Search Results for: matt zurbo

Imagination and Footy

    Kids books are funny things. Sometimes I write a few on days I get rained out in the bush. It’s all stories. Footy, playing it, is full of experiences, stories. So is going to a game to support. You want to write. Do. Live life and stories will follow. Sometimes, even, the inspiration [Read more]

A Corker Grand Final

How damn brilliant was Jetta taking on Rioli? Something for the ages.

It was like the fight everybody wanted. Everybody expected. As if the two of them had no say in it. As if it wasn’t just a piece of play, as if it wasn’t just a race. There was ownership involved.

Off Season Odyssey Part 6: Excaliball

Footyhead of the Cove… Devil’s Kitchen, Moonlight Head, Victoria. I hope all the Knackers have a corker of a season on and off the oval next year. Matt Zurbo.

Off Season Odyssey Part 4 – The “G”

  by Matt Zurbo   Jack’s in a band. He plays social footy, and fills in with a suburban team now and them. They call him The Butcher. More for the way he kicks than anything. “How was the Tassie west coast?” he asks. “Brilliant,” I say. “Lonely. There just aren’t any people down there. [Read more]

Leo

    by Matt Zurbo   I don’t know why I did this, or for who. Maybe me. Maybe just because. Because it was true, and I like stories. Leo somehow got a copy and my number. Hell, it was a while ago. For all I know I sent one to Sydney. I got home [Read more]

Atlas Shrugged

What do you say about a game like that?  Eagles brilliant for 70 minutes.  Legless for 40.  Gutsy for 10.  We’ll take the 4 points, but otherwise hard to say what it means for September prospects. The game came down to run and clearances.  The Eagles had it all until 10 minutes into the 3rd [Read more]

Football fact 1,000,000,072: Guy McKenna was tops!

by Matt Zurbo Not enough people give backmen their due. We get all wooden over anything with the name Ablett in it. Hell, if Dick Smith wants to keep us buying Aussie, he should brand Ablett soup! There have been songs written about Carey and Lockett. We all know how grouse Judd is! What a [Read more]

Suffering for your art

by Adam Gruer   I took the young fella to the footy on Sunday as part of my efforts to bring him into the Pies family.  Young Tom is almost five and this would be his third game of the season, following successful encounters with Port and West Coast.  When the FIXEDure came out I [Read more]

In the shadows

by Matt Zurbo Four anti-inflams, three pain killers and some good padding on the ribs and I run out in town for my 499th game. The oval is strange. Wide enough, but an outline of a thing. The ground either side of it is railway-yard-flat. There are no slopes, no trees, no back fences or [Read more]

The Most Beautiful Kicks

  by Matt Zurbo   The most beautiful kick I’ve ever seen on a football oval was a torpedo by Andrew Levi.   The third most beautiful kick I’ve seen was a goal in a VFA/VFL Grand Final by Ian Rickman. His Williamstown were 42 points down at the start of the last quarter, then, [Read more]

Winter in the West

Winter has made its annual guest appearance in Perth.  Water sporadically fell from the sky, and seasoned observers confirmed this as a rare phenomenon called ‘rain’.  While the east coast has been deluged in the past 6 months, over here the ducks learn to swim by correspondence class.   And so to Subiaco for a [Read more]

Where Loyalty Starts

  by Matt Zurbo What the hell is a GC? I tried explaining it to my nephew. He’s looking for a team to barrack for. Red and yellow are simple and bold. Good stuff. He’s young. A new life for a new club, I thought. But GC? “It’s a co-orperate emblem,” I said. “Hm, you [Read more]

Scratcher

by Matt Zurbo The oval of the Otway and Districts Footy and Netball Club was packed like I’ve never seen it for Scratcher’s 500th game. Every ex-player, all my old peers, kicking around the boundary, milling between the gums trees that surround the oval, gathering around the oil drum fires, drinking, cheering, being happy, having a [Read more]

Teammates

by Matt Zurbo I was dragged out of retirement early this year. All up I missed three gloriously injury-free games. The memory of them and my total playing absence, was sweet. But, before long I was back playing my 25th year of adult footy for the not so mighty Otway Districts Reserves. (Second last on [Read more]

Grand Final 2023 – Collingwood v Brisbane – Love, Hate, Advantages

Old Dog hits suburbia for his annual Australia-wide, roaming Grand Final pieces. And this game was a corker!

Almanac (Local) Footy: Fitzroy Thirds Fan Day – POSTPONED UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE

Some of the boys from old (new?) Fitzroy will be putting on a show for the fans at Ramsden Street Oval in Clifton Hill and would love to see you there!

Round 18 – Melbourne v Brisbane: Keystone Cops

Old Dog battled a laptop streaming like an old Keystone Cops movie to watch the Dees take on the Lions while playing Dad at the same time. It turned out to be quite a night!

Almanac Footy: Old Dog’s overseas footy adventures with the LA Dragons.

The Old Dog and family are on the road – overseas in fact. He managed to keep up his training and fitness regimes with all the sightseeing, and he even played a game of Aussie rules with the LA Dragons as he recounts.

Grand Final – Geelong v Sydney: Murder in the Centre

Old Dog has a footballer’s and football eye. He casts it over the Grand Final which he watched with his family and an old friend at The Millers Inn in Altona.

Takeaways from this footy season

Old Dog with some thoughts about footy, and life. Observations and suggestions. And a few musts. [With a couple of ripper photos – Ed]