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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Tatyoon: ground zero for the Dave Astbury Appreciation Society
Many 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’.”
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.
Once again a good read, but as usual i will put in my 2 cents worth. The moans ans groans of we lost it in the dying seconds, are not really correct, we lost it in the first quarter kicking 1 goal 7, not at least 5 goals 3, a result which would have had the magpies wondering how their wing got clipped, we had at least 3 hit the post, (which i still recon should be 7 points, as it is far harder to do than miss it.) at the end of the day we made some bad decisions at the wrong times. Hampson is no doubt good in the ruck, but unfortunately being good at one thing in footy these days is not enough, and ruckmen who can not go forward and kick goals are becoming as extinct as t-rex. At the end of the day I will be back making the banner (but not poling it this week) and appearing at the game, to support our team and win or lose I will bne there for as long as I am able into the future.
Vince, four words:
Salt. Of. The. Earth.
The work that you and others do in making the banner – in adding to the day’s spectacle, in always being there – is so very admirable, and appreciated by so many. I cannot make it (again) this weekend, but am hoping to sneak off in the night to see the Melbourne game the following week. It’ll be my first of the season. I’ll be going to the game alone. Will see if I can sneak a seat down near the fence in the cheer squad, if there are any going.
Long live Vince Morton!
Long live the Richmond Football Club!
#gotiges
Good on you Vince, I largely agree. Gut wrenching last few minutes, but if we had been up at halftime 8:3 to 3:3 instead of 3:8 to 3:3, the Pies would have laid down and let us take it away.
I’m with Vince & Chris; ‘bad kicking is bad footy’ & our inaccuracy last Friday hurt us badly. Hats off to the Pies, whilst perhaps a tad less skillful, they kept at it all the way thru so winning the game thru taking their chances & being hungrier & more confident. In short they persisted; we desisted.
Great piece Dugald, the pain shines through every well-crafted word…. I truly believe we still have such a huge, loyal and vocal supporter base because we have been conditioned to accept mediocrity- we are so thrilled to finish in a position with a number higher than nine that we accept this as “good enough” when it clearly no longer is. We have had two seasons where we’ve had amazing runs and stormed into the finals, but we seem to be happy with that and thus, underperform under the intense pressure of finals. I reckon we desperately need a better sports psychologist as so much of our lack is clearly between the ears.. Whilst I’m thrilled the players are happy and confident about what happens “in our four walls”, I no longer am and want to see whatever mysterious voodoo ways they practise transposed onto the field every bloody week! There’s clearly something wrong when you come away from a packed ‘G on a Friday night, where you’ve been the better team for most of the match and you’ve lost to the mortal enemy by 1 point, and the best thing you can say is “it’s a Richmond thing”…… I’m truly sick and tired of “Richmond things” and want to see more “Hawthorn-like things”…. Despite the constant heartbreak and humiliation that are the natural milieu of being a Tiger, I’ll still go on Saturday and, as always, have hope in my heart that this week I’ll see more… Go Tiges!
Robyn, I think this comment probably encapsulates the mood of all Richmond fans this week. Such a sigh of resignation. And yes, a questioning of the psychology – are us fans too much of a burden to carry? but ultimately, ours is unconditional love. we are in the thrall of football, and of Richmond. These are ties that bind. We could not step away lightly.
Looking forward to catching up at a game.
#gotiges
5 year plans. I moved back to Melbourne during the ill-fated Terry Wallace 5 year plan. Planned it perfectly too – it was 2007. I thought – the rewards I would get in those last couple of years. ahhhh it was not to be.
I am still optimistic that it will be a good year in 2016. I’m not ready to throw Dimma under the bus. Yes. We lost to Collingwood. We should have won. Geelong, Melbourne, Fremantle & WestCoast should have won too? I’m mightily happy that West Coast did not. This was just one of those Round 2’s. I have a sneaking suspicion that this could be one of those: Win 10 games and you’re in the 8 kinda years. If it is and round 2 was just an anomaly, then round 3 should right itself.
We can expect bad kicking. We have a few different players in the lineup this year.
What I like: Rance is now our defensive quarterback. Dimma has opted out on selecting Chaplin and given Rance the top job. He is wonderful at it. Watch the backmen – they listen to him when he says good job – or not so good job. I hope Dimma sticks with this for round 3 even with Grimes down. We will see.
Unfortunately, real life will be in the way this weekend. So I’ll be resigned to watching the game on a telly. Hopefully hidden in some forgotten corner of the house where my wife will be oblivious to the fact that I am being “Anti-Social”.
#GoTiges
Oh Clayton, there is nothing “anti-social” in watching the football. Does she know it is one of the great social rituals of this city? Does she understand you will be watching with so many others? And more importantly, who does she barrack for?
(having said that, I will not be at the game on Saturday either, have a family day that involves children’s theatre – the ’52-storey treehouse’ – and hopefully a trip to Castlemaine to see an exhibition of Ben Quilty’s artworks from Afghanistan.
I’m interested in his study of young men and risk-taking behaviour.
I’m also interested to visit the birthplace (?) of our Dusty.
#gotiges
The wife follows the Bombers. Probably why she doesn’t follow as closely as I do. Although I do tend to watch every game I can. I have just realised that we play at 2.10 on Saturday. This means I can go. I promptly told the wife this and I think her eyes rolled back further than Mitch Duncan’s after getting a man hug from Mummy. Meh she’s a tiger member so I’ll bring her along with the boy.
The Bombers, oh dear. Poor thing.
Another terrific bloggie there, Dugald.
Maybe we should think about the “Love Bomb” campaign again?
Oh the agony and ecstasy of being a Tigers supporter.
Skip, just went a bit weak at the knees at some pics you posted this afternoon. You and Cotch,. poawwerrr!
Love bomb? Let’s make a call by Round 9.
You never know with Richmond, they’ll probably come good this week.
#gotiges
Hehe, thanks. We had so many former Captains and the current Captain at the Tommy Hafey Club event today I was in heaven! Part of the reason I’m on the Committee (:-)).
Never pass up a photo opp, you know me. 🙂
You’re right if we threaten the Love Bomb the boys will come good.
The measure of Bachar Houli is not that he fluffed his lines against Freo. It is in that the week after he kicked a steadying and important goal in the game against the Hawks. He has not shirked responsibility and that is one of the many reasons why he has the respect of the Tiger faithful despite that glaring mistake in what was a morale sapping loss.
The players deserve both our respect and our criticism. I believe criticism can be done fairly from both inside and outside the Mythical Four Walls. Apparently the team have ‘taken ownership’ of the calamitous last two minutes against the Warblers. I am sure the players are mature enough to take fair criticism: what no one needs is the faceless bullying that so often is the norm on social media or some forums. Players, as we know – just like anyone else – get depression and go through hard times. We need not revel in the downfall of public figures for our own amusement.
As for the Rioli incident: I’m looking forward to his first goal. A goal that will hopefully come from his own hard work, rather than taking one off Jack. I’m sure it will happen in the next game he plays.
“We need not revel in the downfall of public figures for our own amusement”
I wish every Richmond fan, and all at ‘the club’ could read that line. I wish that line could make a difference.
And the point about depression is so true. Having played the game – and my great team attribute was taking marks, and as such was very much a confidence players – I appreciate the emotional struggle when your form goes south. And these players are professional athletes – this is their uncertain livelihood – under a very public glare. That emotional turmoil must be magnified so many times. Yes, it’s a risk and reward profession, and they ostensibly ‘choose’ to be footballers, etc, but the anonymous belittling on social media does nothing to help anyone’s cause. And I’d reckon the prevalence of depression – undiagnosed or not – is pretty high in league footballers. Young men. Away from home support structures. A high pressure job. Public scrutiny. etc, etc.
And yes, Bachar is the best. he is such a godsend to the RFC. From the dark days when Dimma first took over, he’s been the most consistent shining light.
Long live Bachar!
I was just musing about the ‘2nd team’ thing you mentioned up top here. I am a sucker for 2nd teams, actually very fond at different times of all the Melbourne teams bar Hawthorn. Even Carlton, I admired that 95 team so much.
But – I would love to be so successful that people from other clubs are dropping off us for a different reason – because we bruised and battered and annihilated their precious Cats or Bulldogs or whoever. I am sick of being people’s cheeky 2nd team.
We have stuck it to top sides regularly of late. We need to do the same *every game*. We need to put away a Carlton in the first half, Collingwood maybe in the 3rd quarter. At the last break, its over. There is a feedback loop where you crush a few sides and it quickly becomes received wisdom that once you are down a few goals to Richmond, there is no coming back, its time for self-preservation.
Instead we are creeping back into the reverse, where Richmond will be synonymous again with fragile minds, with giving up leads and losing in the most unimaginable circumstances. We achieved so much in the last 3 seasons, it is heartbreaking to think that that progress might have been an illusion.
As a long-suffering Richmond fan only one of my three kids is keen. Until Friday night. “I’m officially a Gold Coast fan,” she said after yet another disappointment. Let’s hope we turn the corner so she forgets about that awful four minutes and stays in the fold.
TIGERS PLAN:
I did so much over the weekend in hope of Drowning my Tiger Sorrows, but it was there looming in the background like an ugly black cloud!:( Still cant believe it! Not even the CATS, DEES, & FREO shock losses doesnt help.
The magic 3.
Usually its 3 strikes youre out!
3 years no Lids = no Wins, 3 poor season-starts, and 3 finals losses. Its time!
So here’s my simplified “KISS” 3 POINT PLAN:
1) Kick >100p (fwd50 achilles)
2) Learn to Win w/o Lids!
3) Smash sides > Top4 % !
1) 100P:
Our FWD50 has been our achilles heal. We now have quite a few who can stepup & kick those few “extra” goals to kick over 100p (as top4 sides do) so lets do it (weekly).
Aside from the obvious Jack, Ty, Lids & Dusty, we have Sheds, Lambo & Lloyd just to name a few. Short showed great signs too & soon Rioli. But we’re not yet clean enough in our fwd50.
2) LIDS:
We have to learn to win without Lids! 4/14 isnt enough. Lift the Lids voodoo!
(Like we got out of jail vs Carlton).
Id love to know WHY Lids has injury issues during each pre-season?
A major factor to our poor starts hence no top4.
We shouldnt be Lids dependant but its a fact.
So why isnt he better prepared during the 6mth preseason?? 3 years in a row is too much so the Q has to be asked.
3) SMASH:
For 3 years we hear ‘it Hurts & we will Learn from it’, but we DONT WALK THE TALK.
So Id really love to know what Lessons were really Learned?
Has the hurt been swept under the carpet to prevent dwelling on it?
The “hurt” shouldve motivated us to SMASH clubs, raise our % to a top 4 level (which we havent been able to do for many years), win the winnable games for 16Wins (which we havent been able to do), & make the top4 to give us a crack at the GF!
We are much better, & definitely have strong Top4 POTENTIAL, but we’re still not as hungry to win as the Dogs or Hawks to make it a REALITY. But we can make this happen from any week we choose to! WE control our Destiny!
Our mental attitude has significantly improved but we still have a way to go to get us to where we want to be.
We lift vs top teams but drop & conserve ourselves in winnable games (hence a few shock losses & ave %). That wont get us to where we aim to be & where we belong, Top4 & GF!
As some who know me, I can be prone to extreme emotions. So watching my Tiges last friday, and last September, and the september before that, and etc etc, is like pouring petrol on a burning man. I feel like my soul has been raped by a pineapple. See, its extreme.
But, you can put a bridle on the extremes and wheel them around quick.
A couple of tigers will have played their last game, and rue stuff. One big, one small. We’ll beat the crows on 90’s style emotion and luck then well give West Coast a belting at our home away from home. Big Ivan will be thrown the keys to Punt Road, young Connor Menadue will have a stand on a grim Sunshine oval named after him in texta and the Tiges will be contenders once more.
Then some other extreme stuff will occur
Three generations of being anti Collingwood, 4 if you count my daughters. I drive around Collingwood not through it, I started reading the papers again once color pictures were added. I brought a Moe footy membership when I lived in Sale because Moe were Lions, Sale are Magpies. We lost to them by a point and I lost my weekend sulking, to be Mr six year old again……if I was 6 again we’d be heading for the 1972 grand final against Jezza and the blues……..at least it wasn’t Collingwood in 1972, more reasons I’d not like them……I don’t like them…..and I won’t ever. Thanks again Dugald, keep telling it like it is.
Kate and I will be there again on Saturday, ever optimistic of a win. Something after that loss has to have lit a fire in the team’s collective belly…. surely.
We were at the game with my Collingwood supporter son-in-law who was so angry about 10 minutes out from the final siren. [At half-time the whole crowd was frustrated with their respective team – an unusual mood really]. By then I was resigned to the result going either way. I commented to SIL that it wasn’t over yet. Yes Richmond was playing slightly better than Collingwood, but the skill level, decision-making, and so on was so second rate I felt that neither team deserved to win. A draw would have been the better result, mortal enemy or not. Even the Punt Road end was strangely subdued over the evening. I have never felt that way before. I commented on facebook that I was dismayed with the efforts of the team [except Bachar] and sat wondering what on earth they had been doing for three months during pre-season. Why does Richmond always start the season this way? I’m a passionate supporteras you know, but Friday night was excruciating awful to watch.
Dugald, you mentioned the Doggies. I believe Luke Beveridge has that special, passionate power some leaders have, a bit like Sir John Monash or Weary Dunlop, that causes his team to gather the momentum of the goal and strives to achieve it. Alistair Clarkson has it too. Tommy Hafey had it. It’s either there or not……..
Thanks Dugald and all the excellent commenters above. Last Friday night was one of the worst and we’ve had some shockers. Luckily I only watched it on television. To have been there and heard the Magpie throng celebrating would have been excruciating. My hat is off to all Tigers who endured this torment.
But tomorrow is another day. In the Wallace era we played the Crows, at Docklands if I’m not mistaken, after a run of terrible losses. The Crows were in good form but we pulled off the most unlikely win. I was listening to the radio in the kitchen, there were seconds left, Krakouer had the ball in the middle and chose, in the great tradition of that Wallace-coached side, to kick it fifty metres backwards.
But before disaster could unfold the siren went. I sobbed aloud. Had I actually been at the game I might have died of joy, who knows.
Anyway, hope we beat ’em tomorrow.
Brendan O’Reilly
G’day Dugald,
I posted the following on TTBB Tassie Tiger a few days ago…
Chris,
What follows is a rant/ramble through my thoughts on my experience as a Richmond supporter. It is being written ‘off the cuff’ so don’t expect a masterpiece…
Paul Roos (2 years ago): “That was the worst 47 seconds played in the history of Australian Rules football.’
SEN commentator (calling Friday’s last minute): ‘What the hell is going on?’
Gerard Whately (AFL 360 Monday night): ‘How do they do it? How do Richmond fans keep fronting up?’
Damian Hardwick (post-game): ‘That was unintelligent football’
William Crawford (age 8 – in his ninth year as a Richmond member) ‘Dad, I don’t want to follow Richmond any more. They are hopeless. Can I follow someone else?’
Me (watching Friday’s all-too-familiar Richmond self-implosion): ‘That’s f*&^%d. What bunch of useless c*%#s.’
My wife, Jill (having sternly admonished me for my comment): ‘Well, if they make you that angry, why bother?’
I genuinely don’t think I can go on. DECADES of incompetence, DECADES of ridicule, DECADES of new starts, DECADES of misery, DECADES of dud drafts, DECADES of irrelevance, DECADES of unwatchable football…
On Friday I used language that I most certainly wouldn’t normally use, especially with Jill in the room – don’t panic, William was rugged up in bed asleep so didn’t hear his dad use such foul language. I was so exasperated, so frustrated, so aggrieved that it it came out before I had a chance to self-edit. I realised at that moment that Richmond isn’t healthy for me. I was genuinely angry.
While I was preparing dinner later that weekend, I heard Jill cheering on the Bulldogs from the other end of the house – we have a small house – and amid all the whoops and claps and laughter I thought ‘I can’t remember the last time I did that watching Richmond’. Yes, there was the odd game where it looked like we were going okay but there was always, justifiably, the nagging doubt that any good performance would soon be nullified by a shambolic one, or seven. I came to the realisation that following Richmond is NO FUN.
So here’s what I’m doing for the rest of 2016:
1. I am not going to watch any Richmond games.
2. I am not going to listen to any Richmond games.
3. I am going to watch the Bulldogs with my wife Jill and enjoy the ride watching an exciting team in which I have no emotional investment.
4. I will continue to monitor Richmond but with only a fraction of the interest I have invested since the 1970s.
I could go on and on, as most Richmond people could/do, but really, one doesn’t have to say anything when a club dishes up the tripe Richmond has.
Nnnnhhhh….
Joe.