 Fitzroy senior team singing the theme song after their victory of Prahran Saturday afternoon Photo: dowdenphotography.com
IS THERE a better place to be late on a Saturday afternoon, standing on the grass in front of the grandstand, after the final siren has sounded, among the throng of fans, which has parted to let the boys, your boys, trot proudly through?
Fitzroy has won at Brunswick Street for the first time since 1966. The Roys have beaten Prahran in D1 amateur footy. Backs are slapped and players beam with watermelon smiles as they tear the tape from thumbs and wave to friends and family and stop to cuddle the niece.
You can feel the affection in the sustained applause. From past players, grey-haired now, who once ran around on this ground themselves. From old Fitzroy fans. And from people like me, just six years in the area, but feeling it is home now.
Fans flank the players and many make their way into the dressing rooms. They feel they have no choice. Something in our drab selves has been ignited and we just have to get inside. People are spilling out the door when the first bars of the Fitzroy song rattle the grandstand.
At the lunch beforehand, president Craig Little explained that the club really was the old Fitzroy again, with the blessing of all concerned; that Fitzroy hoped to be the club of the community, as it once had been. The faithful believed him, and if you had any doubt what was in people's hearts you should have been there for Kevin Murray's speech.
He didn't say much. He didn't have to. It was the silence that was most powerful, that moment when a man is so connected to his world and the people in it that he cannot speak. The purest silence. Recognised by everyone in the room. Then old Bulldog composed himself, wriggled in his back brace, stood tall on his bandy legs and smiled the smile of a man returning home, his new false teeth as perfect as his football gums used to be, his Brownlow Medal pinned on his pocket. He continued.
"My two brothers and I played for the Fitzroy thirds, and I went on to play in the ones," he said. "I played for the claret and blue from 1955 to 1974. And my father and Uncle Phil played for Prahran. So this is quite a day for me.
"This club has always been about finding the fighting spirit. Which is all you can do. It has been about creating something that means something to all of us. And, look around and you can see that it does."
The Roys are strong in the first half and lead. They play open footy. But there is still plenty to do. In the rooms at half-time, coach Simon Taylor speaks quietly. "We're evolving," he says in a voice that has picked the best from Ross Lyon and Elliot Goblet. "But we can't negotiate. No negotiation. We can't choose."
Some players look up from their muesli bars and turn their heads in that way a puzzled pooch does. He's going to be interesting by round 17.
I watch the second half with Spud Dullard who played for Melbourne in the '70s. He lives around the corner. He has planted succulents in the front garden. They are doing very well. So is his son, Connor, who is picking up plenty of kicks.
He's got plenty of mates and the Roys are too good.
I am in the community room after the game. Stubbies are sold for $3. Players drift through the door. Carrying their footy bags. Showered (apart from that little bit of mud in their eye socket). Some starting to feel sore. A grazed elbow. A stop mark on the neck.
It's buzzing. People are introducing themselves to each other, discovering points of connection, telling stories. During the speeches, Isaac Hughson, who has kicked seven, is announced as Fitzroy's best. He is the grandson of Fred Hughson, captain-coach of the 1944 premiership side, and full-back in the team of the century.
With the formalities over, conversations resume. More beers. I reckon it's going to be a good year.
And I hear a six o'clock question I haven't heard for donkey's ages: "Does anyone know how Carlton went today?" |
