Hip Hip…it’s Hawthorn
Conditions were gloomy and from the outset we were outmanoeuvred and regularly caught out of position, exposing a poor and undermanned defence. We showed very little guile or power in attack, shooting with sub-par accuracy and displaying an absence of tactical ingenuity or resolve. A slaughter was on the cards and so it proved with scores heavily weighted to the smaller, faster and fitter unit. Heads bowed, we slunk from the arena of battle. Happily this description is not of Hawthorn’s performance against Port, but of the Dads’ performance against a crack unit of children in a birthday battle of laser skirmish earlier in the day. It being my birthday my two sons took over the itinerary and at a time when I should have been relaxing under the gentle kneading and calming ministrations of a (Thai) masseuse’s knowing palms, I was instead under siege in a mock war zone being trapped and zapped by a marauding horde of children. I just hoped that Port’s defence would prove to be as fractured and feeble as my own and that their attack would mirror my inept and inaccurate efforts.
When I was young the first things I’d check when the footy fixture was released was who the Hawks played first, when we played Collingwood and who we played on or nearest my birthday. For me it was particularly important that we win my birthday match. And matches held on my actual birthday came weighted with even greater significance. The first Hawthorn draw I ever saw was against North Melbourne on my 21st birthday in 1985. This week’s match against Port Adelaide therefore took on additional import for me as it was being played on the anniversary of the day I rode the bumps with a grin and emerged into the world.
When devising the AFL fixture the committee or computer that cobbles it together always throws up some odd combinations. Once the various set-in-stone games are programmed in – the ones that only ever involve Collingwood, Carlton, Essendon or Richmond, and, bizarrely enough on the Queen’s birthday weekend, Melbourne (spare a thought for Collingwood fans; they never get to plan long weekends away, as their team is always playing a stand alone match on the public holiday; even on New Year’s Eve 1999 they were scheduled to play a game) – the rest of the teams are thrown the remaining timeslot morsels.
And this weekend is a perfect example of the AFL’s scheduling bypass. With a long weekend and one extra day for footy courtesy of Her Majesty’s nominal birthday and our anachronistic system of government, the AFL slap a bye in place and we get less football over three days than we normally get over two. You’d think then that with only six matches to be played across three nights and three days that every match would be awarded a convenient prime or semi-prime timeslot. How then does the Port v Hawthorn game – the only match to be played on the Sunday – get scheduled at twilight? In the time/location matrix, it’s the equivalent of playing in Canberra on a Wednesday. ‘When can’t you make it?’ seemed to be the overriding consideration when scheduling this game, and then they scratch their heads over Port’s poor crowds.
Not that I was ever going to get there, but even for casual viewing it is hardly ideal. What would have been wrong with Sunday afternoon at say, 2.10 pm? In any case, I was taking in the match via the radio. With only one match on I at least had my choice of radio stations. I plumped for Triple M whose Adelaide’s crew includes Dale, or is it Mark, or someone Lewis anyway, Warren Tredrea (Tredders), Mark Ricciuto (Roo) and Rhett Biglands (Bigs), and possibly one or two others – there always seems to be a throng in the Triple M box. But they seemed amiable enough and fairly subdued by comparison to the raucous Melbourne team of Lyon, Spud, Brayshaw and the twenty or thirty others that seem to crowd into the box. Doubts about their credibility emerge, however, when one of them comments favourably on Hawthorn's white clash strip and how good it looks. Now such a top might pass as haute couture in Adelaide, but it’s hardly as stylish as the brown and gold verticals. And why are we wearing our clash strip against Port Adelaide? Which type of hallucinogen do you need to ingest to confuse brown and gold vertical stripes with a white and teal yolk over black?
Listening on the radio comes with all its usual problems of not quite knowing where the ball is – just when you think your team is surging forward, you find out they’re actually paddling it through for a rushed behind at the other end. The upside of this is that when you believe The Rough to be gathering possession on the half back line, you suddenly learn he’s snapping a spectacular goal from the pocket.
The other problem with radio is being unaware which way we’re kicking. I like to picture the action in my mind and I find it quite disconcerting if I can’t be certain which direction we’re heading (a problem I also experience in my fantasies about Jaimee Rogers). The commentary team threw about phrases like the ‘southern end’ or the ‘golf course end’, but this is only helpful if you know Adelaide or have been to the ground – something my Adelaide friends assure me I never want to do.
Which ever way we are going we get there quickly, largely through Sewell and Hale whose names are being called fairly regularly. We slam on seven first quarter goals, including a couple to Breust, one to Buddy, even one for Gunston, and a nice soccer goal from The Rough, heralding the beginning of Euro 2012. As the Hawks continue to win the clearances, Ricciuto wonders aloud at the wisdom of Primus’ decision to tag Clinton Young rather than Sam Mitchell. It does seem odd, and while Young is a good player, I don’t recall the prefix ‘matchwinner’ being applied to him too often, or at least not as often as it's bestowed on Mitchell.
The scoring slows in the second quarter as the evening dew sets in (that’s ‘dew’ as in small drops of atmospheric vapour, not Stuart Dew, portly premiership hero of both teams), which makes it less likely that Port will get back into the match. It also makes it less likely that we’ll beat the record margin of 165 points we set last time these sides met in Round 21 last year. Buddy tries for it anyway, providing the highlight of the term by dodging and weaving to squeeze past Carlile and slot one from 50. The other highlight of the quarter is Ricciuto revealing that Redden’s nickname is ‘Sex Panther’. I don’t know what you have to do to earn such a nickname, and it’s possible I wouldn’t even survive such encounters, but I’d be willing to give it a go.
By the time the match resumes for the second half, I have impromptu guests and my listening is necessarily sketchy. I can tell that we continue to draw away after another snap from The Rough and a couple more from Franklin. Brad Hill kicks a couple in the final quarter but I miss what becomes the talking point the match – Buddy’s report for a sling tackle. Who gets reported by an umpire nowadays? Well, only Buddy of course. Is it that everything he does is somehow magnified, or is it that umpires resent that fact that people come to watch him play the game rather than watch them officiate it? And their only retaliation is free kicks, 50s and reports. Having seen the tackle I can only assume it’s the latter. Far from rough conduct, GBH, attempted manslaughter or whatever outlandish charge they laid, Buddy practically nursed the Port player to the ground – if he’d had a pillow handy he would have slipped it under his head and then fed him some grapes. Anyway, crisis averted and justice scores its second big victory of the week, with Buddy cleared to play against the Lions in the same week Lindy Chamberlain is finally cleared of any involvement with Azaria's tragic death.
In the end it was a good win, despite allowing Port a few late consolation goals to cramp the margin. Any win in Adelaide is a good one for Hawthorn. And it certainly made for a good birthday present, although the Kindle pre-loaded with Martin Amis’ new novel was also a welcome gift and will provide much needed distraction when we head into the bye in a couple of weeks.
Buddy goal tally: 4 = total, 38
Buddy behind tally: 4 = total 44
No comments:
Post a Comment