AFL Round 11: Thank God for the Queen and her birthday

by Josh Barnstable I awake on a Monday at 10:30am. “Uh-oh, I’ve overslept”. I think to myself. Then comes the excitement you get when you realize you haven’t overslept, you’ve just enjoyed a good sleep in on a day off school. With that excitement, I bury my head into my pillow for a further 15 [Read more]

AFL Round 11: cloudburst by Haiku Bob

cloudburst       Queen’s Birthday the number one pick rubs shoulders with the best           this day looks no different yet eight unanswered goals           dark clouds and Presti shut out any light           cloudburst – goal sharks spill over themselves for [Read more]

AFL Round 11 (and gymnastics): Perfection 1 Gymnasts 0

  by Dips O’Donnell       I’m at the Sate Netball and Hockey Centre to watch the Victorian Gymnastics championships. It’s an impressive centre. Lots of steel girders, vast glass windows, and official looking desks with official looking people manning them.   I have a nervous daughter competing today. There are a few Olympians [Read more]

AFL Round 9: Hawks do enough

by Steve Healy This game was never going to be a blockbuster. But how can a game be a blockbuster when it is played in a Sunday twilight timeslot? I hopped on the train at an unfamiliar time in the afternoon for the second time in five weeks. Luckily, it wasn’t a Demons home game [Read more]

AFL Round 8: Melbourne v Bulldogs: Dees go close again

By Steve Healy It was clear from the start that the Dees would put up a fight against the Dogs, but a fight isn’t enough when you come out to win games in front of your home crowd. Matthew Bate kicked the opener for the Demons, which came as a surprise due to his recent [Read more]

General footy writing: May 17, 1859 and the codification of footy

by John Harms   The date, May 17, is of great significance to the Australian nation. Especially footy-lovers.   Not that too many of us know about it.   On May 17, 1859, at the Parade Hotel, on Wellington Parade, East Melbourne, four men from the committee of the fledgling Melbourne Football Club (and maybe [Read more]

AFL Round 7: Dees just the same at the Bentleigh Club

by Steve Healy There is always something to look forward to in footy. Whether it’s analysing the eight games in the coming round, or deciding what games you score or the release of the teams on Thursday at five. There is always something to look forward to. On this particular day, however, I was looking [Read more]

Oh yeah, and Ablett did his groin

By Steve Healy Nine seconds had lapsed in this game between the Dees and the Cats and it was already apparent that Geelong had the game on a string. I watched in disgust as Gary Ablett, the Brownlow favourite, stormed through the middle without a Demon in sight. He sprinted up to the fifty and [Read more]

Little devils fire up while Demons take another step

By Barry Levinson It’s only now, in my early thirties, that I’m beginning to think maybe one day I wouldn’t mind having kids. So far I can think of two good reasons. First, it would be handy having someone able to work out how to program the video recorder.  Second, and most important, it would [Read more]

Strange, tingly feeling leads to rare delight

By Barry Levinson From the moment Round 3 concluded with yet another Richmond loss, I began looking ahead to Round 4 with a strange, tingly feeling inside … the sort of strange, tingly feeling usually reserved for the build-up to a final. But I wasn’t imagining the sensation … as a Melbourne supporter, this was [Read more]

Tigers continue to wander around the desert in circles

By John Green It’s the game Richmond have to win. When supporters first perused the 2009 draw this clash with lowly Melbourne was pencilled in as a certainty. Humiliate those Bluebagger upstarts who were coming and we all knew it, fly the colours against the Cats and the Bulldogs in the following rounds, boost the [Read more]

Richmond clown removes his make-up

  By Christopher Riordan   How could we resist? It’s not often that you get the chance to witness cannibalism on the terraces but, if the papers are to be believed (I know this has just taken a credibility dive), that is what will happen if the “eat their young” Tiger fans witness a loss [Read more]

It’s a wonderful feeling to share a win with Demons fans

By Steve Healy This was the most important game of the round. Both teams had opened with three losses and not looked like winning. The best thing about the lead-up to this game was that the media were talking about how bad Richmond were. Terry Wallace was under extreme pressure after being talked down by [Read more]

Dees have a long way to go

When it’s Easter Sunday, your beloved Demons are playing interstate and you don’t have Foxtel, what do you do? Before I had answered that question, I reflected onto the game against Port Adelaide. Most people on Demonland didn’t think highly of our chances. After two unhealthy defeats, it was all up to whether we would [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]

Pies Cruise

by Tim O’Leary Thankful: adv, act of being grateful for playing Melbourne round 2 and getting the four points.   The Collingwood banner exclaimed: “Dedication and Passion: The will to win”. What a pity the Melbourne players read that simple message and took it on board for the first quarter. They played a neat brand [Read more]

Four Quarters of Psychosis by David Enticott

First Quarter. Transference, n. “Unconscious transferring of one’s hopes, desires, fears etc. from one person to another” (The Chambers Dictionary). Thomas has been looking forward to the game all week. At five years of age he is making his AFL debut. Like all good Enticotts he barracks for Collingwood. The morning starts with Auskick where [Read more]

Tell them Junior’s dreamin’

By Chris Riordan Like most footy fans, I tend to base judgements and opinions on an inconsistent range of often contradictory observations or even pig-headed bias. The gathering of evidence can come later! I’ve never embraced the DreamTeam concept. I vaguely recall once watching an awful quarter of Port possession and hearing someone behind me [Read more]

New season brings hope

The beginning of a new footy season is always eagerly anticipated, but after getting engaged over the summer and being consumed by wedding talk for a couple of months, I couldn’t wait for round one – even as a supporter of the reigning wooden spooners. Walking through the Fitzroy Gardens to the ‘G, my chances [Read more]

Go North, after a long drive south

by Josh Barnstable “Josh wake up”. That was Mum, coming in to wake me up at 7:30; 7:30 on a Sunday morning. I would have thrown something at her if I had not already been awake, already thinking about the day ahead. I got up, grabbed a yogurt from the fridge and settled down to [Read more]