by “Rocket” Rod Gillet The Sydney Swans defeated last year’s AFL runner-up St Kilda in a NAB Challenge match at the BCU Stadium in Coffs Harbour by 31 points last Saturday night. Almost 5000 attended the fixture on a unseasonably cool night on the north coast of NSW. One of those in attendance was my [Read more]
Search Results for: AFL twenty years
Real footy: kicking game
March 8, 2011 by 9 Comments
Kicking Game. Real Footy. I met Christiano at his home after work. He was covered in dust and stank of sweat. Another day like every other in twenty years on the demolition crew. He hit Billy and hit it and hit it and hit it and hit it and okay, he was ready to leave [Read more]
GIGSTUFF #47 – No News, Just Sport and Weather
January 24, 2011 by 3 Comments
by Andrew Gigacz 24th January 2011 Z FACTOR UPDATE In last week’s GigStuff, mention was made of Feliciano Lopez and Guillermo Garcia-Lopez holding the hopes of the “Z” drought being broken. The only letter not included in the surname of past Australian Open winners is Z. The Spaniards have fallen by the wayside but unseeded [Read more]
Australian Football Versus Tackleball and Stoppageball
November 15, 2010 by 12 Comments
THE ‘GREAT GAME’ OF 2009–10 This is a story of the state of Australian Football — with implications for the character of other invasion/?eld games in the commercial, professional, corporate era of sport — in three parts. This more speci?c study is set in an era of the corruption of contemporary sports (from corporate club [Read more]
The Albatross Rules- Chapter 28
October 7, 2010 by Leave a Comment
28. Preliminary Final, Albertville v Nambool (at Hellenswood): Jimmy’s Gone A Fishin’ On the Monday afternoon following the semi-final win the people of Albertville, past and present, came together to celebrate the life of ‘The Tiger’, Jimmy Hyde. Among them were most of the players from the club’s golden era. During the seventies, with Tiger, [Read more]
Floreat Pica Report- Premiership Edition
October 7, 2010 by 2 Comments
PART ONE – Game 1: “Weird” is definitely the word from last week – thanks Steve, perfectly worded yet again. For me it was doubly so – as I’ll explain! For any of you who subscribed to the Hot Pies Fanzine from 1999 – 2004, you may recall a “page filler” on page 26 of [Read more]
That which I most feared has come to pass.
September 27, 2010 by 4 Comments
By Stephanie Holt For 43 years I’ve had one dream – or, at least, one that’s endured unchanged. A St Kilda premiership. And for almost as long, I’ve had one dread. Meeting Collingwood in a Grand Final. There are two ways to rewrite the script of ’66, and only one bears contemplating. It doesn’t help [Read more]
NOT IN A LEAGUE OF THEIR OWN
September 17, 2010 by 5 Comments
”The fact is rugby league lives and breathes in western Sydney – we’re part of the community, we have been there for a century … ” (my emphasis) (David Gallop, NRL CEO, Sydney Morning Herald, 9 September, 2010) The NRL is paranoid about the AFL’s expansion into western Sydney. And they’ve got good reason to [Read more]
Geoff Sinclair’s Home and Away Games: The Finale, Rd 22
August 30, 2010 by 2 Comments
Round 22 Western Bulldogs versus Essendon Saturday, August 28th., Etihad Stadium We’re out of coffee beans. I’ve scrounged and found a bottle of gold-label instant, carefully avoiding a confrontation with the ‘best-by’ date. And because I have gifted the remaining few jars of cumquat jam to the deserving poor, we’re into Cottees’ marmalade. As a [Read more]
Victorian Women’s Lacrosse
August 20, 2010 by 3 Comments
Lacrosse is a very small sport in Australia. There are two forms – men’s and women’s – and the rules are quite different, with the men’s game being much more physical. My exposure to the sport has been limited to the women’s game, through my children’s participation, so this article is confined to that form [Read more]
Floreat Pica Report- Rd 18 Collingwood V Carlton
August 1, 2010 by 7 Comments
irresistible a too strong, convincing, delightful etc. to be resisted One of my favourite match reports in the 2009 Footy Almanac came from a North supporter called Andrew Starkie. Andrew’s report started : “I hate Carlton; despise them. My loathing is limitless, my contempt physical. It causes my forehead to burn and a deep pain [Read more]
THE PRE WRAP – ROUND XVII
July 22, 2010 by 6 Comments
FOR THE PHILOSOPHICAL MARNGROOK FAN What a week it’s been in Footy Eddie. The invertebrates at the Star Chamber are in the news again. Tigerland midfielder Cotchin gets four weeks for doing what Bomberland’s David Hille did three times for three reprieves earlier in the season. In the same round, Carlton’s Andrew Walker laid a [Read more]
That Blasted Holy Grail still in sight
July 1, 2010 by 15 Comments
When Mark Seymour scripted Holy Grail back in 1992 – just as the Cats lost the second of their four grand finals in that era (ooh, early knife there), I doubt whether he and his merry minstrels envisaged their royalty cheques skewing significantly every September over a decade later. Thanks to Channel Ten’s incessant dead-horse [Read more]
The Perry Meka Roadshow
June 29, 2010 by 7 Comments
By Paul Branagan I was obviously out of my inner-suburban comfort zone when I buggered up the take-a-number system at the Nagambie bakery. It was 11.30am and I was on my way to the Shepparton United / Shepparton Swans clash at Princess Park by the Goulburn River. Innocently I picked up what I thought was [Read more]
Cats Machine Rusty on a Wet Night
June 29, 2010 by 11 Comments
The rain poured, making a mess of my blazer in minutes. The train was delayed, so consequentially it was packed. I had to run in school shoes for fifty metres to get out of the freezing June rain. And I did it all with a smile. School was over. The Friday afternoon rain just made [Read more]
Ken Piesse: Favourites sons of the GOULBURN VALLEY
June 23, 2010 by 11 Comments
KEN PIESSE: FAVOURITE SONS FROM THE GOULBURN VALLEY Years ago I was interviewing an old Australian cricketer, one-Test wonder George Thoms, when he stopped in mid-sentence and said: ‘Ken… you’re a good listener.’ ‘George,’ I said, ‘I just love hearing all your stories.’ Footy or cricket, I have been a sucker for a good yarn [Read more]
THREE SOUTH PREMIERSHIP TEAM MEMBERS RETURN TO QEO
June 21, 2010 by 2 Comments
TWENTY years on, South Bendigo’s three premiership-winning teams from 1990 will celebrate their QEO successes on Saturday, June 26th. The Peter Bradbury-coached seniors downed Golden Square by 22 points in a classic grand final, Brendan Francis’ reserves accounted for Eaglehawk by 27 points, while in the under-18s the Brian Teasdale-mentored Bloods beat the Square by [Read more]
Geoff Sinclair’s Home and Away Games- Rd 13
June 20, 2010 by Leave a Comment
ROUND 13 Hawthorn versus Essendon Friday, June 18th., M.C.G I honour my promise to drink wine with Elaine Sidebottom when the Richmond Tigers next win. It happens very quickly, and emphatically. In Round 12, they flog the West Coast Evil and “her boy”, the new Royce Hart, Jack Riewoldt, bags a cool 10 goals. I [Read more]
Gigs’ Stats Round 12: Last gasp goal for “drawn again” Magpies
June 15, 2010 by 3 Comments
Stats Entertainment – Round 12 by Andrew Gigacz THE WRONG CONCLUSION TO DRAW What is it with these young modern folk? Lamenting a draw like this week’s blockbuster between Melbourne and the Pies on the rare occasion that one occurs. Sure, it can be an empty feeling for the players and supporters. And yes, neither [Read more]
Geoff Sinclair’s Home and Away Games- Rd 8
May 27, 2010 by Leave a Comment
ROUND EIGHT St. Kilda versus Essendon Sunday, May 16th., Etihad Stadium The Contest Scheduled to take place during the Twilight Hours It’s Sunday, Mother’s Day, bleak at seven o’clock in the morning. Not cold, but not exactly motherly warm either, and overcast as only Melbourne can be overcast. It’s a lounging-about, coffee and Sunday papers [Read more]
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