Almanac Soccer: The Big Dance Looms and the Les Shorrock Award

Wrapping up the Victorian National Premier League season this year, the last entry made a month or so ago was a two-horse race between Oakleigh and South Melbourne to the Premier’s Plate. In the midst of it all, South were able to clench the title with one game to go as they have crucially defeated Oakleigh 1-0 to ease the pressure, allowing an unsurprising loss to their historically bogey team, Port Melbourne, not to deter their quest to win the league by defeating a stubborn Dandenong City the following week.

I took a detour along the way where I was fortunate enough to attend my very first Dockerty Cup Final between Bentleigh Greens and Oakleigh, capturing the shots of the Greens making a late 2-goal comeback to snatch the title from Oakleigh in what was a rough, cagey affair throughout.

 

 

The Greens took this momentum to put the A-League club Sydney FC to the test in the Round 16 Australia Cup tie the following week to a 2-1 defeat in front a crowd that was packed to the rafters at their home venue. They played so well that you would have thought that both Bentleigh Greens and Sydney were in the same league as the former played a more threatening and aggressive game plan and were just unlucky to concede those two goals. Although Bentleigh have won the Cup, made the finals play-off and the Round 16 of the Cup on the backend of an injury-stricken roster, their manager was controversially let go which caught the whole Victorian community by surprise.

Oakleigh booked their spot in the Grand Final after beating Port Melbourne 2-1 in extra time and South Melbourne edged a 1-0 victory over Green Gully. However, it was disheartening and shocking to see Ben Djiba sustain a broken fibula as a Gully man dived straight into his legs, with the full extent of his bodyweight crushing his leg in a careless and cynical challenge just centimetres from where I stood with my camera. The scream of agony was surreal and uncomfortable to witness and, to add insult to injury, the referee did not penalise the player for a red or yellow card, he did not even call for a simple free kick. The only card given was to the South Melbourne’s manager after he sprinted to the scene and laid a verbal attack on the official and the Gully team that completely shocked the players and fans.

Other than that, with South progressing to the big dance, this will go down as a rematch of the 2016 Grand Final between South and the Cannons. On that fateful night South came out victorious (3-2) in front of a sold-out crowd at Lakeside stadium. Unfortunately, this tie will not be played at South home venue again as the governing body opted for a neutral venue.

 

 

I am not qualified to share an opinion on the matter but it is noted that eyebrows were raised and there was a social media uproar when Football Victoria announced the Grand Final is to be played at a venue in Caroline Springs that only provides 200 seats and minimal shelter. Understandably it provides a crowd managing crisis if such a final can attract of up to 4,000+ fans. Only time will tell (albeit in less than a week) if circumstances will change or the venue is locked in for good heading into this weekend. UPDATE: Thankfully it has been changed to Heidelberg’s Olympic Village on Sunday night.

Aside from what’s happening on the field, I’m glad to share the news that I have won the 2022 Les Shorrock award at Football Victoria’s gold medal night on the 5^th of September. The award is given to the best photo taken at a match throughout the season with entrants from across all Leagues that Football Victoria organises from NPL 1 all the way to State League 5. There were only six spots to fill in the final hurdle and two of my photos were nominated.

The winning photo is the picture that captures Katherine Goff consoling Akeisha Sandhu (South Melbourne) after winning their semi-final bout with Heidelberg United in the Nike FC Cup Semi-final, coming from 2-0 down to win it 3-2 against the hot favourites and title contenders.

A brief moment of being somebody does feel surreal before falling back to irrelevancy and quietly doing my own thing. But I’m thankful for the recognition, which was a surprise as I have looked upon the work of Jack Dilks, Matt Johnson and Rachael (By The White Line) as far superior to my output of football photography. But I guess I was at the right place, at the right time to invoke an emotional response and let a picture literally tell a thousand words.

As the NPL season finally comes to a close this weekend, I sit here at my desk just thinking… What the fuck am I going to do until March?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

To view Luke’s photography, click HERE.

 

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