Round 21, 2004

 

 

Football and rugby union don’t usually have much in common but this week Geelong found they had more in common with the Wallabies than they could have ever imagined. The Cats fortunes this weekend mirrored those of the Wallabies in the Tri Nations decider over in Durban on the same day. The similarities between the two are startling: 

• Both teams had ventured westwards to a similar yet slightly backwards society known as SA; 

• Both SA societies are notorious for their polluted water supply and high murder rate; 

• Both SA societies have shameful histories of prejudice and bigotry (Apartheid and Kick-a-Vic) which resulted in their sporting isolation up to 1991; 

• Both SA societies with a unique ability to produce a hostile home crowd whipped into a feral frenzy by their local brands of dubious-quality beer. 

Both the Wallabies and Cats faced a team that they have no problem beating regularly at home but which afflicts them with a mysterious hoodoo whenever they play them away. And true to form, the Cats and Wallabies once again came up short against the respective Prides of SA.

 

Geelong have once again added to their abysmal interstate record. Of their 7 losses this year, 5 have been interstate. They have now won a grand total of 2 out of 18 games at Moron Park in their history. They should forget about calling themselves the Cats and instead re-name themselves the Richard Butlers, such is their propensity to make fools of themselves whenever they are sent to do a job in another state.

 

The Fuscias, meanwhile, once again wilted, dropping their third in a row, and bringing back memories of the bad old days of 03, 01 and 99. It looks like Neitz and the boys need to start getting back to Clown Casino more often in order to rediscover what it’s like to approach a task with a bit of aggression and intensity.

 

The Shinboner spirit once again went missing as the Dogs embarrassed the Junkyard Dog, meaning the Roos will now finish the season as the damp squibs we all expected them to be. Realistically, the Roos were playing above themselves for most of the year. They managed to bluff their way through a month or two this season on the back of some admirable performances from Sav Rocca but, as his 13 year career attests, this was always going to be a tenuous foundation for success. As was always the case with Sav, it could never last.

 

The Hawthorn Football Club once again treated us to another weekly episode of the Frank Spencer show with two more pieces of comic genius in its search for a coach. This week Rodney Eade revealed that the Dawks were so slack that they did not get around to scheduling an interview with him until the day he accepted the offer from the Dogs. When asked by an incredulous media what the outcome of this interview was, an even more incredulous Eade simply said “well, it was cancelled”. But if that wasn’t enough, the gold medal for Olympian administrative excellence must surely go to Dunstall and Brereton’s latest excuse for not seeking out Mark Harvey. Their excuse for not even contacting him - that’s right, not even contacting him - was that they tried phoning him one evening but he wasn’t home and they didn’t want to call him at work during the day because they thought it would be “rude”. 

 

Hello? Rude? RUDE!!!???

 

Kevin Sheedy, like a proud but cash-strapped father showing off his lovely daughter in a mail-order bride catalogue, has proudly spruiked Harvey on the open market and literally invited every other club to consider him as a coach. Harvey himself was itching to be considered, yet Baldrick Brereton and Frank Spencer Dunstall thought it would be “rude” to contact him. Who exactly did they think might be offended by such “rudeness”? Certainly not Harvey. Certainly not Sheedy. And they certainly didn’t have any qualms about being “rude” when they tried to get Leigh Matthews to break his contract with the Lions – now THAT was rude.

 

Frank Spencer, looking oh-so stern and earnest reading from his oh-so serious prepared statement at an oh-so-serious press conference, claimed this week that in his search for a coach he had “an obligation to the Hawthorn Football Club to uncover the next Kevin Sheedy or Leigh Matthews, if they are out there.” Now Sheedy himself has promoted Harvey as being the next Sheedy, but Baldrick and Frank still ignored him. Back when Baldrick quit the Hawks as a player in 1993 he accused its then administration of “tearing the heart out of the club.” He can now rest peacefully knowing that he has now played a major role in the removal of the club’s brain.

 

Tragically for football, however, the Dawks are now threatening to upset the natural order of things by not winning the mahogany ladle. What a travesty this would be, for rarely has a club been so thoroughly deserving of the honour, both on and off the field. They are now level on four wins with Richmond but lead the Tiges on percentage by a mere 2 per cent.

 

That means it’s now up to Geelong to beat Hawthorn by a big enough margin that their percentage falls below Richmond and they end up taking possession of the ladle. But - and it’s a very big “but” - as Geelong’s history over the last 41 years shows, relying on them to do anything is always a big ask. No matter what is expected of them, they always find ways to let themselves down. This time, however, it’s different. This time they won’t be doing it for themselves, they’ll be doing it For The Good of The Game. Footballinvective.com would almost be prepared to forgive them the 8 grand final losses they’ve served up in our lifetime (4 day and 4 night, count ‘em) if they can do this service to society and put the Hawks in their rightful place by giving them a good whipping this Sunday. Before Shane Crawford gets too excited, we mean “whipping” in the metaphorical sense only.