Grand Final – Geelong v Brisbane: I went to the Grand Final

 

 

 

 

Geelong v Brisbane

2:30pm, Saturday September 27th

MCG

 

 

I went to the grand final on Saturday. Hoping for a Cats victory. Not super confident but hoping. Like Gandalf hoped that Frodo could breach Mordor.

 

There is nothing quite like the walk through the gardens to the MCG. It is so Melbourne. There is a smell to it; the early perfume of Spring, the new paper smell of The Footy Record, the canned food whiff of the odd dog turd left nestled in the fallen leaves by a lazy bastard from the surrounding apartments, the hint of pre-game beers on the breath of passers-by, deep in conversation and analysis. Beer is liquid wisdom. Like Guiness is a liquid lunch. But the consumption of it has a tipping point. There are three phases:

 

1. the getting of wisdom
2. wisdom attained
3. idiocy takes over

 

Phase two is the sweet spot.

 

A few blokes are entrenched in phase three. They’re suggesting Brisbane will win by ten goals.

 

Yeah right.

 

We meet my old mate Butch. He’s a legend. He has tickets for us. And he’s a Lions supporter. But he got the tickets for us because that’s what good blokes do.

 

‘I’d wish the Cats good luck but I won’t’, he says. ‘Hope we trounce you.’ The grin breaks out. Pre-grand final jitters are everywhere. Even in a mate’s quip. Surrounding conversations are skittish and staccato. No long sentences. Just utterances.

 

‘Yep. Gun.’

 

‘Nup, No chance.’

 

‘Cats by twenty. Smith: Normie.’

 

These words run into us like rain on a windscreen as we surge through the crowd, aiming for Gate 6. People dodging and weaving like we are, speaking across several shoulders to a momentarily separated mate.

 

‘Nah. Dempsey will kick the first.’

 

‘Neale is sub for the Lions!’

 

‘What?’

 

‘Stay in this line. Shorter.’

 

‘Where’s Pete?’

 

Inside the MCG the building is heaving like a lung. Punters are ascending the various stairs to the upper levels. A few are heading back down. A nervous leak required. But the stands are filling and the banter from the masses merges into a mighty hum. The players are out having a kick. Not many miss their practice shots at goal. In the centre of the ground a stage has been erected. ‘Snoopy’ is going to play a few songs apparently. I’m hoping he brings Charlie Brown with him.

 

Then fireworks explode and a bloke in a white jump suits walks onto the arena and starts talking into a microphone, but I can’t hear what he’s saying because the music is too loud.

 

‘PUMP IT LIKE ITS HOT!'[sic] he roars into the microphone, then starts a slow hip gyration, like he needs to have a piss.

 

Pump what? I ask myself. When does the entertainment start?

 

Anyway, he keeps talking for a while and heaps of crackers go off and some dancers are swinging fake trumpets around, and then he walks off and everyone cheers. A bloke gets on the PA system and screams:

 

‘CanIhearabigmelbourneroarforthedogg!!!’

 

Or something like that. I’m baffled. The bloke next to me wearing a Lions guernsey (nice fella we’ve had a bit of a chat) screams out:

 

‘LIIIIOOONNNNNNSSSS’

 

Then he sits back and says:

 

‘You’ve gotta get into it’, almost apologetically.

 

The teams emerge from the darkness and enter the stadium. There’s delirium in the audience.

 

‘GEEEELLLOONNGGG’ scream some.

 

‘LIIIOONNSS’ scream others.

 

They run around a bit, the national anthem is belted out, then the umpire bounces the ball into the rubber nob, it takes flight and two rucks leap for it, fingers extended, almost in slow motion. At the tops of their leaps they look like a superb brass statue. Game on.

 

It was a game of two halves.

 

I wonder what Einstein would make of that concept.

 

The first half was the tough half. It was gritty and physical and the ball pinged around the ground, in and out of multiple player errors. Kicks missed targets. Mainly kicks from Geelong players. Though Bailey for Brisbane seemed to be aiming for the points.

 

The Cats hung in, but that’s all it was. They didn’t have that winner’s sheen. Except for Ollie Dempsey. He plays with imagination. Poor old Shannon Neale is still reading Dick and Dora. Harris Andrews is reading Shakespeare. He makes the game look so simple, and genius lives in simplicity.

 

Sometimes sport is cruel because it just decides to be. It was cruel to Max Holmes whose kicks kept hitting the instep and wobbling off the boot like an air-filled goon bag. It was cruel to Dangerfield who went from Samson in the preliminary final to Homer Simpson in the grand final. The game completely eluded him and whizzed past his outstretched hands like an express train. It was cruel to Jeremy Cameron and broke his arm. It was cruel to Conor O’Sullivan who wasn’t looking when Zac Guthrie kicked it to him. He fumbled then slipped then tossed the ball away like it was a live hand grenade. He wanted it to be anywhere but with him. The Lions kicked a goal. The crowd laughed at him and pointed in ridicule. He checked to see that he hadn’t left his fly down. And it was cruel to Rhys Stanley who ran wildly around the ground like a kid full of red cordial. But he couldn’t get near the ball.

 

At half time it was even. But it really wasn’t. The Cats had a stench. A few heads had dropped. Not even Bailey Smith would get them out of this one. And so, the beautiful second half started. Beautiful for the Brisbane Lions that is. A bloke called Lachie Neale came onto the ground. He was like a sober bloke arriving at a piss up. The pace of proceedings went up. He played at a heightened speed and tenacity. The Cats brittle grip on the flag gave way, cracked open by a Neale goal on the run from over fifty out. I went flat in the stands. Max Holmes’ goon bag went flat too. The universe warped. The Lions were suddenly playing in a different space-time continuum and their goals piled up. Each one a dagger in a Geelong heart.

 

Deflated and dejected we exited the ground. I shook hands with the Lions supporter next to me.

 

‘Good on ya mate.’ He said as we got up.

 

‘Enjoy.’

 

‘I will!’ he replied.

 

As we headed up through the gardens to the tram stop, I stepped on a fresh dog turd nestled amongst the leaves. It left a foul stench. I didn’t wipe it off.

 

 

 

GEELONG       2.3     5.6     6.8     11.9 (75)
BRISBANE      1.6     5.6     9.9     18.14 (122)

 

GOALS
Geelong: Dempsey 4, Blicavs, Bowes, Close, Holmes, Mannagh, Mullin, Neale
Brisbane: Cameron, McCluggage 4, Bailey 3, Lohmann 2, L.Ashcroft, W.Ashcroft, Morris, Neale, Rayner

 

BEST
Geelong: Dempsey, Holmes, Humphries, Atkins, Smith
Brisbane: McCluggage, W. Ashcroft, Andrews, Bailey, Cameron, Gardiner

 

Crowd: 100,022

 

 

 

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