Road Trip Rage

Thanks to our guest reporter, and intrepid football tourist Tom M for his report from live on the ground in Sydney

Round 5 vs Sydney ‘our supporters are mute fuckwits’ Swans.

The “I’m officially on suicide watch, where is my portable noose? Maintain the rage” cup.

Lesson 1: Don’t book tickets for an away trip before the season has actually started. It was a stupid idea and a complete waste of money.

When our flight was delayed an hour (Virgin Blue, fuck you) our tendencies towards extreme negativity (Melbourne supporters) kicked in. It was decided that we should launch a pre emptive strike on the pending disappointment that the trip promised and begin a two day bender leading up to the game. Blind drunk in a nameless, shameless Bondi pub we stumbled across none other than a Febey brother (note: take a sherrin with you wherever u go, that way you can have a kick with Febes and find out whether it is Matt or Steve. He was drinking with his right, but what does that really tell us?). Febes (as he was known for the whole night) was in town for a golf trip, oblivious to the fact that his beloved Dees were in town to get fucked on by the Swans. As if this news wasn’t bad enough, Febes gave us nothing when we suggested that we should ‘talk Demons’. When we laid down the law and some idiot mentioned Darren Kowal and Steven Tingay in the same sentence Febes blew up. Thus ends lesson one: be wary of your idols, for they may be chain smoking piss heads, just like yourself.

Lesson 2: an 18th century scientist hypothesised that optimism and idiocracy run parallel and directly correspond. Hence a highly optimistic person is extremely mentally ill, and should be assigned to a padded cell down at Junction Oval.

Tired, bitter, homeless, disillusioned, angry and ashamed: our dreams ruined by the Febes episode last night (never to be spoken of again), we found ourselves in a state of blissful optimism. What the fuck??? This could be our weekend. Donning the dees number 16, (I bought some black tape and turned the 16 to a 15 after the game: go ricky, fuck off trav) there was a tangible feeling of solidarity as we strutted the hostile streets of the enemy. The captain Cook hotel was the nominated demons safehouse, and many a steely dees supporter snacked nervously on an $8 dollar steak, cautious that we could be eating our last, poisoned meal before following our boys into the abyss. The gaggle of good natured fucked in the head moron Sydney fans eating the same steak made us all the more wary. Did they poison half the cow????

Lesson 3: No matter how close your back is to the wall, a smart enemy can still drill through it and fuck you in the arse.

Scouring the causeway of the SCG we spotted an ally in the distance, who was midway through an unprovoked, unnecessary verbal spray aimed at some fuckwit wearing an Adelaide jumper to the match. Our recruiting sensors kicked in, and we adopted this mateless demons supporter (who lived in Brisbane, on the run from something no doubt) to our cause. His first pre game comment was: “It stinks of going to jail tonight”. And it did, as a diatribe of mindless, senseless, hilarious vitriol was launched in the direction of anyone stupid enough to listen. Some pricks listening were the crowd security, who issued the first of many warnings regarding bad language, manners, behaviour, body odour etc. We were in the family section, and so asked the location of the non family section where we could use such language in its appropriate context. The wanker looked perplexed and walked away to find his supervisor. The first mental battle had been won by the Demons, in convincing fashion. Unfortunately, the physical battle on the field, significantly more important, was being won by the Swans. And so the game went.

Lesson 4: The Simon Godfrey Law: Effort is temporary, shitness is forever.

Now I am not a Daniher hater. But Neale’s match ups in the Sydney forward line to start the game illustrated 2 points: one, we were fucked, two, Daniher is fucked. Miller on Hall (he played one good game on him and has been a shit defender in all other attempts to play there). You can lead a Queenslander to the ball, but you can’t make him punch. Godfrey on Goodes (perhaps no other options there, thank god Goodes was injured most of the match). Carroll on O’Loughlin. Rivers on O’Keefe, and the mighty Paul Johnson on Everitt. When Hall went nuts on Miller, Daniher made the changes to positions he should have begun with. Miller moved forward, where the wet footy gave him an excuse for dropping marks. Rivers moved to O’Loughlin and thrashed him. Carroll moved to Hall and held his ground admirably. Johnson stayed on Everitt and they cancelled each other out with shitness. After the initial fuck up, the defence performed well. But my issue with Daniher is not his coaching so much as his selection. Where the fuck, Neale, is Bizzell??????? Three years ago, in a season much like this, he was our only shining light. Floating across defence, diving into packs, clearing, tagging, hassling, running. He was our best player at ours (and yours Neale) lowest ebb. Two years of cruel injuries later, when he is ready to resume his stilted carrer, he must wait in line behind: Ricky Petterd and Col Garland (0 games between them), Paul Johnson and Simon Godfrey (0 brain between them) and other hacks that litter our team. Does Neale have any respect for skill. And if he doesn’t, doesn’t he realise that with more good nicknames like ‘the biz’ our membership would rise significantly? Well Clint gave up a promising modelling and acting career in Hollywood to play at Sandy, and it’s a fuckin shame. And when Neale Daniher cops the arse at the end of the season, this small little fact will stop me from feeling sorry for him.

The Dees put up a good fight. But the match had a sense of inevitability about it. Rivers dominated O’Loughlin and he regularly dropped into the space in front of Hall to help out Carroll. Seeing Jared run stupidly into instant death contests warms the heart. Incidentally, our watching companion revealed that Barry Hall’s mum drives a taxi…at night. We thought it was a silly, irrelevant fact, but turned to see the shapely, heavily aged Craig Hutchison scribbling in his notebook. Those journos… Ricky Petterd gets the Brent Heaver medal for debut of the season. He had 20 touches, most of them good (take note Nathan brown, quality not quantity) and kicked a nice last quarter goal. Davey kicked 3 and how great it is to see his confidence back. After watching Alwyn on Anzac day I’m sure the Dees recruiters are targeting brother Theodore in next years draft. Can’t the cheap pricks at AFL house introduce a brother brother rule???? Miller was excellent after being dragged off Hall. His confidence was no doubt low when he went forward but he presented and contested all night. Worked tirelessly, provided an option and smashed Leo Barry in the last quarter. Moloney and Bruce were good also. White is down on confidence but will come back and Travis Johnstone was just atrocious. Is he the definition of receiver? Were he a racehorse he would be in a truck on his way to the glue factory. Either he is seriously injured or just seriously shit. We need him back in form for when Time to Brock returns and we lead a charge to the finals from 0 and 8.

VOTES
5 Rivers
4 Petterd (anointed thus: NNNBT)
3 Davey
2 Miller
1 McDonald

Honourable mentions: Bruce, Moloney, Carroll, Bell
Brent Heaver award for debut of the year: The Rickster Petterd
Kent Kingsley award for Melbourne specialist: Teddy Richards. Negotiate your new contract NOW.

Crowd Watch: What the fuck??? Have you ever lost a game and had an opposition supporter say bad luck and smile and just want to smash their face so they never smile again??? Have you ever gone wild over a disgraceful free kick and had an opposition supporter turn and nod in agreement? This is what Sydney supporters do. And they don’t cheer. And they don’t even do a “ball……….yeah.” In Melbourne there is 10 a quarter. Here they don’t even bother. Maybe they don’t want to bias the umpires’ decision. Well we fuckin do. And we told them so in no uncertain terms. Sydney supporters are friendly, objective, harmless and fuckin annoying. It’s a cunt of a place. On the other hand the Dees fans were solid, louder than the Swans dorks who outnumbered us 24 to 1. Swans fans only started cheering when they were 8 goals up with 5 minutes to go.

Ripping the soul out of Football:
Families don’t win flags. The SCG groundstaff can go and get fucked. We stood in front of a pylon missing 30% of the action, we waited for 15 minutes for a beer. We will support. We will heckle, we will offend, we will jibe, irritate, abuse, complain, piss and moan. And we will swear. And we will not be silenced. Or we will go to Sandy and watch the Biz. Go the mighty Dees.

2006 Allen Jakovich Medal Leaderboard

12 - McDonald
11 - Bruce
8 - Green
8 - Miller
5 - Neitz
5 - Yze
5 - Rivers (Leader: Marcus Seecamp Medal for Defender of the Year)
4 - Jones
4 - Petterd (Leader: Jeff Hilton Medal for Rookie of the Year)
3 - Davey
2 - Moloney
2 - Dunn
1 - Pickett
1 - Bate
1 - Jones