Almanac (Community) Footy – Reclink Community Cup 2024: Feel so free

 

 

Now listen
Oh we’re steppin out
I’m gonna turn around
Gonna turn around once and we’ll do the Eagle Rock
-Eagle Rock, Daddy Cool

 

Sunday, late morning in Brunswick East, within a week of the winter solstice. On Nicholson Street cars stop for the #96 tram as low tufts of cumulo nimbus race along on a south westerly.

A couple in their 50s step onto the tram. She finds them a seat while he distractedly follows – eyes and fingers all over his phone. As she sits and lightly pats the seat alongside, he stops his halting steps, throws an arm out sideways and says to her: “Do you believe this guy?”

Next to me a woman files away at her nails with an emery board.

Johnston Street, Fitzroy. Shopfronts on the south side bask in full winter sun. I’m onto the #207 bus and it is full. The bus driver of Latin American bearing nods at me behind his sunglasses and navy blue beanie. The ride is for everyone.

Down the hill, we’re onto the Collingwood Flat. It seems I’m now playing with a pre-verbal infant of African heritage. The look-towards, look-away game. His mum notices this and leans over to me: “His Dad doesn’t want him. How about that? He said to me ‘I don’t want you and I don’t want him in my life.’ Oh, he’s giving you a grape.” The boy offers me a grape.

==

Oh momma
Oh you’re rockin well
Hmm yeah you do it so well
Well we do it so well when we do the Eagle Rock
-Eagle Rock, Daddy Cool

Squinting into the sun, I walk along Lulie Street, Abbotsford, and line up for entry to Victoria Park. Today is Reclink Community Cup day – the annual charity footy game between the Triple R and PBS Megahertz and the Melbourne musicians’ Rockdogs. Reclink Australia is the charity. They provide sport and recreation programs to disadvantaged Australians to help with social inclusion, health and well-being through to education and employment.

“Get your Footy Record! Get your Footy Record! Your choice of donation! Get your Footy Record!”

It’s not quite midday and the atmosphere is building. A musical act aimed at kids – Whistle and Trick – performs on a stage. They sing about dinosaurs.

Members of both the Rockdogs and Megahertz teams warm up at the city end. And the day has Occasion stamped all over it. Among the players is someone in a bunny suit. And another in a full white jumpsuit. We have a sparkly red cowboy hat.

Two Labradors meet on the oval. They sniff and wag.

We also have fishnet stockings and odd socks.

A border collie leaps to intercept a bouncing footy. On Victoria Park she reads the bouncing ball like Peter Daicos and times her jump like Billy Picken. She meets the ball with her nose and whacks it so that it loops parabolically into the raised hands of her owner – unknowingly taking the role of Gordon Coventry.

The UV Race plays a set on the stage and this day is building.

==

A man approaches a small group alongside me.

“Have you spotted Jodie yet?”

“Nah, we haven’t spotted Jodie yet.”

“Should we send out an S.O.S.?”

“Nah. She lives on the other side of the city.”

“And,” says a woman in the group, “she’s a big girl.”

A young red-haired woman walks past wearing impossibly short shorts, a long-sleeved 1980s Footscray Football Club jumper, and her earrings are myki cards.

==

And now, Ross Wilson and the Peacenicks are introduced.
Ross Wilson himself is right there.
Daddy Cool, Come back again, Cool world, Come said the boy. I am uplifted.

“I wrote this one when I was still a teenager – or almost still a teenager – myself,” Ross Wilson says. “Now I’ve raised four teenagers of my own.”

He pauses to let that sink in. And then: “The oldest is now 53.”

And he starts into ‘Teenage Blues’.

Clouds thicken as the outstanding set ends with ‘Eagle Rock’.

 

 

==

Now momma
Yeah you’re rockin fine
Why don’t you give me a sign?
Hmm just give me a sign and we’ll do the Eagle Rock
-Eagle Rock, Daddy Cool

 

The ground looks very well attended as both teams run through banners and among cheer leaders and pom-poms onto the field.

I pick up a lamb souvlaki (chips and garlic sauce) and suddenly a game breaks out.

And it is wonderful community football.

Scrappy, clean, slow, fast – all in the first minute of play.

The Megahertz have the better of the quarter, kicking to the city end. Simon Sez Hughes and then Brett Ditchfield (I think) kick rapid goals from open play.

But this is a party.

QT
Rockdogs    0.0.0
Megahertz   2.0.12

 

==
I’m into the Ryder Stand for the second quarter, where the members of Collingwood used to watch from the wing, sat on wooden slatted bench seats – winter sun slanting through windows onto the backs of their heads.

Spencer Dyson of the Rockdogs kicks a goal within a minute of play resuming. All the scoring is at the city end.

It is an entertaining game, peppered with moments of footyskill and footynous. Every so often a flash of brilliance is revealed – a gather off the ground at pace, a blind turn. It is enough to keep the eyeballs attracted. Like the suburban golfer, who may hit three or four genuinely excellent shots per round. Those shots are enough to keep them returning.

Chris Gill of the Megahertz outbodies his opponent for a clever, strong mark. His attempted torpedo to the Yarra Falls end sprawls off the side of his boot and out of bounds.

HT
Rockdogs 1.2.8
Megahertz 2.0.12

 

==
Every person and their dog now play on the field at half time. Balls fly in every direction. It is a sea of footy.

Musical act Kaiit hit the stage for their half time set as rain tumbles from the sky. I have a real sense of organised chaos about this event – like living in a share house. Or even visiting a share house – you know there is always something going on – someone with a story – someone with the limelight – and you also know that there is so very much more going on beneath the surface.

This is a day of performers, performing.

As half time ends, I am prompted to wonder what is the collective noun for moustaches?

Players re-take the field – among them a Rockdog and a Megahert(z) who between them run around waving a Palestinian flag.

Third quarter, and it is dark. Thick cloud hangs overhead. I check the app to learn it is 11.8°C (feels like 7.9°C).

I can’t make out the player, but the Rockdogs – kicking to the Yarra Falls end – score a goal after nine minutes. Then Nick Clohesy of the Rockdogs marks directly in front and kicks truly, somehow triggering General Pandemonium. Huge squads of cheerleaders and interchange people run onto the field and effectively take over the centre square. Glittery pom poms everywhere. Then music kicks in – and everyone does the Rocky Horror Picture Show Timewarp.

All in the middle of the third quarter.

Perfect.

3QT
Rockdogs 3.2. 20
Meghahertz 2.1.13

 

==
Clouds thicken further as the high-tension last quarter inches along. And BOOM a flash of brilliance from the Megahertz at the 14 minute mark – a huge kick for goal – and we have a 1-point game.

Rockdogs bring it to the city end but their shot at goal is smothered. The ball rebounds through the centre.

It is anybody’s game.

The ball spills to the Yarra falls end where the Megahertz have numbers.

There is a shot at goal – the ball bounces, bounces through traffic, and runs between the big sticks.

But it has been touched.

Scores are level.

SIREN.

FT
Rockdogs  3.2.20
Megahertz  3.2.20

We have a tie. A draw.

==

I’m onto the field with most of the rest of the crowd – people and dogs – and this is a happy place to be.

Later, there will be a presentation. Musical act Teether & Kuya are on stage.

And Floodlights will play.

But I am off.

I feel lucky to have been here.

Well played Megahertz, well played Rockdogs.

The Community Cup is the winner.

 

==
Oh baby
Well I feel so free
Hmm what you do to me
What you do to me when we do the Eagle Rock.
-Eagle Rock, Daddy Cool