Death and its malcontents

I'm tired of the old shit 

Let the new shit begin

Eels - Old Shit/New Shit

I had begun writing up a post about last week's final friendly, but it was maudlin and stiff to the point of self-parody. Normally that would only bother me a little bit, but there are times when I feel like I've pursued that angle as far as it will go, and that I need to lay off it lest the blog becomes emotionally monotone - especially when there's a whole season to go, where we can all be as pantomime miserable as we like.

So before re-writing the sections I'd already written, I thought I'd write the thing that I should have been writing about in the first place, that being the reason for my break.

Three weeks ago, my father died.

He had been battling pancreatic cancer for the better part of a year, and for most of that time was holding up relatively well; but as was explained to me by the oncologists in what turned out to be the final couple of weeks of his life, at some point the body can no longer fight the fight. The blog's hiatus came on the day before his death, though at the time I only knew that dad's time on this earth was limited, and not necessarily that his end was imminent. So it goes.

I could write about my father's life in great detail, but my telling of it would be incomplete, and besides which, this is not really the place for it. Suffice to say, he was born and raised in difficult circumstances, worked a series of back-breaking jobs throughout his life, and spent most of his life - 49 out of 72 years - in a country he never was able to quite get his head around. It's a story a good chunk of my readership will be all too familiar with.

But there was joy, too, and one of the things that brought my father joy was soccer. His village in Greece, now close to collapse from population decline, was large enough then to have its own soccer team, and in one way or another dad's interest in the game remained for the rest of his life.

Arriving in Australia in 1971, the football scene he saw here was past its 1960s state league peak, but it was still healthy enough for there to be good players and good entertainment. Dad picked Alexander as his club not because he was from the north of Greece - though that became more important later on - but because when he first arrived in Melbourne he lived in the inner-north, in Collingwood. It was about as good a time to get on the Alexander bandwagon, as for the next decade or so they would be at their peak. Later the combination of distance (it's a fair hike from Altona North to Olympic Village), work and family commitments (my brothers have no interest in sport), and off-field politics (Macedonia issue, NSL and Soccer Australia bull-crap, internal club stuff) which gradually wore down not just the Bergers as a force, but also my dad's diminishing optimism about the game's prospects.

Thus he gradually drifted away from the local game; never completely losing interest, but never doing much to reverse that trend. When I came back to South in 2006, dad came with me for a few games, but eventually for all sorts of reasons - not least because I'd managed to attach myself to Clarendon Corner and the smfcboard bunch - his attendance at the soccer became minimal. He would still keep up to date via the Greek papers and radio, but most of his interest in soccer regressed to what was available on free-to-air TV. For a while there in the early-to-mid 2000s, I was headed much the same way, but turned that around in a story I've related in a number of places already.

My love of the game exists both because of, and in spite of, my father's relationship to the game. It exists because of his love for the game, because the game as it was for a good chunk of his first twenty years in Australia, contained a language he understood both in terms of what was happening on the field as well as off it. It's not that he didn't like Aussie Rules, but he had no cultural connection to that game. I only went to one footy match before I was 18, and that wasn't with my dad. When we went together to see a sporting match, it was inevitably a soccer match.

So we went to soccer matches. At Paisley Park initially, where we saw Altona East win the Hellenic Cup on its home turf. Then to Middle Park and Olympic Village and Olympic Park, and even after the Bergers were kicked out of the NSL, he would take me to South games at Lakeside. Dad had the habits a lot of his generation had. Park miles away from the ground and risk a parking ticket instead of paying for parking; never pay for a grandstand seat; always time your run to get to the ground five minutes from kickoff, and always start getting ready to leave five minutes before the end of a game, regardless of the score. So many of these things infuriated me, and still do, but it's just the way he was, and none of my nagging was going to change things.

Besides which, I had found my own way to annoy him. I became a South fan instead of a Berger because I saw the 1991 NSL grand final on TV, and because the team did well after that, too, and because there were enough nearby relatives at the time who were also Hellas fans to keep me attached to that. The novelist Christos Tsiolkas relates the story of how the first time he disappointed his father was when he chose Aussie Rules over soccer, and I guess my picking Hellas over Alexander was something dad could never quite get over.

Dad kept that feeling buried pretty well though, still taking me to South games when he could, and using the line (that was only a half a lie) that watching a good game of soccer, and watching talented players, was more important to him than his team winning. He'd use the examples of someone like Ulysses Kokkinos, or Branko Buljevic, or Dusan Bajevic when he came out here with AEK. The Bajevic example he loved to roll out a lot - on that day the Olympic Park pitch was a mud bath, and yet Bajevic came off the field without having gotten dirty at all. Why? Because Bajevic refused to make an idiot of himself and chase balls when people should have been playing the ball to his feet.

But when I say it was only a half a lie that dad preferred entertainment and quality over the glory of victory, it was because deep down my dad really was a Berger tragic. In 2008, the Bergers' 50th anniversary season - and probably the last proper Bergers game my dad went to that I can remember - the home team came from behind and beat South 2-1. As their second goal went in, he smiled in a way that I hadn't seen him ever do, and he even did a little fist-pump. I didn't even know that he had a fist-pump in his gesticulation repertoire. The ride home in the station wagon from the Village to Altona North was almost unbearable for the smugness in that Kingswood, the years of being humiliated by South during the 1990s melting away for him during the trip back.

But our trajectories as followers of local soccer nevertheless drifted further and further apart. He had a passive aggressive tendency, too, with my attendance, especially because I would take public transport to most grounds. He both wanted and was happy for me to to go all sorts of soccer games; but there were also times when he was befuddled by the notion of my taking a lengthy public transport journey, which would see me return from the other side of town in the early hours of the morning. "Why do you need to go, when there'll be other people there? Does the team specifically need you there?"

And like a lot of the older generation, if it was raining, so much the worse! Why would someone deliberately go out and get wet for no good reason? And don't get me started on what he thought about anyone who would be stupid enough to volunteer at a club, and especially anyone who trusted anyone on a committee, ever. At some level, what my dad would've considered as my crazy and now decade-plus renewed dedication to South Melbourne Hellas and soccer - in terms of attending, writing, and thinking - is my attempt to make up for lost time, and to avoid becoming so jaded that I stop caring about something that matters to me so much. I'm trying to make up for all those games I didn't get to see during the NSL years, for all the soccer friends I didn't have in the 1990s and early 2000s, and for the culture I was not as connected to as I wish that I was.

It's also my attempt to not fall into the trap of self-defeating cynicism that my father fell into. My friends and readers will know that I love to complain, that I instinctively first see how things could go wrong instead of how things could get better, and that I am prone to being openly caustic; but I've seen the alternative, and I'd rather be attached to the glorious mess of Australian soccer than be apart from it. In other words, unlike my dad and so many of his generation - and later generations - I'd rather be mumbling to others at a ground that things will never get better, rather than sitting at home mumbling to myself that things will never change.

But we still talked about all the off-field and on-field happenings, and we would still watch most of the major world tournaments at our disposal. I remember him taping Greece's first World Cup game in 1994 against Argentina, and then when I woke up and asked about it, him telling me it was not worth watching because we'd been smashed. I remember sitting in my uncle and aunt's lounge-room in 1997, where in the only time I ever believed he had any clairvoyant ability - because he'd make these kinds of predictions often, whether one way or the other - he picked Iran's coming back from 2-0 down.

We were both stoked when Australia finally qualified for the World Cup, and like everyone else we watched the Socceroos with awe in Germany, and with less awe in later World Cups. But the best time was probably the 2014 World Cup, where we stayed up late and woke up early and I watched far more of a World Cup than I ever had before, and my dad became a sort of ancillary character in my sleep-deprived narration of events, waking me up for games, and supplying me with tea and biscuits.

The final confluence of our soccer interests was the most unlikely set of circumstances I can think of. Throughout my extended career as a university student - a botched stint at Melbourne University in 2002 and 2003, and a much more successful stint from 2007-2018 - the things I was studying almost never came up in discussion. When I was writing my doctoral thesis on Australian soccer literature, for the first three or so years of that he must've just assumed that I was doing "something", but who knows what. But one day he asked what it was that I writing on, and after I'd explained it his face lit up and he started talking about his own poetry.

Now I knew that he had once fancied himself a poet, and that he had been published in Neos Kosmos in the early 1990s, writing poetry on a variety of subjects - such as the commercialism of the modern Olympics, and the Macedonia issue - but the key here was that he remembered that he'd written a soccer poem, an ode to Heidelberg United Alexander while they were having a difficult season. Not only that, but it had been published in Neos Kosmos in an abridged form, and a Bergers committee member had seen it and was so moved by it that my dad was offered a double pass to their next home game.

But that wasn't the whole of it - dad had also written a poem on what he saw as the unjust sacking of Jim Pyrgolios as Hellas coach and Pyrgolios' replacement by Frank Arok; as well as a lengthy poem on Altona East PAOK's Hellenic Cup win in 1992, which was printed and placed on the window of the wooden portable which was then PAOK's social club space. The Pyrgolios poem and the PAOK one survived in draft form, but the Bergers one I was never able to trace down a complete version of, except for a couple of stanzas in a draft. Maybe when Neos Kosmos completes its digitisation I can finally find the rest of the poem.

Now to be honest, the quality of dad's poetry was firmly in the category of doggerel; but since one of the points of my research was its focus on what existed in terms of Australian soccer literature, rather than the quality of what existed, I was stoked to learn about his soccer poems, and that some of them had survived. I transcribed the remnant drafts, transliterated them, added them as an appendix in my thesis, and cited the poems as works and my father as a writer in the main body of my thesis. I used my dad and his work specifically as an example of how hard it was to find examples of Australian soccer literature by non-English language writers, but also how important it was when one did find examples of them.

Passing my doctoral thesis was an ordeal - I had wildly disparate examiner's reports - so the day that I got notice that the third examiner had passed me with minor corrections, I was more relieved than elated. But the day I graduated was a joyous moment, because I got to share that with my dad, having written a work which had him in it. Like many of the people who followed soccer in this country, my dad's experiences, memories and thoughts of the game will soon be lost. It's in Australian soccer's DNA that we keep forgetting the past, and keep attempting to re-build Troy on top of the rubble and ashes of the cities which  came before. And the nature of most theses is that once they are finished, they will soon fade into irrelevance or insignificance - but knowing that I was able to preserve my father's work and part of his life in some format was reward enough for the effort.

As for last week's friendly...
Returning for my first bit of South Melbourne action for the 2020 campaign - or more correctly, preparation for the 2020 campaign - I felt that not much had changed in the months since I last watched a South game. The greeting at the door before I pick up membership pack was the same.  There were the same old faces sitting in the social club, and later watching the game, in this case a friendly against NPL2 side Northcote. Not everyone was there - more will be back this week - but there were no unfamiliar attendees except for the subbuteo faction on the futsal court, and even they've been there before.

If there were changes to be noticed, they were subtle ones. The complimentary scarf is longer than usual. The faces behind the bar are a little different, but they're still pouring spirits somewhere between a shot and a free-pour. The burger is much the same, including the wait time. At one point, social club manager Vic had Clutch(!) on the social club's stereo system. Outside, the sun-and-rain-bleached blue of the athletics track has been touched up to be of a more robust royal blue hue, while the city skyline to the north was clouded in smoke.

But the meaningless of the hit-out, bushfire relief aspect notwithstanding, was much the same. Whether pre-season form is magnificent or disastrous, there is no oracle which can reliably predict what it will mean for the season proper. But I asked those who had been to more pre-season games than I had this year to offer their assessment of what they've seen anyway, even if I knew that the answers would be non-committal. The most optimistic refrain was that it seemed that at least the team no longer hated each other and themselves which, if true, would be a step up from last season and the season before that.

Then again, give it five minutes and anything could happen. It's a very long season and a very large squad, and all the woodfired pizzas in Shepparton might not be able to prevent internal schisms should things go wrong.

On the field, I don't think it was a full-strength line-up for us. Peter Skapetis was out there, and initially at least he ran harder than I'd seen him do at any point for us last year. Chris Irwin played further up the field, as a pure winger, than he usually did during his previous stint with us, where he was much more likely to be used to as a wing-back. Harrison Sawyer is big, runs hard, and has spindly legs that I predict he will repeatedly trip over, Melvin Beckett looked exactly the same as last season, a lot of sizzle and not much steak. Marcus Schroen was not out there, so someone else was taking corners, free kicks, and penalties.

The tempo was high throughout the friendly, but you know what I think about high tempo at this level - that it's the Max Power Paradigm - not the right way or the wrong way, but rather the wrong way just faster. Both sides created a ton of chances in part because of this high tempo, which has freaked out the kinds of people who treat pre-season friendlt games against lower tier opposition in which we don't run them into the ground (with what I assume is nowhere quite near our likely starting eleven) as an ominous portent of doom for the coming season. Of course, had we belted our NPL2 opposition, the calls may have been that it was not a real hit-out against a comparable opponent. I say let's just wait for the Bergers to bury us on Friday night before we get legitimately panicky. 

Aside from what has been happening on the field, it has been as low-key a lead-up to a Victorian top-tier season that I can remember, apart from the bizarre Avondale points deduction which happened very late. There is no buzz. It's not just us, either - pretty much the whole league, and the federation, too, has approached 2020 as if there is nothing to get excited about, nothing to look forward to. Of course it doesn't help matters that most teams in this competition have no fans to get excited about anything, but even those clubs with what might be classed as "actual supporters" have mostly been quiet.

So is this it? Is this the end, the point where everyone finally, genuinely acknowledges the futility of state league football? One can only hope, though we'll have probably have to wait until after the game against the Bergers to be sure.

It's official
I am glad to say that I am once again officially accredited by Football Victoria to provide the public with South Melbourne Hellas nonsense. Also other nonsense, too, I assume, but I'll have to check the accreditation agreement.

Yes, it has arrived, with "South of the Border" instead of the usual "freelance". pic.twitter.com/KydJkOXXES

— Paul Mavroudis (@PaulMavroudis) February 12, 2020

My accidental career path in sports - Peter Filopoulos

Peter Filopoulos, current CEO of Perth Glory, and former general manager of South Melbourne, originally posted the following piece on his own blog. Because of its unique insights into what it was like to be at South Melbourne during the 1990s - an era of rapid transformation for the club both on and off the field, but also an important period for the concept of sports administration in Australia - I asked Peter if it would be OK to republish his piece here, and I'm glad that he's given his permission for me to do so. 

With the exception of one or two things (such as the final score of the first game at Bob Jane Stadium), I have left everything as Peter has written it.

A memoir of my accidental entry into the world of sports administration
Over the years, I am regularly asked by bright eyed young people, how did you get into sports administration? A career in sports has become a major career option progressively over the last fifteen years or so, but this career path wasn't so prevalent when I graduated from university in 1991.

My first job in sports came in December 1993 in a totally unplanned and unexpected manner. Prior to this and as a Bachelor of Business graduate with a major in Accountancy, in 1991, I embarked on my career in this field, firstly with a construction company and then a marketing/licensing business.

Around the same time, a close friend, Peter Abraam, invited me to join a sub-committee at the National Soccer League Club, South Melbourne Soccer Club. Peter was a former player and now on the Board of Directors of this historic club and at the time, working as a Project Manager with the City of Melbourne. South Melbourne Soccer Club was making a conscious effort to attract a younger profile onto their Board, which was at the time predominantly made up of first generation Greek businessmen. Around this time the famous Hungarian, world renown ex player and coach Ferenc Puskas was coaching the Club and had coached the Club to its first national Championship in 1991 since 1984 with Ange Postecoglou as captain.

The 1990/91 South Melbourne Squad with Ferenc Puskas as Coach, Ange Postecoglou, captain. Also in the pic is President, George Vasilopoulos and Major Sponsor, Jack Dardalis from Marathon Foods, a generous benefactor and philanthropist.

My initial involvement was as a Social Club sub-committee member where our charter was to raise much needed revenue and funds to support the Club’s quest in the National Soccer League. Over the course of 1991 and 1992, we managed to initiate a number of successful activities and initiatives resulting in a secondment onto the Board of Directors in 1992. I recall the Annual Presentation Night Balls we used to hold where I worked with fellow Directors such as Peter Abraam (ex head of the Victorian Major Events Corporation), Emmanuel Kotis, Jim Karakoussis, John Dimitropoulos and Peter Cartsidimas. They were amazing nights well renowned within the South Melbourne Soccer Club and Greek communities of Melbourne held in the most prestigious functions rooms around Melbourne.

As a volunteer on this sub-committee, I was able to bring to the table some strong administration skills and one of my first initiatives was to request a computer for the Club. I still recall the looks on people’s faces when I made this request, explaining that I wanted to digitalise a lot of our processes. Peter Abraam was delighted at the time as he had been asking the same for some time. The main reason I had requested a computer is that I wanted to migrate the Club’s Membership database from a manual database to a computerised database. Direct Mail under the old manual system was simply a nightmare. Quite quickly, once we acquired the computer, we managed to migrate the entire database onto a D-Base system at the time and we embarked on a data acquisition campaign so that we could begin a more aggressive membership program. Marketing material would be generated from the computer and Direct Mail became more prevalent. On the back of these campaigns, we had immediate impact. Each week at the Board meeting, I would present hundreds of new membership applications with enclosed cheques and our Treasurer at the time was one happy gentleman. It’s hard to imagine that the Club functioned with only a committee of management in place at the time who met for hours each Thursday evening which often went well into the morning hours. Thankfully we had a great social club where we would gather to have dinner after we had watched the first team training and before the meetings would commence at 7:30pm. The mixed grills prepared by Jimmy and Filio were something to look forward to. Having met Cameron Schwab, then CEO of Richmond AFL team, their management team wasn't very big at all either at the time in comparison. Full time administrative set-ups and careers in sports administration in 1993 were not very prevalent.

After months of this activity and other influences the younger generation had on the Club via seats on the Board, the Board turned their focus to the possible requirement for a full-time General Manager, given that they could see the great outcomes generated from some organised activity. The Club already had what they titled a ‘Marketing Manager’ in a gentleman I remain very good friends with today, Barry Horsfall. The fact is, Barry was a self-funded employee as he was only earning a commission on new sponsorship and adverting deals he would generate. He did a great job in selling signage packages at the old ground, which was demolished in 1994 to make way for the Australian Grand Prix track. He would bring a cheque in for $X and he would immediately be remunerated with his pre-agreed commission of 30%, a formula that worked for some time. This was a win-win and successful arrangement.

Fellow South Melbourne Soccer Club Directors, Peter Cartsidimas and Emmanuel Kotis around 1994 at the South Melbourne Soccer Club Annual Ball and Presentation night.

The discussion of a full-time General Manager occurred whilst I was on vacation and on my return I received a phone call from fellow Director, John Dimitropoulos, then an associate solicitor with a former President’s and Chairman and co-founder of the NSL, the late Sam Papasavas OAM, to advise that the Board was now actively looking for a full-time General Manager and that several people had nominated me as the ideal candidate. The conversation went as follows:

Pete, while you were away, we spoke at the Board Meeting about the need to appoint a full-time General Manager at the Club to oversee the day to day activities of the Club, some of us thought that you may be the ideal candidate. If you are interested, this would require you to step off the board and become our inaugural General Manager. This could change your life for ever.

At the time, I was returning from vacation to accept a job with a national architectural firm as their State Accountant, a great job with an attractive package and consistent with my qualifications. This and subsequent conversations with John, the President, George Vasilopoulos and fellow Director, Peter Abraam, threw a spanner in the works. In speaking to my family, they thought it was a crazy idea. I recall clearly my father asking me if I had lost my mind at the prospect of deviating from my chosen vocation to take up a post with the Club.

A career in sports in 1993, was not a well known or accepted career path, not the way it is today. So much so, the most asked questions at barbecues was, “so what do you do in the off-season?”

Against all advice, my instincts told me otherwise and at the age of 25, I accepted to become the inaugural General Manager of the South Melbourne Soccer Club in December 1993 and commenced immediately. I clearly recall waking up on the first day of my new job bouncing out of bed with a spring something I still do over 22 years later. At such a young age, I had so much to learn and was wide-eyed and full of energy as General Manager of the biggest and most successful football club in Australia.

What I didn't know at the time was that I had embarked on a career in sports something I look back on today. This was the platform from which created my opportunities from thereon. John Dimitropoulos was right, this decision was about to change my life forever in a way I couldn't possibly imagine.

The beginnings
From my appointment as General Manager of South Melbourne Soccer Club, it was a baptism of fire. So much to learn, however, it was great to have such good mentors and people that supported me. Peter Abraam in particular, would be on the phone multiple times during the day, steering, mentoring and inspiring me. He still inspires me to this day. We all became such close friends and every one at that time had an influence to my induction into the new role. Many of these friendships remain in place even today, with both players and board members.

Our offices were underneath a grandstand at the stadium which accommodated a board room and a small office where I think I banged my head on the ceiling on several occasions. It was in this office that one day in 1994 I received a phone call from the Head of Sport at Melbourne Grammar School who were searching for a Head Football Coach.  I recommended that they speak to our recently retired star player in Ange Postecoglou who was by this time Assistant Coach with the Club. Ange took on the role and I remember him coming back and telling me it was fantastic and that the school was paying him more for a part-time role than what the club was to be Assistant Coach. Ange delivered that message in a way only Ange can and we often joked about it.

Last Game at Middle Park in 1994 after 34 years of memories

My initiation into the new role went into a spin. Within weeks of commencing, we had received a phone call from the Premier’s office to arrange a meeting with the Club. Upon attending the meeting, we were advised in absolute confidence that Victoria had almost acquired the Australian Grand Prix from Adelaide and that the race track would be in Albert Park Lake. We then learned that as part of this grand plan, the pit straight was going to run right through our then home ground, Middle Park Stadium, home to the Club since 1960 and which we had just signed a 21 year lease for and had plans to re-develop with a new grand stand. Our world had momentarily turned upside down.

An NSL game at new home, Bob Jane Stadium in
December 1995 and the beginning of a new era.

Negotiations commenced immediately for appropriate compensation which resulted in the Club receiving a 21 year lease on Lakeside Oval (now known as Lakeside Stadium), once home to South Melbourne Football Club who was years earlier relocated to Sydney as the Sydney Swans. The lease also incorporated a two-storey dwelling which housed a function centre upstairs and a social club and office space downstairs. It was perfect!

With significant additional funding also provided by the government as part of the relocation package, we raised another $3.5M to build the purpose built football ground and after selling the naming rights, soon to be known as Bob Jane Stadium, which opened in December 2005. It was a facility admired by all in football and this legacy remains today.

This process took a lot of hard and dedicated work and we were fortunate to have so many good people on our Board, lawyers such as Peter Mitrakas and John Dimitropoulos, Architects and Project Managers such as Peter Abraam, strong accountants such as Jim Karakoussis, a PR specialist in Jim Stiliadis and a politically savvy President in George Vasilopoulos at the time who forged a close relationship with the Premier Jeff Kennett, someone who also became our number one ticket holder in 1994.

Then Premier of Victoria, Jeff Kennett with our President, George Vasilopoulos, farewelling our old home ground at Middle Park in 1994 and announcing our new home ground development at Lakeside Oval.  Also in the picture was Managing Director of major sponsor at the time, Marathon Foods, Jack Dardalis

In July 1994, we had appointed the longest ever serving Socceroos Coach, Frank Arok as our coach after lacklustre 1992/93 (after finishing first) and 1993/94 (after finishing second) NSL seasons where we would reach the finals and bomb out at the Preliminary Final.

Frank was crucial in the identification and recruitment of a raft of upcoming young talent which formed a nucleus for the successes we enjoyed long after Frank’s tenure. Names like Billy Damianos, Tansel Baser, Steve Panopoulos, Con Anthopoulos, Con Blatsis to name a few. Frank brought in a renewed belief in our junior development and plucked these players from our juniors to add to the big names like Paul Trimboli, Con Boutsianis, Ange Goutzioulis, Socceroo captain, Paul Wade, Mike Petersen, Steve Tasios, Francis Awaritife, Mehmet Durakovic to name a few….

With Frank Arok at one of his recent visits to Australia along
with friend Manny Gelagotis who Frank also coached at Gippsland Falcons.

For 1994/95 season, under new coach Frank Arok and his recently retired South player, assistant coach – Ange Postecoglou, we played out of the old Olympic Park in Melbourne, as our new stadium at Lakeside Oval was being constructed, where we again bombed out at the Preliminary Final against Melbourne Knights with a memorable 3-goal performance by the V-Bomber, Mark Viduka.  I still remember the hurt on everyone’s faces after this game and there was even a little scuffle in the dressing rooms involving a couple of players that day which reinforced how much we were all hurting. We had drawn the line in the sand – we wanted and demanded success. This came several years later under a new coach, a young Ange Postecoglou, who picked up the baton from Frank and continued the journey in his own style. Ange was magnificent in instilling a sense of ambition and desire for success.

There were fond memories for the South Melbourne faithful of Olympic Park where we had one our latest Championship during the 1990/91 season in spectacular fashion against cross-town rivals Melbourne Knights in the most amazing penalty shoot-out one could ever imagine.

For the 1995/96 season, construction at our new stadium, Bob Jane Stadium, was completed and we played our first home game on Round 9 on 26 November 1995 against West Adelaide where we lost 3-2. The stadium was a major feature for the National Soccer League and the Club continue to prosper with record membership, crowds and sponsorship.

As we approached the end of the 1995/96 season, we saw the end of the Frank Arok era with three games to spare as it became evident that the Club would miss out on the finals for the first time since 1989 and Assistant Coach, Ange Postecoglou was put in charge as interim coach for the last three games winning all three at which point the search for our new coach commenced immediately and I will touch upon in a later blog as to this journey and the emergence of Ange Postecoglou and the successes of that time in more detail. Ange’s path to where he is today as Socceroos coach is a fascinating tale of passion, commitment, ambition and hard work – I will share my insights into this wonderful story of Ange Postecoglou and his journey from retiring National Soccer League player through to back-to-back championship winning Head Coach of South Melbourne Soccer Club.

I do vividly recall prior to Frank’s removal as coach, after a game where we had lost to Marconi 3-0 at Marconi and a spray Ange gave the players on the long bus trip to the airport which has left its mark on me even today. To be fair the players were misbehaving on the bus and carrying on somewhat and Ange felt it was time he reminded them in the strongest possible way about the badge that they represented and “how they had disgraced it that day”. Little did I know at the time that the Socceroos Coach was born that day. A word was not spoken amongst the traveling party for the remainder of the trip and even remember the players shuffling boarding passes so no one would sit next to Ange on the plane. I don’t think Frank said a word for the entire trip slumped in a chair on the bus reflecting on the performance. I also remember telling my President the following day of Ange’s exceptional display of leadership and how he would one day be our Head Coach.

After a whirlwind meeting at the Board meeting the following week, I recall having to call in Frank Arok the following day and arrange a meeting to advise him that the Board had unanimously decided to terminate his coaching tenure with the Club effective immediately. I couldn't believe that I had just sacked the longest serving ex-Socceroos Coach and a man I admired and learned so much from. He was a friend and still remains a friend to this day. Many will tell you that Frank’s impact at the Club was effective and long lasting. He began a process where he had set the foundations for our successes in the subsequent next few years. Unfortunately the Board and Fans had run out of patience and as a Club we succumbed to the the need for immediate success. Clubs like South Melbourne and its strong fan base, demanded success.

Since taking on the role as General Manager a few years earlier, the Club was achieving record membership, sponsorship, match day attendances and had built a formidable team which was in desperate need of a coach to help reach their potential.   South Melbourne was widely acclaimed as the leading and most professional club in the National Soccer League.  So many worked tirelessly to reach this stage and as a young administrator learning the caper, I rarely was home before 8pm every night.  By 1997 we had an office which consisted of a General Manager, Sales & Marketing Manager, Office Manager, full-time Social Club Manager and a team of Chefs and casual staff.  It was only recently when some one tweeted a match day programme, “In Blue and White”, from the 1998/99 season where we had announced a major sponsor worth $1M over two years which would have rivaled most of the AFL clubs at the time. Having a look at the list of sponsors we had fantastic corporate support.  My entry into the world of sports administration was a whirl wind experience and by the end of the 1998/99 season where we had one back to back Championships under young Coach, Ange Postecoglou, I was beginning to contemplate where this journey would take me next. I had completed six (6) wonderful years but I knew that if I would master this new career path, I needed to expand upon my experience maybe outside of football.

It was in early 1999 that I had meet President, Ian Dicker and CEO, Michael Brown from Hawthorn Football Club via our mutual sponsors Puma.  My next opportunity was about to take shape, which I will also elaborate in a later blog.

During my six years at South Melbourne, I can now say, I was thrown in the deep end and in front of buses, however, I recall these days with fondness and have taken so many learnings from this experience and remain friends with so many wonderful people from that era. It was a ‘sink or swim’ environment and I am proud to say I swum and I swum well.

South Melbourne still exists today and participates in the NPL Victoria based at Lakeside Stadium which has gone through another major transformation and most likely the best facility in the National Premier League.

I am proud to remain a life member of the Club today and I am grateful for the opportunity given to me back in 1993 to take on the reigns as General Manager / CEO which has paved my career to where it is today.  So many fond memories and close bonds that I will never forget.

In my current role as CEO of Perth Glory, I draw upon my experiences and learnings from South Melbourne often and I have been overwhelmed by the support I have received since returning to the game I love, all because I was once involved with South Melbourne which has helped get instant respect.

Peter Filopoulos

Is it OK for South fans to like Ange Postecoglou again?

Here's a confused ramble focused on confusion.

So, while waiting for a bad episode of The Simpsons to start, I was watching Ten news yesterday evening, the sports segment to be precise. The first item was on the Geelong Cup, a group three race, whatever that means. Then some racehorse trained by Tom Waterhouse's mother being retired. Then AFL trade news, including Heath Shaw being traded to GWS for Taylor Adams. Then finally, four stories in, the fact that the Socceroos had a new coach. It makes you think that we still have a ways to go yet. Today online on The Age's sport section prominence is given to Bradman and Warne getting a perfunctory honour, and after that a washed out one day cricket match.

But back to Ange - who could have foreseen this situation after that interview on SBS all those years ago? One of the more humorous comments on the matter in the week leading up to Ange's appointment was made by 'Chips Rafferty' on Football Anarchy:

Imagine, Ange the NT coach and Craig still the SBS weather girl.

Some people have talked (vaguely) about his stint in the VPL before making his comeback to the national scene via the A-League - which really, nothing much can be made of, because that team was doomed from the get go. More interesting for me is the fact that, like his 1991 championship teammate Joe Palatsides, he actually tried his hand at coaching in Greece, getting out of the comfort zone of milking a local career, lower league club by lower league club. In our boredom, South of the Border was probably the only English language 'press' (and we use that term lightly) that covered Ange's stint at Panachaiki in the third division, and that was mostly relaying basic progress updates.

What it means to me is that he's willing to take chances, something that became evident as well when he went through the process of creating his Brisbane Roar team. Despite the success he had in his years as South coach, there was always (and still is) talk that he more or less inherited Frank Arok's team, a team that after a tumultuous period would have supposedly come good anyway. And that's no post-A-League sour grapes - that line of thinking existed even among contemporary South fan commentary.

During his A-League coaching career, the attitude of South fans towards Postecoglou has ranged from a certain matter of factness - coaching is his career, and he should be able to continue it anywhere he wants - to calling him a sellout for becoming a part of the system which has relegated us to dealing with an ethnic club glass ceiling (and taking Paul Trimboli with him as well). He's not alone among our former players, sponsors and fans to do this, but he's by far the most high profile.

Postecoglou overseeing South training in Brazil in 2000.

Most though probably never wished him either well or ill, taking a more ambivalent, philosophical approach - he's not at South, so who cares? That's certainly the approach I've taken since he left Panachaiki, a stint I covered more as an oddity than as anything serious. Perhaps those attitudes stem from the way his recent Australian soccer history has shone a light on the general South experience post-A-League, at least from the point of view of those of us in exile from the top-flight. Here's someone who, because of his association with old soccer, the NSL and especially its most powerful (ethnic) club, was thought to offer nothing to the new dawn, who would usher in an era of new players, coaches, methods and history divorced from whatever happened before. Now he's in charge of the goddamn national team, while we've got A-League reject Mehmet Durakovic.

When I celebrated Mitch Langerak's rise to Borussia Dortmund and Socceroos representation, I did so because yes, it's a magnificent achievement, but also because South was a small, perhaps unusual stepping stone on the road to those achievements (which he acknowledged with re-tweet, swoons). Can we then ignore Postecoglou's even more incredible rise? He's one of the few who came through the South system and had a sustained career at the top as a player. The only one involved with all four of our NSL titles. Someone who had been doubted repeatedly, and yet is one of the few players or coaches who left the club both on his own terms and as a success.

The variety of reactions with which South fans have dealt with Postecoglou and others like him, is reflective of the alienation seemingly inherent in being a South supporter these days, at least for those of us who don't split our time between South and an A-League team. Who are we now, compared to who we were? Can we be something like what we once were, in terms of status? What if we never make it back to the top-flight? Just how much has everyone who once supported us moved on from everything? Far enough to forget us completely, or within reach should we ever once again reach where we 'deserve' to be? At least once a year, most often in the quiet of the off-season, I seem to ask this question, and every time I think I get closer to an answer, I find that it's just as elusive as it ever was.

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Here's a couple of articles from the mainstream/legitimate press that are worth a look.

Ray Gatt's article charting Ange's coaching career path isn't too bad, including some good South history with David Clarkson.

Ange Postecoglou's path: from near-death experience to the Socceroos

Ray Gatt, The Australian, October 24, 2013 12:00AM

IT was early November 1996, in the days of the National Soccer League, and Ange Postecoglou, a wet-behind-the-ears coach, was conducting a training session with South Melbourne, oblivious to the lynch mob gathering around the back of the stands.

Only five rounds into his first senior coaching job and with just a single point to show, Postecoglou had already come under intense pressure from fans and officials of the Greek-oriented club.

That night was supposed to be his last in charge of the club he had served for 193 games as a player. The committee had made its decision and the president would be the one to deliver the coup d'etat.

As the committeemen nervously shuffled their feet waiting for the president to arrive, they received news he had fallen ill and could not make it. Reluctant to complete the hatchet job without him, they made a hasty retreat and decided to leave him in for one more week.

The rest is history. South Melbourne won its next game 1-0 against Newcastle Breakers and went on a winning streak that saw it climb from the bottom of the table to the preliminary final, which it lost to Sydney United.

Under Postecoglou's positive "follow-me" coaching philosophy, South Melbourne won successive NSL titles in 1997-98 and 1998-99.

Postecoglou's coaching career, give or take one or two hiccups, has gone from strength to strength and today he is the new coach of the Socceroos, entrusted by Football Federation Australia to lead the national team out of the abyss and into a new dawn.

David Clarkson, who won two championships under Postecoglou at South Melbourne, always knew his old boss would climb to the top of the coaching tree.

"Who knows what would have happened had it (the sacking) gone through," Clarkson told The Australian. "But, he got that luck. We won two titles, were Oceania champions and played in the world club championship against Manchester United."

Clarkson said he always saw the drive and the passion for coaching in Postecoglou.

"He was a winner, very intense and a lover of the game. You could see it in everything he did," he said. "Yes he was passionate about coaching, but he was also very passionate about the game and how it should be played."

Clarkson said if Postecoglou had a fault it was "maybe he did not manage players as best as he could back then".

"But it was never personal. He always had his end goal and he'd tell us he would take people on the journey who wanted to be there ... if not 'you can go'," he said

"I was always scared of him, to be honest. Why? Because I was afraid of letting him down. He expected such high standards and I respected him so much that I just didn't want to disappoint him."

Postecoglou did it tough as coach of the Young Socceroos between 2000 and 2007, struggling to come to grips with international football and drawing intense criticism from past players and coaches.

Some might have thought that was the end for him as a coach, but his stint as an analyst on Fox Sports showed he was a deep thinker about the game and the critics did not affect his fierce pride and burning ambition.

Postecoglou has stayed true to his philosophy of playing entertaining football based on retaining possession and playing out from the back, even when under pressure.

He is not afraid to make the tough decisions on players. It is the "my way or the highway" mentality as he showed when he first took over Brisbane Roar midway through the 2009-10 season. Postecoglou was ruthless, releasing Socceroos veterans Danny Tiatto and Craig Moore, and journeyman Bob Malcolm.

Young players were drafted in and while Roar did not get anywhere near the finals that season, he was sowing the seeds of success. And success came quickly.

The Queenslanders won the A-League title the next season then followed up with a second in 2011-12 as he became the first coach to win back-to-back titles in the A-League - something he had already done in the NSL.

Postecoglou will be vastly different to his predecessor, the sacked Holger Osieck, in many ways.

Firstly, he understands the Australian sporting mentality. He won't be as rigid in his thinking and will rejuvenate the team with younger players. No player will be safe from his scrutiny. They will all need to fit within his system.

He will go with what he knows and believes in. It is best explained in an interview he did after he was appointed Victory coach before the start of last season.

"I'm in it to win championships, but what drives me is that it has to mean something. A title must reflect the way we've played, behaved on and off the field. When people went to watch Brisbane Roar, they knew how they were going to play and conduct themselves, win or lose.

"I'm not going to do exactly what I did at Roar, but there will be a strong identity there at Victory."

With eight months, maybe half a dozen friendlies and a couple of camps to the World Cup in Brazil, the odds are that there is not enough time for Postecoglou to impose his will on the squad.

But unlike with Osieck, FFA has given him a mandate to produce talent, revitalise the squad, jettison some of players and set up for the future, including the Asian Cup on these shores in 2015.

Even at Brazil, you wouldn't want to bet against Postecoglou at least turning the Socceroos into the competitive team fans have grown to love and admire.


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Joe Gorman's article from The Guardian isn't too bad either, though it probably didn't need the music analogy. The comments on the cultural cringe in Australian football are worth noting.

Ange Postecoglou: the Socceroos' very own Paul Kelly

Like the musician, the new Socceroos coach shows respect and a deep knowledge of the medium in which he works

Ange Postecoglou has graduated from the A-League to become the new Socceroos manager. Photograph: Julian Smith/AAP

After almost a fortnight of rumour and recriminations, the FFA has appointed Ange Postecoglou as Socceroos coach. When Frank Lowy confirmed last week the next coach would be an Australian, it was always going to be either Ange or Arnie. Both worthy choices, the FFA has put its faith in a local for the first time since 2005.

Melbourne Victory have made the noble decision not to stand in Postecoglou’s way, although not before criticising the FFA for tapping up their coach and baulking at the seven figure compensation package.

In a statement to the media, Victory Chairman Anthony Di Pietro said, “we are disappointed with the process undertaken by the FFA, given the outcomes we tried to secure could never have been achieved within the timeframes offered, which ultimately forced us to accelerate our decision not to stand in Ange’s way.”

As much as the Socceroos are the pinnacle of the football hierarchy, the clubs are also entitled to defend their own patch of turf, as are state league clubs below them. Developing players and coaches comes at a price, and it is not for the FFA to be cherry-picking the best talent without recognising the investment of the clubs.

That said, it is a milestone in Australian football for several reasons. In the ninth season of the A-League, Postecoglou becomes the first coach to graduate from an A-League club to the Socceroos. In doing so, he’ll also become the first Australian coach to take the national team to the World Cup since Rale Rasic, who led the Socceroos to the nation’s first World Cup in 1974. Forty years is certainly a long time waiting, but it is a change that will be welcomed by the vast majority of followers of the national team.

Having an A-League alumnus at the helm of the Socceroos will certainly be a boost for the profile of the competition. After three successive foreign coaches, the football community has been heavily in favour of a local, and now that we’ve gone native, the cycle will likely continue. With so many former Socceroos completing their coaching licences and receiving jobs in the A-League, Postcoglou’s appointment may be a harbinger of change in the selection process.

In elevating Postecoglou, the FFA has pushed him into a new realm of prodigal son. As one of Australia’s most successful club coaches with South Melbourne Hellas, Brisbane Roar and Melbourne Victory, he comes into the job with huge expectations. Despite the Young Socceroos hiccup in 2006, Postecoglou has been something of a King Midas at club level.

When he took over from Frank Farina at Brisbane Roar in 2009, he quickly moved to purge several senior players from the squad including Craig Moore, Charlie Miller and Bob Malcolm, building a new-look team around midfielders Matt McKay, Massimo Murdocca and Erik Paartalu, all of whom he had previously worked with at youth level. After two successive A-League championships with Brisbane – which included a record breaking unbeaten streak – he took up a new challenge at Melbourne Victory.

Postecoglou may have taken a little longer than expected to make his mark in Melbourne, but when the Victory are on form, they play some of the best football in the competition. And as he did at Brisbane, Postecoglou has given young players a chance, putting faith in the likes of Marco Rojas, Nick Ansell, Andrew Nabbout and Connor Pain in important matches. In round one this season, Postecoglou continued this trend by granting the highly rated Rashid Mahazi a start in central midfield in the Melbourne derby.

In this regard, Postecoglou offers the Socceroos a sound knowledge of local players and a willingness to experiment with young talent, two qualities sorely needed in the national team. With the team in serious need of regeneration before the Asian Cup on home soil in 2015, many senior Socceroos will no doubt be uncomfortable about their future in the green and gold with Postecoglou in charge. As the Postecoglou motto goes, "you don't sign players but people". It’s about time players are selected on their current standard, not reputation.

Notwithstanding his credentials, Postecoglou is also a fitting appointment for symbolic reasons. Having grown up a South Melbourne Hellas supporter, he spent his playing career at his boyhood club, before taking them to two NSL titles in the late 1990s, as well as a Club World Championship in Brazil. His has been a career at the coalface of Australian football.

The question of nationality has not been far from the debate about who should take over from Holger Osieck. Sections of the media, particularly Michael Cockerill and Robbie Slater, have been banging on for some time for an Australian coach to be appointed to the national team.

Others prefer to look simply at the credentials of the coaches in question, rather than the passport, with Craig Foster going as far to say that some of the discussion has reeked of “xenophobia” in his Sunday column for Farifax Media. Certainly Foster has a point, although his own Sam Kekovich on Pim Verbeek during the 2010 World Cup in South Africa would suggest patriotism is indeed the last refuge of the scoundrel.

While too much has already been made of nationality in the current coaching debate, the importance of Postecoglou’s emotional attachment to the local game should not be understated. David Gallop expressed his delight that Postecoglou happened to be "someone who’s learned his football in this country and who lives and breathes the mission of Australian football." For too long, Australians have held a cultural cringe towards the game’s history, cultural position and importance to the nation.

In many ways, Ange Postecoglou is to Australian football as Paul Kelly is to Australian music. Where many Australian musicians entrench the cultural cringe through gratuitous imitation, Kelly spent his career chronicling Australian culture through his songwriting. In several columns for Fairfax Media, as well as numerous media appearances, Postecoglou shows the same careful understanding and critical engagement with his surroundings, highlighting both a fundamental respect and a deep knowledge of the minutiae of Australia’s unique relationship with the world game. Like Kelly, his is a reflective nationalism, not the shouty, chest-beating, face-palm kind.

Moreover, when Postecoglou talks about learning from coaching greats such as Kevin Sheedy, Mick Malthouse and Wayne Bennett, as he did when he took over at Brisbane Roar, we get of a glimpse of a man unburdened by the insecurity that blinds many other football fans, coaches and commentators. In appointing Postecoglou, the FFA have found an ambassador for Australian football, not just a new coach.

Rama Rumours Run Rampant

So the story's going something like this.

Eddie Krncevic has stripped the captaincy off Ramazan Tavsancioglu and given it to Steven O'Dor, for reasons which have not emerged yet in any official capacity. Since then, the situation has deteriorated so much that Rama is out of the side altogether. Rama is a free agent and assessing his options - with a return to South under Eddie's tenure almost impossible. Naturally this has set off a massive torrent of support for Rama and a heap of abuse against Eddie Krncevic and the board. But it's never so cut and dried.

Eddie's appointment as coach was not a universally popular one. His previous stint at the club back in the NSL days ended in controversy, with rumours of transfer impropriety, which it must be noted, have never been definitively established in the public sphere. More recently, with his work as a player agent, it has been assumed that he would try and get work for some of his clients, even though as a coach he can no longer be an agent. Bringing over his son Jesse, despite Jesse's undoubted quality as a striker and our desperate need for one, is just another target to aim at for his detractors.

In his first stint as coach at South, Eddie took over after Mike Peterson upped and left for the Football Kingz - Eddie was left with a weakened squad, and after the betrayal of a favourite son, was granted a bit of leniency. For his second stint as as coach at South, Eddie has replaced Vaughan Coveny, whose contract was not renewed. This time will not be easier. Of course, Horsey is a 'club legend', and all sorts of rumours started about how he was treated poorly by the club. All this ignores the fact that the style of football we played was atrocious, regardless of earning enough points to finish in the finals.

Add in the anti-board agendas of several groups, of whom few have had the temerity to actually say something at an AGM, where they did actually attend; the fact that before this situation started, half the Greeks of soccer-forum.net and even some non-Greeks wondered how a 'Greek' club could have a Turk as captain, a tune which has now changed to focusing on the club's apparent betrayal of Rama. And lastly for now, the fact that Rama's uncle was providing sponsorship to the club as well, and it keeps getting worse and worse.

Now if Eddie's goal was to stamp his authority on the team - and I seriously hope it was - he's seriously messed up this situation. If it's merely a case of not rating Rama as a player, Eddie has obviously gone about conveying that message in the worst possible manner, and it has only emboldened those who had him as a marked man even when his appointment as coach was still an internet rumour. It's also interesting to note that Rama has still been appearing at our Hellenic Cup fixtures, while at the same time also acknowledging that the rest of the squad has not risen up in rebellion against Eddie's decisions and processes. Why this is the case, I do not know.

For what it's worth, I like Rama. He seems to genuinely care about the club, has improved his disciplinary record a great deal, and the players generally seem to look up at him. However, there is also the playing side, which I;'ve felt for some time hasn't improved significantly. His crossing is still very poor, which nullifies his effectiveness as an overlapping player. And he's still having difficulty judging balls going over his head, as well as getting dragged towards the middle far too often. But Eddie's also cut James Stefanou and Eddie Cetkin from the side, meaning that experienced defensive stocks are thin on the ground, and that perhaps Eddie's squad management and people skills aren't exactly crash hot.

Should Rama not return this season, will it mean more opportunities for players from our youth squad, such as Josh Colosimo and James Riccobene? I certainly hope so. Krncevic, as coach of Carlton, despite having a large budget for which to purchase high profile players, which he certainly did, also gave opportunities to young players such as Marco Bresciano, Simon Colosimo and Vince Grella. Several young players have been trialled against the lesser likes in the pre-season, and our under 21s did of course cruise to the title last season, playing some attractive football. And isn't this what having sttrong junior sides is all about? Using them to rebuild and replace without needing to shop around?

I'd say this is going to be fun, but it obviously won't be. Once upon a time this club even sacked Paul Wade, who was the Socceroo captain at the time. In part this was because the coach at the time, Frank Arok, felt Paul Wade wasn't up to it any more; and surely an additional reason would have been because Arok wanted to create his own group with new leadership. I hope that this is what Eddie has been aiming for, and that his methods are proven right. Getting rid of a captain and player with several years at the one club is never easy, and Eddie's success and legacy may well rest on this issue alone. The old maxim that no player, no coach and no fan is bigger than the club is about to get a massive work out.

Meanwhile, I'm going to be in my bomb shelter until this thing blows over.

1995 Dockery Cup Final

The 1995 Dockerty Cup Final, with thanks to our friend Boo once more. Tansel Baser has a great game, Curcija's name gets pronounced differently to what is these days, Frank Arok looks more grizzled than usual. Deano has his surname on his shirt, but no one else does. And what a nice trophy it is. Perhaps one day we can not only play in this competition again, but maybe even win it, too.

First half



Second half and presentation ceremony

Coveny appointed as coach for 2010

They dawdled and delayed, but in the end the club decided to go for man considered as favourite for the task. I suppose this also means the end of Horsey's career - one which will not be remembered for any particular brilliance - even his highlights package is full of tidy finishes almost completely lacking in anything extraordimnary. A player best known for running in straight lines, hitting straight shots and often being used a sub during our glory days up front or on the wing.

And his longevity will not be appreciated in much the same way as that of other former greats. South is notorious for player turnover, but having played so much in the decline years means that Horsey will never get the mass appreciation he deserves. In many ways his career was one of accumulation and attrition - just hanging around for so long means that he will inevitably get some nice achievements - which for Vaughan include 2nd highest league goalscorer and 3rd highest games for South, and most games (64) and goals (28) for the All Whites (the games record is hanging by a thread - if Ivan Vicelich manages to play in both qualifiers against Bahrain he will overtake our man). The fact remains though, if he weren't a half decent player, he'd never have racked up that much game time in the first place.

Being the right man for the job is mostly about hindsight. Frank Arok built the nucleus of our last golden age team, but it's Ange Postecoglou who gets his name on the honour boards. Fernando's stellar 2006 season - 12 goals from midfield and who knows how many set up - carried that team, but John Anastasiadis as coach got his share of plaudits - and perhaps elevated his abilities in the public sphere to beyond those of the reality. Also left to the winds of hindsight are whether it was right to go for someone inxperienced in coaching as opposed to someone etsblished; someone from inside the club and close to much or some of the squad, as opposed to a clubman who has been away for a few years or a complete outsider.

It will be recalled by some that Horsey undertook AFC coaching licence exams during the season - causing him to miss three games - so at least you can see this is certainly something he has been thinking about a lot. On the other hand, much of the VPL is about grinding out results, not about pretty football - which is a problem at South, because the supporters also want something pleasing to the eye, the South tradtion being of attacking football and plenty of goals. David Lugli becomes Vaughan's assistant, after having taken the under 21s to their best finish in years. I wish them all the best of course - but a large part of that is also based upon them succeeding; their success will be the club's success; their failures, the club's also.

Sponsors of yore - Southern Motors

Something a little different for today. For those not in the know, Southern Motors were a sort of large car dealership owned or operated or both by a bloke called George Kotses. Back in the day they were noted for sponsoring quite a few Greek backed soccer clubs in Melbourne, including Heidelberg and South (even being the major sponsor in our championship year in 1998 for example). The company eventually went broke I think, and Kotses started a new dealership somewhere out in the arse end of Brooklyn (and that's saying something) called New Concept Car Sales, the new concept probably being, well, not going broke.

Anyway, the ad below is from happier times, sometime in the mid 1990s. In the clip, Kotses seems happy, Frank Arok is Frank Arok but much quieter, and there's some really random and quite fast Greek being spoken which combined with the dodgy animation of the ball flying all over the place, gives it a fucked up Japanese TV/Mr Sparkle kind of aesthetic. I'm not sure if that was their intention, but hey, just roll with it.