, David Astbury and Bachar Houli. Two wonderful men that have been ornaments to Richmond Football Club and to the game. Football has given them a platform and a career to this point; I expect we will hear a lot more from them in the years to come.

Bachar has his Foundation and we know he’ll continue to do his amazing community work; which I think of as stitching Muslim Australians into the wider fabric of Australia. David comes across as such a deep thinker, a humanist and an optimist. I hope we will have further opportunities to hear him speak – whatever his public role.

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Chris 03/10/2021Filed Under: front, tassie, Uncategorized

Season 2021 – The highs, the lows…

03/10/2021 By Malcolm McKinnon 1 Comment

The Red and Blue mob are still be waving their Grand Old Flag in a state of delirium. And we don’t begrudge them the pleasure ‘cause we know what that feels like. There are so many apparent parallels between the Dees of ’21 and the Tiges of ’17 in their rapid rise and redemption. Simon Goodwin voices the same epiphany that turned Dimma around. The talk of team-culture, deep camaraderie and self-belief sounds very familiar. And Christian Petracca really did put on an amazing Dusty Martin impersonation in the big game, didn’t he?

This football season just concluded was another strange one. For the parts that coincided with Melbourne lockdown it did provide welcome distraction and entertainment, just like the one before, even if it didn’t offer the same exquisite pleasures for us Tiger supporters.

The velocity of our team’s crash back to earth took me by surprise. It is weird how quickly one adjusts to following a top-of-the-table team, and it’s not an easy thing to relinquish. A terrible run of injuries was a large part of the cause but, still, it was alarming to see the wheels fall off the juggernaut so quickly.  And who can say whether season 2022 will bring resurrection or stagnation? Anything can happen. Aside from Gold Coast FC, which I still can’t take seriously, the competition is really quite even. Most clubs have potential to take the fast elevator ride from middling under-achiever to serious premiership contender. Barring another catastrophic injury run, I think the Tigers are well placed to bounce back. Some of our older blokes are close to the end but we have some great players in their prime years and some promising new ones coming through. I reckon that Ross, Collier-Dawkins and Hugo-Smith are the safest bets in this latter category but there’s scope for others to stake a claim too. The compromised second-tier competition this year and last made it so much more difficult for players to step in at the top level. Hopefully next year will be better in that regard.

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I managed to watch two games at the MCG in real-life in season 2021, encapsulating the good and the bad of our season. I saw the Tiges storm home with a wet sail against the previously undefeated Bulldogs in round 7. We still seemed vaguely like a champion team at that stage of the season, with the added bonus of Shai Bolton looking like a break-out superstar. But then in round 17 I witnessed the unedifying spectacle of demolition by Collingwood in the final quarter. Our team looked shot. And losing to the Pies hasn’t become any less horrible as the years roll on.

For me, the best game of the season was actually one that we lost narrowly, against Port Adelaide in round 4. Such a high-quality contest between two sides playing great football, and neither deserved to lose. The game that we lost by a mere skerrick against the Wet Toast later in the season was a cracker too, although harder to take pleasure in because of our team’s woeful capitulation in the final ten minutes. The win against Brisbane on the occasion of Jack Riewoldt’s 300th game was a season highlight too, although soured by Dusty’s ruptured kidney. And I shouldn’t forget to mention the final six minutes of our season, where we suddenly woke from our slumber and kicked several quick goals to snatch a draw with the Turd-birds. That was fun to watch.

The lows? The aforementioned capitulation to Collingwood is up there on the list. But I think that fortnight where our team was demolished by St Kilda and then trounced by Gold Coast was the nadir. Both those games were truly demoralising. And I think the game against Freo, where our only goal for the entire first half was one kicked by mistake by Rhyan Mansell, deserves a special mention too. Shocking. But then I guess we move on, preferring not to dwell too long on such indignities.

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We’ll miss David Astbury and Bachar Houli in season 2022. But we look forward to welcoming back Ivan Soldo, Noah Balta, Nathan Broad, Dustin Martin, Dion Prestia and Shane Edwards, all in better health. And then who knows what might happen? Hope springs eternal, in a yellow-and-black jumper.

Malcolm McKinnon 03/10/2021Filed Under: front, Uncategorized

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