Tasmanian trip artefact Wednesday - South’s Slow Start Spares Blue and White Blushes

This Friday marks five years since we ventured to Hobart to play South Hobart in the NPL national playoffs series. Though I linked to the article below from South Hobart blogger Richard Rants in my original piece on the game, it's nice to reproduce it here in its entirety so that it doesn't get lost to posterity... also Richard is a preyy decent writer.

0

SEP

Connor Kass and his blueSouth’s Slow Start Spares Blue and White Blushes shins in the sunset.

South’s second National Premier Leagues adventure – this time against the mighty (sic) South Melbourne Hellas, Victorian Premier League’s champion – saw us come mighty close to a humungous upset, going down 1 – 0 after scaring the living fecal matter out of the sleek and highly fancied semi pros from across the big water. Some of these Hellas players, so I’m told, are paid thousands a game, and this mob are one of the best outside the A League. Real contenders to win the NPL. On this showing I’ve got to say: Really?

They brought a 150+ yapping, chanting, potty mouthed, whinging and beautifully passionate fans, and for 93 minutes or so, it felt like somebody cared. There was a gaggle of their fans yelling personal things about our players parentage from behind the fence the whole game, or it might’ve been the wonderfully passionate mister George Mamacas, I’m not sure. The great thing about having a yell for your team at the footy is it crosses the boundaries of the contemporary oh so polite, PC and correct social norms and allows one to exercise his inner boofhead. For many, their inner boofhead is buried so deep, was last seen so long ago, probably up the scrub where no-one could hear you scream – that they believe it simply doesn’t exist. They feel themselves far above those kinds of lowly proletarian forms of utterance. It’s therapy, it’s primal scream, it relieves the tensions, it shows you belong, and I would never think ill of a bloke for expressing himself as long as we keep it within boundaries – no violence, racism, sexism etc. The support of the fans rang about the foothills of Kunanyi and it was just wonderful. Loved the South Melbourners for coming over, for going nuts, for lifting off the roof – thanks guys!

With 18 year old Connor Kass as a makeshift right back thanks to the muscularly inconvenienced Jayden Hey failing his physical on the morning of the match, and Scott Lamont as Defensive Midfielder allowing Caleb to play further forward, South began with their imitation of a cute little fluffy bunny caught in the dozen 120,000 lumen spotlights of a massive Blue & White Albert Park Bogan Humvee. South Melbourne’s VPL legacy physicality, size and speed were too much for us early, and Connor had an almost vertical learning curve in the first 20, with his winger getting slipped in behind constantly, they also got behind us centrally far too easily, every corner we conceded almost ended in catastrophe, our defense let the ball bounce repeatedly in our box, and it was six minutes in from one such fluffbunny bit of defending that we left a bloke called Reed completely unmolested and watched as he performed “le bicycle kique” into the right side of our onion bag. He’ll go home and tell his dear old mum all about it, and maybe she’ll think he hasn’t wasted his life running about kicking a football after all.

The brave South Hobart Ultras Head Squawker Jono fronts the almost soporific South Hobart fans, whose idea of raising hell is probably dropping a scone and wincing at the splat. C’mon folks – loosen up ya tonsils, will yas?

So as they all trotted back to the halfway line, I had that sinking feeling, and started to think we were about to witness the much predicted mother of all shellackings. It didn’t get better quickly, Hellas still could’ve scored again, with dangerous balls flashing across our zone of uncertainty particularly from their left.  In fact our zone of uncertainty seemed to be growing. But the fighting spirit was about to make a comeback, and we began to show glimpses of composure, and began to get into more dangerous areas, albeit sporadically.  For some reason, the lads started to feel better about themselves – being a goal down and all and these blokes being Victoria’s finest and all – and suddenly we began to get a bit more on the front foot, got a bit more aggressive, started to play some combinations, and began to settle into the higher tempo of the game. We always do so much better when we defend from the front, and in numbers, and we soon became more recognisable as that team of ball pressers, nipping in and snapping into some tackles. Matty Le Wis, Scotty Lamont, El Fruit Salad – all got their toe in to good effect, Liam Scott looked composed and was his usual unflappable reliable self. Then in the 28th minute or so, we should’ve had a penalty. Braydos chased down some very ordinary work by the left back, nicked the ball, charged into the box, and the defender tried to get round his leg to get the ball from behind, but took out his legs, brought him down. It was a penalty. A big mistake by the referee. South Melbourne began to fray as our attacks began to be more regular and dangerous, they began to get fractious, their right back began to develop some kind of obsessive compulsive disorder, and collectively they left their foot in, went over the ball, pushed and shoved, all was waved blithely on by referee Brenton, then on about the 40th minute, the seemingly bonkers James Musa who’d been chirping like some kind of unhinged 6 foot canary went through two footed on Andy Brennan only about three quarters of an hour late, and most referees would’ve shown him a straight red. The Scottsman came in to Andy’s defence, and that was warranted and good sight to see.  It was a dangerous tackle, late, aimed at taking the player out, he should’ve gone. The players got more and more angry as nasty little ankle taps were let go by Brenton, and then just before the half ended Andy went for a wee bit of revenge, went in late and the handbags were out. This might’ve got worse, as Mister Kopra had lost the plot, and the longer the frustration grows and the spiteful behaviour is let go, the more likely someone was gonna get badly wrecked.

Half time was a welcome opportunity for everyone to take their medication and take a look in the mirror, perhaps. As the game wore on, and particularly in the second half, South Melbourne still threatened, and looked like they could score whenever they got forward, especially through the services of their big number 9 Milos “The Submarine” Lujic  who won the inaugural NPL Biggest Whinger and Obvious Diving Spiteful Bastard Award but we began to get on terms, and really started to stretch them. There is still plenty of room for improvement for our lads – the decision making falls apart at times, and poor options are tried when simple passes in the opposition’s box are missed because some of our lads develop tunnel vision when the opponents onion bag looms. Ken replaced the ankle knackered Matty Le Wis and threw on attackers, The Hammer put in a tidy and bothersome for the opposition shift, Darcy Hall came on later, and we huffed and puffed. Whatever the haters may scribble about Hellas being in second gear, they genuinely were panicking for much of the last half hour, and that’s a credit to our lads. Bren Bren had the golden chance after being put through, and I seem to recall 3 terrific opportunities he missed as he skied his effort. Mind you the opposition were guilty of that also, with a few glaring misses and some incredible goalkeeping from Kane Pierce.

As we continued to chase the game, we left a few holes at the back, and when Reed put The Submarine clean through with only KP to beat, our Kane not only took the Submarine out, but ran up into the change rooms, flushed his car keys down the dunny and sent a rude email to his aunty. A certain red and it was game over. Perhaps Brenton was evening things up, but arguably both teams should’ve been down to 10 men, and we should’ve had a penalty.

Kane had a cracker, made some terrific saves, and his coat hanger on Musa was worthy of the NRL. Houdini never made a greater escape than this guy today.

I spoke to a bloke from South Melbourne who goes to see ’em every week, and he thought they’d been complacent – had it won in their heads before they even got out there. He also reckoned that if we played in the VPL we’d be top four. Interesting.

He could’ve and perhaps should’ve but next time I bet he will. With consistency will come true greatness. He made some blokes in blue and white look dead silly, though they also had a hand in it.

Quite an amazing afternoon, arguably we were robbed, but Hellas could’ve won if they’d finished better, as they had more chances. We seem to never get the fabled home team advantage from referees, indeed, quite the opposite – I remember us going down 3-2 to Bentleigh Greens from a late penalty that never was from Kim Barker – the striker ran into our box, crossed the ball, kept going, tripped over Hugh Ludford’s leg and that was enough for Kim.

Our young players looked gutted post match, hopefully some more composure in the box will come with greater age & maturity and while it was sad we lost, these hard working talented lads did us and all of Tasmanian football proud.