Thin white moon

by Haiku Bob     Fraser’s stoop the long curve of the thin white moon             crisp autumn night Pendlebury sticks his little gives             leafless trees Lockyer finds himself loose           rolling zone the crumb gatherer wheels right and bends [Read more]

Essendon fan gets the same old feeling

by Rod Oaten I guess it started some 15 years ago as a Da/Father/Son day but Da gave up about 5 years ago due to age, he is now over 92, and stays in his aged care facility in Northcote and listens on the radio. Family days at the footy have always been important to [Read more]

Don’t Cry For Me Argentina

By Josh Barnstable When the fixture comes out for the season, the team that is named first is the home team who will wear the home jumper and home shorts. Tonight it is North Melbourne vs. Collingwood. North Melbourne is the home team. They run out on the ground. White shorts, White socks. But worst [Read more]

Purposeful Pies Pummel Puerile Poultry Portrayers

  by Steve Fahey   josh (slang) n. good natured joke v.t. indulge in ridicule   The Pies continued their loss-win sequence (which now stands at L-W-L-W-L-W) with a comfortable win against very ordinary opposition.  Other than a ten minute burst from the Kangas in the second-half of the opening stanza, we controlled this match [Read more]

Pies Fans

by John Harms Whenever I sit in the vicinity of the Collingwood Cheer Squad, I am reminded of the Sermon on the Mount. I look at the array in black and white around me, and I see lives lived tough. “Blessed are the Collingwood fans,” I think to myself. Only I’m not sure what they [Read more]

Five Extraordinary Minutes

by Adrian Vitez While driving to the MCG this ANZAC Day, I was struck by a comment made by the ABC’s Gerard Whately on the radio. In the midst of debate about whether Essendon and Collingwood deserve ANZAC day to themselves, he made the salient observation that to have the honour of playing on such [Read more]

People, Places and Footy on ANZAC Day

by Andrew Starkie North Melbourne versus Richmond 7.20pm, Saturday, April 25, Etihad Stadium This is primarily a match report for the North versus Richmond game, however, I do want to share some observations from earlier on ANZAC Day. Earlier in the day… A small group gathered around the cenotaph for the dawn service at Reservoir [Read more]

Round 5 – The Middle Distance

by Haiku Bob       round 5 – the middle distance       Anzac Day defeat staring into the middle distance         cold snap the empty space where our ruckman used to be         swirling breeze Pendlebury splits the pack with a fake         [Read more]

More than a Kick on ANZAC Day

by Sean Gorman I began a conversation with my seven year old son two years ago. That conversation continued yesterday when he played in one of the little league games as part of the half time action at the MCG on ANZAC day. It was the way the conversation started when he was five that [Read more]

Floreat Pica Society Round 5 Debacle

by Mark O’Connell (with Timothy O’Leary’s Danny Roach Medal votes following) Preamble I like, so many thousands of others, left the MCG wondering how we lost and why we put ourselves through such misery time and time again. However, I have a painful duty to perform so I will to review the game as dispassionately [Read more]

Sydney Uni align with Collingwood — and stick with blue and gold colours

By Rod Gillett When the Collingwood Football Club first sat down with the Sydney University Australian National Football Club to talk about the proposal to field an under-eighteen team in the Sydney AFL competition the uni officials made it quite clear that the team’s colours would be blue and gold. This was not an issue [Read more]

Seventh heaven, my bootlace. Writing match reports is a terrible business

By Andrew Stafford A few days after the Brisbane v Collingwood clash at the Gabba, I received an email from a fellow Pies tragic. “You must have been in seventh heaven!” she gushed. Several other friends, not all of them Magpie fans, made similar comments. My job is a source of some envy. I am [Read more]

Round 4 haiku: reeling them in

distant thunder Rocca lugs his thighs to the square * * rain soaked shoes while they dry abusing the umps! * * half moon our defence also sliced in half * * between scudding clouds the moon and Pendlebury * * half-time cigarette a long sigh joins the leaden sky * * after heavy rain [Read more]

Andrew Gigacz’s Round 4 Stat. Declaration

St Kilda dominated the stupid stats in this round. In a tribute to 100-gamer Sam Fisher, the Saints went postal. Their goal sequence across the four quarters was 5, 3, 4, 5. And of course we all know that 5345 is the postcode of Fisher in South Australia. Not only that, Fisher just happens to [Read more]

Vintage Cheese: a tribute to Shane O’Bree.

First half:  Cheesed off. A strange thing happened between Collingwood and Brisbane in the nineties and the noughties—it was the AFL’s equivalent of Sliding Doors or Trading Places. While one group of players and staff became the victors (Leigh Matthews, Gubby Allan, Mal Michael), the others became the vanquished (Jarrod Molloy, Nathan Buckley). Another to [Read more]

Rotting Leaves by Haiku Bob – Round 3

40 point turnaround – in good times and bad we are gathered here balmy night Cox effortlessly runs too far haiku bobRob Scott (aka Haiku Bob) is a peripatetic haiku poet who calls Victoria Park home. He writes haiku in between teaching whisky and drinking English, or something like that.

Autumnal Bliss

Autumn is the real season of love in Melbourne. The revolting heat of an uncouth summer has been relaced by beautiful mid-twenties sunny warmth and cool nights; short sleeves and jeans weather. Easter Thursday (is there really such a thing?) was a perfect example of one of these Melbourne autumn days and like any good writer [Read more]

Cats’ Do Enough Against Wayward Pies by Anthony Jensen

CATS ASSERT SUPREMACY OVER MAGPIES Anthony Jensen 10 April 2009   GEELONG continued its unbeaten run in season 2009, ending up 27 point winners over near-certain finals contenders Collingwood at the MCG on a clear Thursday night in the opener to this Easter weekend of football. While Collingwood coach Mick Malthouse had hinted otherwise, there [Read more]

Holy Thursday and the Unholy Set Shot by Andrew Fithall

Mixed marriages can be problematic. Not religious mixes – football. Helen is a Geelong supporter and I am Collingwood. We have four children: two boys and two girls. A numerically well-balanced family. We would like our children to explore various religions and eventually make their own decisions about their beliefs. But football is too important [Read more]

Dees don’t deliver despite dominating early by Steve Healy

Before the game I checked up. Collingwood and Melbourne had played 221 times, 129 of those of those at the MCG. The Pies had taken the honours 138 times, the Dees 79, and there had been four draws. I wasn’t put off by this stat, I know that Melbourne play well against Collingwood. Collingwood are [Read more]