On Sinisa Cohadzic

Like so many other aspects of South Melbourne history, most of us will never know the truth of what happened with Sinisa Cohadzic's apparent sacking, nor what led to his return within days of said sacking, and how it worked out that he would remain onboard for months afterward, even though everyone seemed to know he would be gone for good at some point this year. Only time will tell whether we got the best out of him, and whether he'll be able to continue his success at Avondale, and wherever he ends up after that; back in the day it didn't look good for Johnny A after he left us, and then it got very good for him. And even if Sinisa does go on to have success in his future coaching gigs, one will never be able to take away his supreme accomplishment of the Australia Cup win. I mean, restoring some of our pride and self-regard in 2025 was good enough for me, but the night of October 10, 2026 will be his as much as everyone else's. (and to think we didn't qualify for the cup in the conventional way through the Dockerty Cup, but rather via the Australian Championship, with an undefeated run and magnificent wins against other formerly great clubs, before we even got to the bit of coming from behind in every single game of the Australia Cup including two wins against A-League opposition). But back to the beginning, or at least after Cohadzic had left us after years spent as a technical director and coach of youth teams. Midway through the 2025 league season, luck finally deserted Esteban Quintas entirely, and we seemed to hire the only coach willing to take up the role in Quintas' place; not many South fans were thrilled with the appointment, as Cohadzic so obviously lacked the local big name and senior men's coaching pedigree. Thanks to Sinisa, as well as some of that luck returning (among other notable changes), we dug ourselves out of a deep hole and then went on a bizarre run where we not only won things, but at times even looked the part off the field, too. That first win in the cup against Bentleigh? The desperation of Lucas Inglese up top and reliance on Jack Pope's cameo against the Knights? Knocking out Avondale in the Dockerty Cup semi? And then the sweetest of all, stealing the Dockerty Cup from the Bergers because he allowed the team to dare. I was glad enough with survival, considering the way things could have gone, but to nab a couple of trophies playing a much more attacking style was a welcome bonus. By the end of the year, the slogan "Hellas is back!" rang out, and life was good, in the sense that it all worked out a lot better than it should have. By comparison, 2026 has made even less sense. We fielded as close to a fully pro-team as we have for 25 years, across two league competitions. At the same time we scarcely fielded a full-strength line-up in one of those comps for weeks at a time. Instead, in part due to deliberate misdirection but mostly down to the demands of the more lucrative competition, we often fielded sides made up largely of footballing children. Somehow, we won two of those games, while our our fully-pro first XI (give or take one or two players) lost to the best footballing children this state has to offer. Sometimes Sinisa coached those weakened sides, sometimes he did so for only a part of the game before needing to jet off, and sometimes he wasn't here at all. Who knows what the breaking point was that led to Sinisa's sacking. A lot of people will say it was the nepotism question, but who knows for sure? That's the thing with South Melbourne, though - they'll tell you that you should write a history of the club, while ignoring that the true history of the club is strictly off the record. Maybe we'll also find out one day why Nahuel Bonada left.

Influencers without influence, voices without an audience

Hearing is not listening. Listening is not comprehending. Comprehending is not understanding. Understanding is not agreeing. Agreeing should not necessarily be an end in its own right. Every time I've posted here, and half the time when I speak about anything, I know that there will be a circuit-breaker at some point of the hearing to understanding chain. The sooner one comes to terms with that, especially as a content creator, the better, as then one can have some freedom to say what one feels needs to be said. Or, just as importantly, not say every thought that comes into one's head. This is the bane of modernity, though; too many people creating, and not enough people listening. In my search for more and more Australia Cup final content, I hit a disturbing brick wall, like finding the smallest, most indestructible subatomic particle, made up of pure content for content's sake. Lots of people with cameras pointed at themselves talking, but goodness knows if I could figure out to whom they were speaking; it may as well have been a monologue to one's self. Of course, I know all about that, and if you're doing it deliberately, with some self-awareness, it can work, though the audience here probably doesn't want to read the exegesis of that praxis, either full-fledged or in the form of endless aphorisms. Some of these creators have managed to get an audience, and if that audience is not me, that's more than OK - I'm only one person, and too old-fashioned and uncool to properly enjoy their content. So to the guy in the tracksuit, the guys on the couch, the journos looking for another angle, even that Pom running around Melbourne looking for actives, but ducking out at half time of extra time of the cup final, keep doing what you do, not that you need my permission or blessing. But for everyone else stuck in front of a green screen, reacting to content to create content, and offering not very much of value for either the present or a hypothetical future, consider this - just go to a game, and be at the game, and turn your mind away from metrics. The game can be enjoyable on its own merits, believe it or not, even with no one turning it into content.

A selfish perspective on the elephant in the room

Far be it for me to address this over a week after it all happened like the moral coward that I am, but let me just say this - the booing of the Welcome to Country by some South fans at the Australia Cup final was a disgrace. And that's not even from the point of view of the politics of it. I get that some people just really, really dislike Welcome to Country, whether they understand the purpose and function of it, or whether they don't. And goodness knows I'm not the person that's going to convince those who are opposed to Welcome to Country of its merits. And I get that some Melbourne Victory fans also booed it, but I'm not interested in them right now. I'm interested in us, and one particular phenomenon that the club has suffered from repeatedly - the lack of a sense of self-preservation among its supporters. So often in the club's history, going all the way back to the 1960s, and so often at its biggest moments, our fans have this rotten habit of making the club look absolutely idiotic. When the club was at its peak it could, to a certain extent, get away with such antics, because of its size and centrality to the local game, and because no viable alternative to us existed to replace us. The club has not had that size or status or clout for a very long time. And the lessons of flares and pitch invasions, as two examples, have been hard ones to learn. Just as hard has been trying to ditch obviously political chants, especially when faced with an opponent which throws them out to you in the first place. (and goodness knows there's so much to write about the double standard of belittling a custom of the most disadvantaged demographic in Australia, while earlier in the year you were complaining about the racism directed towards yourselves). We're getting better at not doing the bad things, we're even getting better at self-policing those among us who want to do stupid shit, but the Australia Cup final was such uncharted territory for us in so many ways - a crowd and South supporter turnout we haven't seen in nearly 30 years, and a situation where we're putting ourselves on display about who we are, and how far we believe that we've come. So many unfamiliar faces, and so many of the usual Clarendon Corner types right at the front of the active group, or in volunteer duties on the ground behind the goal. When the booing started, so many of us implored those doing the booing to shut the fuck up, not necessarily because we like Welcome to Country (though that would certainly be true for some of us), but because we know how it's going to play out in the media and among those members of the public that are already hostile to us. We cannot afford to make mistakes like that, not when there's so much at stake. That it was the only blip an otherwise marvellous night kind of underscores how easy it would have been to not boo Welcome to Country. The Australian anthem was belted out - no 1991 NSL grand final antics here. There were no flares either before the game, or during - remarkable to me, though it was explained to me later that so many of those most likely to do that at the game would have much experience being in the active end at Victory games, where they know the seccos and the cops will swoop in. There was no pitch invasion post-game. I know it's not true of everyone and it's not true of everyone all of the time, but most of us who have been at the club for the past twenty years, we have for the most part become fiercely protective of the club and its reputation. Sometimes, especially on social media, that comes across in less than flattering ways, because all the grievance gets turned into lashing out at anyone unlucky enough to be in the vicinity. But now we're perhaps at a point in the exile stage of our history where there isn't just something to lose, but also something to gain, and people have just got to be smarter.

For One Night (with apologies to Mick Bocchino)

for one night
the apostate is welcomed back
like the prodigal son
for one night
the old become young
and the young will believe they will be forever young
for one night
twenty-two years of hurt and despair
get washed away in rivers of tears
for one night
bloggers believe they can be poets
for one night
all things become possible
for South Melbourne is alive, and
Hellas has won the Cup!

Basking in the glory and the misery

What is best in life? To crush your enemies, see them driven before you, and to hear the lamentations of their women. For a certain kind of sicko, one of the little thrills of a win like that is trawling the internet for ever more obscure references to the event. News articles, social media, and opposition websites provide supplementary nourishment to the original feast. Finding more examples of joy is its own reward. How many different home made camera angles of the whole affair can one find? Not enough, never enough. Each one has its charm, each one adds to the feeling that we were all touching different parts of the same elephant. But there's also something to be said in basking in the misery of others, both those who you overcame even if they wished you no specific ill will, but especially those who wanted you to fail. Some people go further and hunt down every person who sought South's demise, and bring up every receipt, all kept especially for days like Saturday. But I am not like that; I am a basker, content to merely feel the warm, toasty glow of the hatred and recriminations. When that 5-4 match against Dandy City back in 2017 broke me spiritually, the thing that began to heal me was the misery of others. First, watching the Facebook livestream back, and watching as the comments celebrating our imminent failure turned into utter despair as the miracle of miracles took place. Two weeks later, at a Melbourne Knights game speaking to a few of my Cro mutuals, I stood there as they still tried to come to grips with how their sister club had lost the game, and I could finally feel the enjoyment that other South fans had experienced first hand. Even so, more than I hate other clubs, I love my own. If my love for South Melbourne Hellas and its people was not my main motivator to keep going, I would be a much sicker and sadder individual. But still, I ask the question, as I tend to do, can love exist without hate? And while the answer is, certainly, yes. hate still provides a contrast, a different flavour and texture. Though football has its artists, it isn't itself art; it is defined by conflict. But sometimes a footballing moment can rise above the simple duality. Post-match, I received a message from a former Melbourne Croatia acquaintance, congratulating us. In tears, I responded with thanks, and that congratulations meant something because he understood the struggle. For a brief moment, South created a moment of such good feeling in Australian soccer, that it transcended all the fuss about the famous Hellas ego. It was our victory, to be sure, and it always will be; but it was also open to anyone who wanted to feel some of what we felt.

There are no words and too many all at once

Anyone expecting a glorious long post covering the affair will be disappointed. There were two weeks in the lead up to the game where I spoke many words before the event: on Victory fans' podcast For Vuck's Sake, on youth news outlet 6 News, on Channel 10, and on Football 360. Words of hope, of anticipation, and trepidation. Some of those words made it to air, some didn't. They were words spoken out of a sense of duty - to the club, to people trying to make their way in journalism, and to my own ego, always aware of my designation as the "thinking man's bitter". After the game, I was a crying, babbling mess, 20 years of all this flowing out in the southern end of the stadium, like everyone else who had lived through it. And then I was invited down onto the arena, to talk to some Football Australia media, and it got even worse. Words poured out, words that had been held in reserve for a day like this, a day I don't think most of us ever thought would actually come. What does the win mean? I don't know. Something. Everything. Being praised for whatever it is that I did to contribute over the past twenty years, while I tried to let people know that what I did always had a hobbyist's slant, and that there were others who did so much more impactful work. "Talk to this person!" I said when I had the opportunity, trying to make sure that the people who did the hard yards at the worst times got the credit they deserved. I am supposed to be the word man, but there are no words, or too many words all at once. What does it mean? It's just a game, obviously, and it's just a club. But it is also more than a game, and South Melbourne Hellas is more than a club. 

The happy little rut

What is life without risk? Secure. Safe. Routine. There have been many ups and downs over the past 20 odd years at South Melbourne, but one thing has more or less remained the same: that you'll see the same 200-300 people at most home games, making the same jokes and the same complaints about the futility of the enterprise, and while the results matter to us, they don't matter much to anyone else. It's an insular story of a comfortable, quiet despair. But days like today change that. Sure, we've had little moments like this before: a couple of Australia Cup semi finals, the Championship final last year, and even on occasion an NPL grand final, which not only break the monotony of the routine, but remind people outside the club that we exist, and that we have ambitions that many consider beyond our station. Days like this also remind ourselves of what the club was, and what we hope it may be again, but today's match, today's event, is on another level. Today is not necessarily about the football, though of course we want to win, and it's the footballers who have got us to this stage. Today is about affirming to ourselves as a club that we should be operating at a higher level, and convincing others of the same. When Sydney United made its Australia Cup final, unsavoury crowd actions aside, no one was talking about their ambitions beyond the NPL. Heidelberg took the lead last year in the final, and yet even then, no one was seriously discussing Heidelberg as a top-tier aspirant. There's something in our image and bluster, and yes, our history, that has people inside the club and outside of it, that maybe we could be more. The scale of the event, the particular opponent, all have created a sense of magnifying the arguments. And thus if we were to fail in an exceptional manner on the field or off it, we are open to a level of ridicule that we have not felt for decades. But that's the point, isn't? No risk, no reward. Today, we get out of our comfort zone.

A glimpse of heaven

It's only now, three or so days out from the game, that it all seems less like one sort of fantasy and more like another. Three days out from a match with tens of thousands in attendance, in a proper stadium, on the national stage, on national television. We've played at that stadium twice, once in front of almost nobody (not our fault), and another time in a derby against the Bergers in front of a few thousand that should have been more, but wasn't. Now mainstream TV is showcasing our presidents. Our players are being interviewed by the print media and on the radio. Even I'm being a media tart, with three appearances in various formats, my reputation lingering on despite being more than semi-retired from blogging. All this attention, and none of it yet for causing a scene. I think back to then president George Donikian's livelihood being threatened because of the shambles of the 2005 riot against Preston. I think of one of his successors, Leo Athanasakis, doing a doorstop TV news appearance to deny any connection of the club to the violent incidents at the water polo in 2007. I think of all our presidents having to suck up to the small-time and small-minded members of the local Greek press. You can justifiably cringe as hard as you want at the antics of current presidents Andrew Mesourouni and Bill Papastergiadis, but at least we only have to cringe, and not worry about anything worse, at least not yet. It feels like after over twenty years on the outside, that we've been given a chance to taste the good life, of where me might have been, and where we still might end up. Of course, come Sunday morning, we'll be where we have been since mid-2004, and the big show will roll on without us, as it has for the past twenty odd years. But win or lose, we will have had that moment in the spotlight again, where others will have seen us differently to what we've been painted as, and we get to see ourselves as we imagine ourselves to be, so different from the reality we have to live, as our self-delusion and self-aggrandisement coincide with a brief window of undisputed relevance.

When the facts change, opinions must change. Maybe.

It's possible that I was wrong about the Australia Cup. When it began, the framing of "reunification" rubbed me up the wrong way; the new dawn had, after all, won the popularity battle by some margin, especially in Melbourne and Sydney. I hated the patronising focus on "ethnic food", as if that was all our clubs had to offer. And the tournament's original scheduling of the tournament favoured the in-season professional A-League outfits over the out-of-season semi-pro teams - the guaranteed semi-final place for non-A-League teams felt tokenistic at best. Looking at things more closely though, it's less that I was wrong about the Australia Cup, and more that both it and Australian soccer have changed to where the original framing of the Cup is not what it was. The A-League's popularity post-COVID has plateaued, while clubs like South and Preston have, on occasion, been able to rustle up crowds well above what one expects of them these days, and in some cases more than what some expansion teams have been able to do. The food truck fetish is now mostly the preserve of chancer influencers, who are easy enough to ignore if you don't live on their favoured social media outlets. But the big change has been in the revised scheduling, which now sees the A-League sides more likely to field youthful and less match-fit lineups in the early rounds than they did in the Cup's early days. When these relatively underprepared squads come up against experienced, battled-hardened, in-season NPL sides - at least the better ones - the expectation is no longer that the semi-pro side will get swept aside. And so it has come to pass, that what are dubbed "cupsets" - an A-League side being eliminated by a state league side - have become increasingly common. Of course by the time the final rolls around, the A-League team remaining (assuming that there is an A-League team remaining) should be too strong, but the gap is not what it was. It also helps that there's been another change which is less talked about than it should be - that state league talent is becoming more and more concentrated in Sydney and Melbourne. Of course, Sydney has always had the depth of its own superior playing numbers. But Melbourne has done well in overcoming its demographic deficiencies by bringing in ambitious players from Queensland, useful journeyman Brits, and the occasional Tasmanian or Japanese player. Money talks, but so does the latent support in Victoria for these old clubs, which in general seems to have held up better than in other places; it was an observation made ten years ago to me by Joe Gorman, and while anything that old has surely dated, something about it still resonates. Is that why Victorian sides have done so much better than their counterparts from other states? A chip on their shoulder, a point to prove, and the motivation to outdo each other in all formats? And always at the centre of this ambition, and this week the height of such festivities, there is our club. No club with a bigger chip on its shoulder in this country, no club trying harder to prove a point, no club more motivated to get away from clubs that it seldom considers its peers.

Ship of Theseus

South Melbourne Hellas dates its origins to August 1959, but what is left from that time? Everyone who played at the club in the club's inaugural season is almost certainly dead, as would be every committee member. Most of the supporters from that era are gone. The Duke of Kent Hotel on La Trobe Street, where the early 1960 merger of the fledgling Hellas club with South Melbourne United took place, is gone, demolished. Middle Park Stadium, which did not even exist as a stadium at that point, is gone, though the plaque inaugurating the opening of its grandstand in 1960 still exists at Lakeside Stadium, which itself is now not the same Lakeside Stadium was it when it opened in 1996. Almost every team we played against in our debut season in 1960 is gone; more than half the teams we played against in our first State League season in 1961 are gone, or subsequently merged into new entities. Olympic Park is gone. The National Soccer League is gone. Most of our supporters are gone, either temporarily or permanently. To be fair, every institution which lasts longer than a generation or so becomes its own Ship of Theseus; calling itself the same entity, while changing buildings, people, and conduct, while also claiming to be a continuation of a specific moment of creation which occurred at an increasingly remote point in time. There must be just a handful of people left at our club who can remember the 1960s, and seemingly not too many more who can remember the 1970s. Both eras were glorious for the club, and those of us still here, and almost always much, much younger, claim that history for the club as it exists now, even as others claim that South Melbourne today is not the same club as that which attained glory up to a specific point in 2004; today's South Melbourne (which for them is not Hellas) is a facsimile of the real thing, a bad copy, an echo bouncing off a distant mountain and not the original sound. And yet for those of us who were there in the before time and are still here now, we are indeed still here now because we consider it the same club; this is, perhaps strangely, even more so the case for those who have joined the club in its national league exodus years - they recognise something not intangible about the club, but rather something extremely tangible; that the club has a history, a reputation, and a certain spirit that runs in a continuum from 1959 through to the present. The further away we get from that comparatively glorious past, the more it becomes mythologised both by those still here, and by those who have abandoned us; the size of the crowds, the merits of the players, the unsavoury incidents, and the decisions made which saw the club fall by the Australian soccer wayside. Even as the actual living memory of it all fades away, inevitably, the spirit of the club remains perversely robust, and something both the club's supporters and its detractors can agree upon as they respectively dispense love or hate for South Melbourne Hellas.

The Fear

One shouldn't think like this, but it's inevitable. The relevant fear is not about a disastrous result on Saturday, or the mockery that would come from that. That's a different kind of inevitability. No, this fear is the nonsense that could occur off the field, the terrace nonsense, the march to the stadium nonsense. A little bit of nonsense is to be expected; not everyone can be controlled, not everyone can control themselves. And besides which, nonsense is inherent in an exercise where the point is to support an arbitrary group of young men kicking a ball around against an equally arbitrary collective of same. But the fear is about enough people crossing a line, and the cascading effects of that. First, what might happen in the immediate vicinity of the incident; then the immediate impact to the club; then the recriminations among the supporters; and then whatever other consequences flow from that, but in particular, one: the chance for certain people to point at us, and say with a justification made easier by the circumstances, "see, we told you that this is what they're like, and that this would happen"; and then others who were on the fence, or perhaps beginning to come around to our self-proclaimed as well as actual merits, would retreat from acknowledging the worthiness of our cause, our arguments, and ultimately our club as an institution.

Maybe it's time to go back to the beginning...

... and remember the advice of an early interlocutor, to write every day, no matter how badly.