Disappointed, embarrassed - South Melbourne 1 Heidelberg United 2

Normally I'd spend the day after a game like that just getting on with the job of writing this blog, but fuck it if I just could not be bothered with soccer at all yesterday. So I went and watched the Collingwood magoos take on Sandringham yesterday instead.

Throwing away the game like that in the way that we did was a travesty. Not just because it was against Heidelberg, but because undermanned as we were, we managed to look far better than we had in several weeks. Lujic looked like a threat again, Hatzikostas and Jawadi looked good in the middle, even if our back line was a mess. And even though some of our players had absolute nightmares of games - Lakic will surely never play that badly again - there was enough improvement in attack to say that we may just have turned a corner. Oh, Leigh Minopoulos, how did you miss that sitter when you came on? Oh Andy Kecojevic, why couldn't either of your two wonderful freekicks have snuck into the inside of the post instead of ricocheting off it and out? Where was the game sense in the last five minutes? I mean sure, go for the win, but don't throw away the point you've worked so hard to earn!

Then again, considering the shenanigans that happened off the field, I don't know how much I would have enjoyed the win anyway. The behaviour of some of our fans was nothing short of disgraceful. The flares were just the start of it. Despite the pleas from older heads in the week leading up to this contest not to light them in the ground, the calls went unheeded from at least one person.

I should be clear on my position on flares. Firstly, I don't like them from an aesthetic point of view - they smell, they sting my eyes and throat, and I think they look childish and pathetic in comparison to excellent chanting and the colour brought by many and diverse flags and banners. Secondly, the legality of releasing flares is less of an issue to me than the fact that because they're banned at soccer games in Australia, each one lit by one of our fans costs the club money. Now whether you like the board or not is immaterial to this discussion - I'm thinking here of the efforts of the volunteers and staff who bust a gut trying to get a team on the park each week and putting on a professional and well organised show. Thirdly, if you're gonna be a dick and light a flare, at least have the balls to hold it up instead of scurrying away. As for the tosser who threw the flare over the fence, thank goodness you didn't hit the running track. Frankly, if you're so into flares that they take precedence over the enjoyment of the match itself and the efforts of the people working hard to keep the club going, you'd be better off going to watch the gas flares at the casino.

'Lisa, maybe if I'm part of that mob, 
I can help steer it in wise directions.'

Of course there was also the typical sarcastic dropkick reaction of 'oh no, flares, how scary and wrong' - but it's not about the flares, it's about what they represent - a disregard for the club and your fellow supporters. But if only flares were the main problem from Friday night, we could all possibly put it down to some sort of immaturity, and that over time the kids would learn as the older Clarendon Corner heads had to learn.

Unfortunately the flares had to play second fiddle to some younger supporters stealing a banner from the Heidelberg active contingent. On a certain level, I can tolerate accidental stupidity, but planned stupidity - and the banner stealing certainly did seem like a planned affair - that's much less forgivable. This of course kicked off a sequence of events which saw Berger fans rush over to get the banner back and/or remonstrate, and then saw some push and shove after the match. Whatever anyone thinks of the South - Bergers rivalry, it is not a violent or angry one. Being both Greek-founded and supported clubs, many of us know and have known friends an relatives from both sides of the ledger. In the days when people went to more than one game a weekend, South fans would go with their Berger mates to their games, and they would reciprocate.

As for the Berger fans who apparently tried to storm the corporate areas after the ground announcer's 'eggs on toast' jibe, get over yourselves. It's not like he called you Bulgarians or something equally stupid.

Without wishing to absolve the guilty parties in any way, nor appearing to join the 'boys will be boys' crowd, security's efforts on the night were poor. The separation of the two sets of fans at the end of the game, the lack of an obvious presence around Clarendon Corner after some members of Enosi 59 had already lit flares before the match on Clarendon Street - surely Blue Thunder have been around these leagues and clubs long enough to have got even the basics right, but alas that was not the case.

Lest this tirade be taken as a slur against every person in Enosi 59 or their hangers on or supporters, it's not. There are good guys in the group, who've added to the atmosphere at games, and I've been more than happy to have a chat with those guys. Someone who should know better made the allegation recently that I am anti-active and pro picnic support. My response then, as it is now, is that I'm not against active support - I'm against dickheads whether they're chanting types or sitting down and enjoying the game on their own terms types. I'm still of the opinion that being a dickhead is not a genetic condition, and if that is the case, being a dickhead must therefore be a personal decision - and I've yet to meet someone who likes a dickhead.

The problems that pale in comparison to the other issues but which are still worth a mention

There's been an older guy turning up recently to the bay that Clarendon Corner uses who's been using a tabla drum. Some a re for it, some are against it, but I don't mind, it adds to the atmosphere and the guy can actually play. On Friday night though for some reason upon entering the ground, I noticed that he was singing along to a karaoke version of 'Livin La Vida Loca'. He also had Lefteri's trumpet tune hooked up to his sound system on wheels. to which many of the longer standing Clarendon Corner people objected, on the grounds (justifiably I think) of artificiality. Whether or not current trumpet player Bruno is at a game and/or willing to play the trumpet (and on this occasion he was), putting the sound effect on like that while well intentioned is just one step closer to taking away the fan made aspect of supporter groups, and that as such Stathi's vocalised version of the trumpet tune has more heart and character than a pre-recorded tune ever could. The situation seemed to resolve itself.

Crowd
700-800

Crisis at the canteen
Our crowd counter was disappointed that the canteen was no longer willing to serve the Fantastic brand cup noodle, because 'it would take too long to boil the water'.

Celebrity watch
George Calombaris was in attendance.

Next game
Tuesday night at home against a Green Gully side fresh from thumping Bentleigh Greens 4-0 - Bentleigh's first league defeat of the season.

FFA Cup news
We've been drawn against Queensland side Palm Beach, with the match to be played on the Gold Coast. The game will be at Robina Stadium, to be played on Wednesday 29th July at 7:30PM.

Being South Melbourne, the most important club in Australia, our game will be one of those broadcast by Fox Sports. I assume this means that we won't be having our own highlights up on youtube or on the SMFC TV show on Aurora. For those unable to be there in person, I assume some fans will gather at a pub somewhere to watch the game, and I'll let you all know where that will be should that happen. That's what happens when you don't have a social club.

There's also this:

South are marking their return to the big time by wearing their heritage strip of white with a red V, the colours of South Melbourne United, one of the three teams that merged more than 50 years ago to form the current club

Juniper Hill's home uniform.. Julius
Stoker is the club's games record
holder with 314 league and cup
appearances. The design was created
to my spec by 'paquebot', owner of
AS Uijeongbu 07, five time Korean
champions/

which as always has proved divisive on historical, cultural and aesthetic grounds. My stance on the matter is pretty clear, and dare I say it, progressive, rather than conservative (which I've nothing against) or reactionary (you know who you are). I'm not in favour of dislodging the blue and white of the home strip, but I reckon that the heritage strip should be made the permanent away strip. But then again, I am one of those people who likes the aesthetics of the heritage jersey, shorts and hooped socks combo, as well having what I see as a historical wrong being rectified.

The concerns however that it's being used a gimmick have some validity. Here's hoping that it's not just a one off event, and further more that the red vee is tasteful (as per the image adjacent) and not like some of the really huge South Melbourne United ones or heaven forbid, St George-Illawarra Dragons.

Actually, on reflection I may just be a rampant ideologue on this matter myself - after all, I did get a more a talented person than myself to customise my Hatriick team's home uniform to resemble the South Melbourne Hellas heritage strip. On that front, if it were at all possible, I'd also love to see the use of the 1966 Bristol Rovers style jersey, which is also a pearler. Then again, I once argued for QPR style hoops, if the right kind of sponsor could be found to augment the jersey.

Nick Epifano cuts Dundee United trial short

Unfortunately due to family reasons I've had to return back to Australia . Thanks @dundeeunitedfc for the experience- until next time 👍

— Nick Epifano (@Nickepa07) July 2, 2015

Also apparently done his hamstring, not sure of the severity. He was apparently in attendance at the game on Friday.

Speaking of South Melbourne United
While using Trove's newspaper database while doing some research on a project I'm working on, I came across an article from 1936 which talked about that club's very early days, and their application to use the Port Melbourne Football Ground - by which I assume they mean the venue commonly known as the North Port Oval. This is intriguing to me not just for its South Melbourne connections - and why did South Melbourne United form separately from the South Melbourne club that was already in existence? - , but also because of the fact that Port Melbourne as a district was, to my knowledge at least, virtually unknown as a soccer playing area. South Melbourne, Albert Park, Middle Park, St Kilda, South Yarra and Prahran all had lasting and consistent representation either as clubs or venue locations, but Port Melbourne is conspicuous by its absence in the records.

Upon further investigation, it appears that Royal Caledonians had a made an attempt two years earlier to get access to North Port, so it wasn't a new phenomenon. At a meeting to discuss South Melbourne United's application, one councillor said if it went ahead it would be 'the end of the Port Melbourne Football Club', an extraordinary claim to make considering that South Melbourne United had not even fielded a senior team yet. The councillor who stood against South Melbourne United's application was one JP Crichton, a long serving members of the municipality, many times mayor, and on at least on one occasion president of the Port Melbourne Football Club. Self-interest and self-preservation perhaps? Port Melbourne had finished two games clear at the bottom of the VFA ladder in 1936, but surely they couldn't have been that scared of soccer, being part of an Australian Rules club that already had such a storied history? I haven't yet been able ti find any further details of what happened to United's application, but it is an interesting story for both ground usage buffs and South Melbourne soccer history buffs - had United settled down in Port Melbourne, the events which lead to our club's founding some 24 years later would have been quite different.

Final thought
Don't go too hard on them on the blog he said. I gave him my best attempt at an affected death stare, but maybe he had a point.

Paramnesia - Northcote City 1 South Melbourne 2

Paramnesia: a condition or phenomenon involving distorted memory or confusions of fact and fantasy, such as confabulation or déjà vu.

Reduplicative paramnesia: the delusional belief that a place or location has been duplicated, existing in two or more places simultaneously, or that it has been 'relocated' to another site.

Everything seems the same, and yet somehow different. There are fewer people here than usual, but it's hard to tell upon what basis I'm making that assertion. There is more grass on the field than last year, but I don't think the ball will play any truer. One of the Hellas oldies walks past and asks if we're the team in blue or the team in white. I also learn that swearing is bad, unless you're in a position of power. Someone asks me who the moderator is on smfcboard, and this atheist must answer like a theist: One cannot know the Mod, but the Mod is there; the Mod sees all and knows all; we cannot know the Mod's motives, but we must trust that Mod knows best, and that He loves us and has our best interests at heart.

Inside Northcote's social club, the state knockout cup trophy is not the Dockerty Cup, but a giant light bulb. The back corner has been worked on, but the paint job just makes it look bare and sullen, devoid of life and activity. The new Northcote logo that once impressed me is now less impressive once I'm informed that it comes from a Greek cement company's (owned by Italians) logo. Where the table with the sauces used to be is now as fully fledged candy bar as I've ever seen at a soccer club. Chocolate bars, packets of chips, muesli bars, giant 'cookies', and two varieties of Skittles. I go for a pack of sour Skittles, but resist the call to turn it into Skittlebräu; one vice at a time is enough.

We start off the game in a promising fashion, with Andy Brennan doing his usual thing of needing to get three messy crosses in before finding his range. I get the feeling that he'd have made an excellent 18th century artillery man, but that's just probably me having been influenced by one of the DVDs on the history of war machines that one of my brothers borrowed from the library. Eventually a Brennan cross finds Lujic, but in another twist which has me doubting the validity of this reality, Lujic doesn't score from it; instead the ball spills loose and Matthew Theodore tucks it away for 1-0. It's nice to have some variation on the same old theme.

Unusually, we're going towards the car park end in the first half, and because there are games going on at Darebin, I keep hearing whistles from those games, but play keeps going, as my arms become exhausted from trying to block out the sun. Northcote regroup, and soon start piling on the pressure, hitting the post, and then duly get their reward. Defensively we are all over the shop, playing too narrow as in the game against Port. At halftime as I'm making my way around to the western side of the ground, an old man starts saying to us that Hellas is dead, the Greeks are dead. He's not ranting, or screaming - he's speaking in a calm, matter of fact voice, albeit one that will tolerate no argument on the matter. He does not offer the chance of redemption if we repent, however such repentance may be achieved; his statement is made with the knowledge that it is irrefutable, and that anyone who dares try comes across as far more mad than they could ever make the old man out to be.

Dane Milovanovic throws himself sideways into the celebrations following
Milos Lujic's winner. Photo:: Ian Syson.

Choosing to stand behind the goal ends at Northcote means missing out on much of the game, and thus the events at the other end of the field are not entirely clear; and because of this Northcote's many chances may not be as close as they appear, even if the groans of disappointment at the other end seem to indicate that they were close. At our end, even though the sun is no longer in my eyes, I still can't see much of the field even as we begin to reassert control. Being in the bunched up Clarendon Corner means that much of the field is obscured, including most of the goal face. Fate is such though that what would turn out to be Lulic's winner ended up going in at that one piece of empty net that I could see among the miniature throng around me, before the throng rushed forward to celebrate with the team. There were close calls after that, too, and seven inexplicable minutes of injury time played by the referee, but we held on, and we end the first half of the season undefeated; and yet not alone in that regard, and with a fear that it will all come crumbling down. How sad and fearful have I become that even this glorious run can still not be fully enjoyed?

THAT... was Edna Krabappel. You only get one chance with Edna Krabappel. I hope you're happy.
After the match Gains and I went to AAMI Park to watch the Melbourne Storm take on the South Sydney Rabbitohs, because Gains had a coupon that granted the holder two general admission tickets for the price of one. Despite getting to the ground at 6:30 (an hour before kickoff), we find that the general admission tickets are all sold out, and I was not interested in the $32 'general admission plus' tickets which would have had us sitting in one of the worst spots in the ground (which from my limited live rugby league watching experience is pretty much everywhere that isn't an elevated and central sideline position) and paying twice as much as we'd planned for the privilege of doing so. So we did the sensible thing by walking away, and going back into the city for some Korean food.

Next game
Away to Oakleigh Cannons. Something stupid will probably happen. Also, we will probably lose.

Luke Eyles, who's been rumoured as a possible signing, in action for
Hobart Olympia against Devonport Strikers, Photo: Walter Pless.

More Tasmanians, more often
So while other clubs have been making some relatively high profile moves, we'd been relatively quiet - that is until yesterday or the day before or the day before that (and who could be bothered checking), when we announced the signing of attacking midfielder Nick Morton. Morton was signed from Melbourne Heart's NPL side, though originally he was from South Hobart, where his father Ken is of course the coach. In possibly more evidence that our recruiting has been taken over by infamous Tasmanian people smuggler David Clarkson, I've also heard that we may be signing another Tasmanian, Luke Eyles from Hobart Olympia, who was once a defender but is now a left sided attacking midfielder. No news yet on a defender or back up goalkeeper, nor who'll be let go to make room for these signings, nor or information on Nick Epifano's 'overseas move' - which I'm starting to believe does not actually exist.

What's taking the προξενιό so long to resolve itself?
Women, am I right fellas? Can't live with them, can't really call yourself a broad based (no pun intended) and compelling club without them. But seriously, we, that is SMFC, and them, that is SMWFC, are getting along reasonably well these days, or so we've been lead to believe. We're even exchanging coy love letters out in public. No more sending your best mate to get on his BMX to go send a message to her best friend to pass on to her. This is getting serious.

@smfcmike @smwfc_gabrielle @SMWFC @WLeague Gabrielle is a fantastic leader of the womens. Both clubs have never been closer, much respect.

— Leo Athanasakis (@LAthanasakis) May 10, 2015

@LAthanasakis @smfcmike @SMWFC @WLeague appreciated the invite. Girls were thrilled. Here's to bigger and better!!

— Gabrielle SMWFC (@smwfc_gabrielle) May 10, 2015

Still, I am getting impatient. The women's NPL criteria has been released, and I assume that SMWFC will be applying. We keep talking about how much closer we're getting. There's obviously much to be gained from the experience. So what's the hold up, people? Is it that we don't have a social club house ready for the marriage? Is there disagreement about the προίκα they'll bring? Are her parents unimpressed by Leo's apparent inability to properly knot a tie, and why should that even matter? Can't we, simply by being together, make each other better?

Yeah, fuck yas, ya fucken wogs! And I'm allowed to say that, because I am also effnik.

George Calombaris is Victory and SMH until he dies,  but it seems the SMH part died a long time ago if his non appearance at probably any South game since the NSL ended (let alone any sort of meaningful advocacy) is anything to go by. It must be like when Jennifer Gibbons killed herself so that her twin sister June might be able to live a normal life. Calombaris is of course the Ghost of Hellas Future when it comes to abandoning South in part to leverage his fame. There was of course George Kapiniaris, the Ghost of Hellas Past, who loved South but who could not love it in this condition, and who was like me probably at the Richmond-Collingwood game yesterday. There's also of course Nick Giannopoulos, who I'm not sure if he ever loved soccer, or even being Greek, or found it just a useful way to leverage his one dimensional career (and look what happened when he tried to be two dimensional). And thus we now have Calombaris, the modern Greek-Australian spokesman of behalf of the poulimenoi and his own shame re-interpreted as evidence of the game now being inclusive. And so by some strange sophistry, assimilation = multiculturalism, which is OK because at least you can choose which of his overpriced souvs you want to be served cold.

Now maybe Calombaris really believes his own hype, or feels he's doing Australian soccer justice by being its public face in this way, but I wonder if he would have choked on his τραχανά when he saw the Herald Sun's editorial on the morning of the A-League grand final. Would he have been offended at the soccer hating Hun trying to get some leverage off this event? Would he have become squeamish at the way South Melbourne Hellas is put down in the article? Or would he have felt pride in seeing a part of his own rhetoric in the form of temporarily official doctrine?

Oh, we but we had to break a few eggs! Does that mean that the ends justify the means, or is that simply too coarse of a phrase, one lacking the metaphorical flourishes that will hide the atrocities committed? I have written too many times already about the farce that is the FFA Cup especially in its supposed role of healing the game. But there's not just one version of Australian soccer healing - there's also that old chestnut of  merging the stats! A wonderful gesture (when it isn't put down immediately by those new dawners who can't stand the thought of soccer having existed now that we have football instead), but I'll raise the stakes even further: fuck you and all your records, when you don't even have the balls to let us compete. The company man tells his 250 million strong global audience that some team won a record third equalling Australian title; Australian soccer historians wishing to use this bloke to write the foreword for their book may want to rethink that strategy. An Australian soccer book! The shining star told me to write a book, without knowing that even before it got to the bit where I became re-engrossed in South, that almost all of it would be a miserablist dirge focusing on personal exclusion, only to now be institutionally excluded. Another bloke says I am Bob Ellis, and that is the greatest insult of all, being compared to a man who went from the eloquence and pathos of his defeatist weekly eulogies on Tony Biggs' show on Triple R during the Howard years, to becoming the most insufferable and vile curmudgeon of Australian politics.

'To live without hope is to cease to live' said some writer whose work I've never read. But old mate Fyodor only had to deal with the Tsar and on occasion God himself, whereas we have to deal with a far more brutal tyrant. Existence is resistance someone else said, and that's partly true, but AD Hope wasn't too fond of those 'Whose boast is not: "we live" but "we survive", and he probably had a point. Survival is in one sense instinctive, and therefore hardly an accomplishment in its own right. Oh, but there's a glimmer of hope yet another person said! Didn't you read the Whole of Football document? It says NPL teams will be considered for future entry into the A-League! So get cracking and entice those heaving untapped masses with a lot of spare time on their hands and understanding families, who don't believe the hype about evil ethnic clubs, and who go out of their way to find out what exists outside the mainstream, and build up your supporter base the good old fashioned way - a method which just so happens to be the complete opposite of what every franchise in the top tier has done.

Nah, seriously, come to South, it's a lot of fun.

Around the grounds
Ten loukoumades later...
The option was go to Port vs Knights, Oakleigh vs Bentleigh, or stay home and sulk. Tempting as the final option was, the promise of loukoumades (albeit modernised ones as opposed to the crispy, gnarly ones you get at Greek πανηγύρια) was too good of an offer to refuse. One of the security guards, whom I've since learned is an insane soccer-forum quasi-celebrity, informs me with jocularity that South aren't playing here tonight, and that while  Frankly, I'm more interested in promised desserts, and eight traditionally flavoured ones later (with not enough syrup, but that's the style these days), and one each of peanut butter and jam, and some Nutella hazelnut concoction (stolen off Gains), and I felt like I'd accomplished the goal I'd set out to achieve for the evening. The match itself was a bit of a bore, end to end, but lacking in quality. The game finished 1-1.

But that's not all! On the train on the way home, a very ethnically diverse group of kids were on the train (so diverse they could have been included in a Melbourne Victory flyer), and one of them started playing N.W.A.'s Straight Outta Compton on their phone. Then a North Melbourne supporter who was probably in her mid 60s asked them to turn it down. And the kid with the phone did! Somehow that seems to go against the spirit of what N.W.A. were about, but at least the slightly mad North Melbourne fan with the piercing through his lip started rapping the lyrics. Cool story, bro.

Final thought
It only occurred to me one year later that I should have titled the post from last year's game here 'Horses for Courses'. What a missed opportunity.

Assorted reactions to FFA's Whole of Football Plan

Now I'm not going to go into too much detail about a document whose contents were already decided before they'd even conducted their infamous box ticking consultation from 2014 (for some reason the most popular article ever on this blog). So they want to be the number one sport and cement their autocratic rule by abolishing the states. They told us that months ago - and if we're fair dinkum, there is nothing in this document that should surprise any of us. So here are a bunch of mostly hysterical reactions to this announcement.

Misplaced anger
Some people have been upset by the For Modern Football site's satirical take on South's press release. If anyone should be upset though it should be me, because I was doing this kind of stuff years ago.

Cynical
The stated aim of making soccer more affordable to play, especially junior registrations, is a motherhood statement that should be eclipsed by certain realities of the situation, including the backgrounds and statements of those putting forward that rhetoric.

When during the NPL consultation process former FFV CEO Mark Rendell compared the then potential cost of the NPL junior fees to a sport like swimming (as well as classifying South's then $3,500 program as a 'Rolls Royce' program); when Tom Kalas tried to justify the cost of that South program by comparing it to dance, music or karate; and when Kyle Patterson compared the costs of junior soccer to his kid's violin lessons - what does this mean in the context of making soccer more affordable for kids?

At best it's another motherhood statement in a document full of them; at worst, it's insincere about soccer's attempts to go middle class. It's language which speaks to an aspirational segment of Australian society which is not concerned primarily with cost, but with value. In the same way that increasing numbers of middle class people scrimp, save or make sacrifices to send their children to expensive private schools - and to hell with those left behind the in the public system - it's the perceived value that's more important than the price of that sacrifice.

[A side note - whether there is also a cultural and class consciousness element to this is also worth considering. Several years ago on a certain forum, a bloke posted his observation that some middle class English people were moving towards the upper class game of rugby union, in part because of the persistent and/or residual association of soccer with the working class. I don't know if that observation was accurate, and the English class system is obviously quite different to Australia's, but there is I think something intriguing about that assertion, and something that could very well be applicable to those who see soccer as providing a more cosmopolitan sporting option than the insular and boorish (bogan?) Aussie Rules and rugby league cultures.]

In other words, soccer is now a middle class game. The participant is only useful so long as they can be leveraged for more and more money. It's not about fun any more, or belonging to a club, or even being able to take up one sport during the winter and another during the summer. Each soccer loving individual in this country has had a monetary value placed upon their head, whether they are a player, parent, volunteer, fan, media person or even - and while undoubtedly a sign of the times, also a bit frightening - someone mostly interested in soccer video games. And like the cult-ish Evangelical mega-churches the 'we are football' branding and rhetoric reeks of these days, it's bring your credit card with you when you come to worship.

Of course if your bank balance is smaller, or if your involvement in the game generates minimal value for the upper tiers - or heaven forbid, doesn't agree with every part of this Great Leap Forward - you can go and get stuffed. This is disturbing to me because in my line of work I'm required (and want) to see the best in people and their potential. FFA does the opposite. The concept of people getting into and enjoying soccer as an end in itself has been thrown under the bus.

As increasingly seems to be the case these days, I'm reminded of a comment Melbourne Heart CEO Scott Munn made at an academic conference a few years back, about the relative pointlessness of school visits by his organisation.

As an aside, one of the more curious things that was said by Munn, was that one off attempts at trying to convert people to your cause like school clinics were almost doomed to fail (he used some clever analogy about pissing on your own leg - I can't remember how it went, but it was quite funny). 

This was a point expanded upon at last year's Whole of Football Plan meeting in Melbourne, when the failure to leverage soccer's existing base for the A-League was something which FFA wanted corrected (fair enough), but was a point nevertheless which showed how different the priorities of those at the top and those at the bottom were.

The FFA... seemed to think that things like school visits and absurdly inflated participation numbers - which included intangibles like kids playing street soccer - were all about converting kids into being A-League fans. The difference with those of the community club sector was the community club representatives were showing annoyance at the lack of school visits not because of the missed opportunity of getting kids to follow the A-League, but to get them involved with the game of soccer as opposed to other sports.

Some people think soccer is first and foremost a great game to be involved in. Others think the most important thing is not how much you enjoy the experience, but how much they can fleece you for. I guess this is why I'm not in marketing.

Gallows humour

SMFCBLUES07 wrote:

I'll do the honours here Press release: smfc wish to announce since there is no future in football we have abandoned ship and will refocus our efforts in strip clubs not social room

The one with a forced literary allusion
In Toni Morrison's novel Beloved,  the slaves learn that 'definitions belong to the definers, not the defined'. The FFA has spent the past ten years applying that lesson. Soccer is, among other things, wogs, violence, incompetence and marginality. Football is other things: good things, Australian things, mainstream things. Most importantly, FFA has learned from the disparagement that soccer received from other codes over the decades, and vowed that it would never succumb to the same fate - not only this, but they have striven to take it to the next level, by appropriating the language of the oppressor and using it as a successful example of wedge politics.

Terms like new dawn and bitter, mainstream and ethnic, new football and old soccer  - they all create division, and almost everyone has bought into them, this writer included. From our side of the fence, there have been those like the long gone Pumpkin Seed Eaters who have attempted creating other names, such as foundation clubs; journalists, when they weren't completely on the bandwagon, traditional clubs; FFV and FFA when they tried to find the most patronising PC term possible, community clubs. The net effect of all these definitions though was to point towards two directions - the past and the future.

Regardless of whether one got sucked into using the terms created by those with the power, or those without it - even my facetious and petty 'I am soccer' catchphrase in response to 'we are football' - the debate has been had on the powerful's terms. It's too late now to to start using different language in the hope that it will somehow turn everything around, but it's not too late to define ourselves outside of the parameters that have set. How we would do that, and what would be appropriate terms to use is an etymological process I'd be interested in seeing developed.

Official
The club released its own response, and it's another in a recent line of measured posts.

MEDIA RELEASE – THE POSSIBLE END OF ASPIRATIONAL FOOTBALL
May 6, 2015 

South Melbourne FC welcomes Football Federation Australia opening up the dialogue about Australia’s football future with the ‘Whole of Football Plan’ released on 5 May 2015. 

However, the current FFA Plan spells the possible end for aspirational football in this country. 

The proposed Plan currently provides no obvious club pathway that allows any club that aspires to develop and improve their process, systems and connection with their communities – or more importantly succeeds on the field – to be promoted as occurs throughout the football world. 

We are also disappointed that the FFA does not detail plans for further development of a second tier of Australian football, to facilitate the intended expansion of the Hyundai A-League and ultimately the implementation of a viable promotion and relegation system. 

Promotion and relegation would assist the improvement of the quality of our top division and provide a breeding ground for players, coaches, officials and aspiring clubs. 

More generally, a key component of all successful ‘plans’ is ‘implementation detail.’ We are keen to review that detail when it gets released. 

The FFA has certainly made great in-roads for our code’s development (for example football broadcasting and the launching of the Westfield FFA Cup), however we are mindful that strategic errors have also been made in the past. 

As a key stakeholder of football in Australia, we will be contacting the FFA to understand and obtain greater detail about their planning processes and to ensure the long term viability and growth of our club. 

Leo Athanasakis, SMFC President
Tom Kalas, SMFC Director

Whatever I may think of the club's approach over these past few years, I'm not going to go out and fault it. They tried to play nice, they tried to be conciliatory, they tried to be collegiate. Melbourne Knights tried to be difficult, tried to dig their heels in, tried to make a scene. No issue with that either. The fact is if they don't want you, they don't want you, and no amount of niceness or hostility is going to change things. Still, it'd be nice if some people, outside of those who are with us now, could have made a bit more of a fuss, if only for show.

Abandoned

This photo is the one the club chose to use to illustrate its press release. I made a comment on the club's Facebook page that it was slightly mischievous. It's a pointed reminder of what we once were, and where we are now. More importantly, it's a reminder that those who could, at the very least, speak up for us - not in an outrageous way, but in a way that they believe that we are still relevant - have chosen not to do so.

That the photo contains two of our most beloved members adds to the sting. And where's former president George Donikian? Spruiking the A-League semi-final with George Calombaris. Where is the Greek community?  At the A-League or the footy, or making fun of us on our Facebook page, telling us we're doomed, that we should give up because they have, and that there's a newer, shinier toy to play with. To be marginalised by the authorities is one thing, but to be marginalised by your own, that's the biggest insult. Making fun of us because we don't get the crowds we used to, as if the people pointing that out aren't part of that problem. And where will Enosi 59 be this week?

Boy, I really didn't see that one coming/Defeatist
Now the part of the announcement that most South fans (plus assorted remnants of old soccer and their associated new dawn sympathisers) picked up on was the FFA finally putting to rest promotion and relegation to the A-League. I am of course on the record as stating that I don't believe promotion is suitable for Australian soccer, and I still hold to that position. But no matter how harebrained I think that idea is, there is something I admire in it, and which seems to have been lost in the wash - and that is that at some level a belief in promotion and relegation is actually an endorsement in FFA, the last ten years and in the future of Australian soccer. It puts forward the belief that there is a viable future soccer in Australia, not just for the 'mainstream' but also the 'traditional'. It's a belief that's not about the old antagonisms, but about sharing a space.

If that's an example of the circumstances of the past ten years creating a sort of forced humility, then so be it. The problem with FFA's approach of incrementally increasing the number of teams in the top flight is that there is still no detail about what plan they'll use. Their own history on the matter is full of contradictions: last October Frank Lowy says that promotion and relegation will happen soon; now they rule it out; David Gallop says they'll fish where the fish are from now on, but now adds that any region with a population of 500,000 will be looked at, despite the problems of Central Coast and North Queensland; they briefly mention in the Whole f Football document that applications for an A-League licence from an NPL team would be possible, but offer no details, no pathway, no method.

Absurd (sans Simpsons reference)
So how do we get back to the top? If the A-League teams monopolise the majority of youth development, if no matter how well you do on and off the park you're effectively locked out, where's the incentive to excel by the processes of reform and self-improvement and by trying to follow the rules such as they exist in the NPL? To merely achieve the honour of being the longest lasting of the ethnic club museum pieces? When I asked on Twitter, rhetorically of course, for someone, anyone, to at least show us the hoops that we need to jump through to make the grade, Mark Bosnich offered to explain it to myself along with the others involved in the relevant discussion, in person next time he comes to Melbourne.

@jgrb @PaveJusup @pavlaki1969 simple,u guys r in Melbourne yes? When I'm down next time let me take u 2 lunch and listen 2 ur fears.xmb

— Mark Bosnich (@TheRealBozza) May 5, 2015

While I appreciate the gesture, and would happily take part in such a meeting, I'm curious as to what Bosnich thinks it will achieve. Does he have some special insight or inside knowledge that's not available to the rest of the soccer public?

Absurd (with Simpsons reference)

What I imagine Mark Bosnich will feel like if he ever follows through with his promise to meet with the bitters.

Personal
This isn't just a story about old soccer fans, or South fans in particular. This is a story that has deep resonance to me as an individual. Now I've never run a club, but I have the utmost respect for those people that do put their hand up to do it these days - even when I disagree with them, and even when they fail. No one is closer to the coal face than they are in terms of seeing the problems and institutional injustices every day, and no one understands them better.

But having written this blog for seven and a half years, and having been involved in the online arguments for long before that, I feel I have a unique relationship to this problem. Getting reconnected with South Melbourne in 2006, and having my writing on the forums praised and encouraged (especially by Ian Syson) has lead to a number of peculiar outcomes.

Firstly, for better and for worse I have become the chief voice of South Melbourne fans outside of what the club controls and what some fans on certain forums put out. My self-declared desire to be the reasonable one, to play a straight bat so to speak, has won me some admirers; but the overall effect has been that the necessity and rigour of trying to fine tune the arguments combined with the increasing and ongoing marginalisation of South means that I have found myself backed into an ideological corner.

I'm not alone in that corner, but that's not really the point. There have been plenty of times when I've been jubilant or outraged, cautiously optimistic or maudlin, inspired or defeatist - these are the general swings and roundabouts of being involved with the game at any level. The point here is that because of South Melbourne I have ended up with the career of sorts that I have now, and the option to be broader and more engaged with Australian soccer such as it exists these days.

Every few months I end up having a discussion with Ian Syson where he worries about my own increasing marginalisation in the soccer writing world, a world where he thinks I can contribute intelligent and cogent arguments to a wider reading audience than I do now. And yet every time we have this conversation, I find some myself being more adamant that I can't make myself be the kind of writer that Syson (and others) would want me to be; and instead of embracing those possibilities of taking an interest in and writing for a broader audience, with each passing year I find my focus getting narrower, and my outlook become one that can allow fewer compromises and extensions of faith and trust.

While a measure of this attitude is inevitably down to my being an introvert, a large part of it is because by associating myself so strongly with South Melbourne, I have been made smaller and more insular by the circumstances of our decline, and my reaction towards those whom I hold responsible. Thus as South has been marginalised culturally, so have I, and I can imagine that at times this is a feeling that many South fans have felt over the last ten years or so.

And while I'm a doom and gloom merchant by trade, the fact is that I don't like partaking in defeatism for the sake of defeatism. A former friend, from back in the days when I was involved with left-wing student politics at Melbourne University, who had me pegged as a hopeless pessimist, later told me that she'd been mistaken; that rather than being an outright pessimist, I was a foolhardy optimist, who when my expectations weren't met, descended into cynicism and irony as a coping mechanism. Amateur psychology it may have been, but the fact that she took the time to think about it resonated with me as much as the content of the message itself.

I resolved then to lower my expectations, to be more cautious. But no matter how much you try to do that, we as human beings inevitably see and come to understand these things through our own prism. In that way, South fans see this plan as hostile to our interests. Outside of us, an acquiescent and largely apathetic soccer public just goes along with it. All the pride, the incapacitating anger, the depression that we experience is at best for those outside of our sphere seen as a regrettable and ultimately forgettable novelty.

Having by and large conformed to the new regime, outsiders do not understand the pressure that exists to conform to or engage with this regime - and that by not doing so it means that you become smaller, narrower, and seen as selfish almost by default, when all you as a dedicated South fan see is your loyalty to the cause. I know this, because having been briefly on the other side of this schism, I've learned the arguments from both sides.

We have collectively been made smaller by the experience. There are people who have lost their passion for the game entirely, while others have given up the ghost on the national team. On the latter point, despite my diminished passion for the Socceroos, I never thought that I'd get to the point where I felt my relationship to the national team would have felt like it had been poisoned by South's predicament, but that's where I am now. It takes a certain level of intestinal fortitude to resist, which at times becomes too much to bear - when seen from the outside, it seems as if all sense of perspective is lost

There were many times when I was writing this post where I had to stop because I was so angry and despondent. That we care that much should be seen as a strength, not a weakness; but how do we convince not only others but ourselves, too, of that fact?

Pragmatic fatalism
So what do we do now? The same thing we always do. Support the club, try our best to make it bigger and better despite all the obstacles that we face. In that way we not only honour the work being put in now, but the history of the club as a whole.

South make it eight in a row - South Melbourne 2 Bentleigh Greens 1

If this match report is even worse than usual, it's because I was busy chatting with interstate visitors, often not about the game at all.

We watched the under 20s get done 5-2 in what ended up being a bit of a rout in the second half, as well as the sandbagging of the new fangled sponsor boards so they wouldn't fly off onto the running track or the field of play like those from the last couple of years.

Discussed the awesomeness of this post, and of course Michael Lynch's 2012 VPL season preview, which inspired said post.

After second placed Oakleigh had cruised past the Knights on Friday night - more on that in the around the grounds section - the gap between us was once again closed to one point. Bentleigh for their part had coughed up their first loss of the year last week, meaning anything other than a win here would put them in a very difficult position at this early stage of the season.

Of course I ended up slagging off Mothers Day, and after being asked which public/religious/Hallmark holiday I wasn't against, I ended up with Royal Melbourne Show Day, which that jerk Kennett took away from us.

This is what happens when you use people's Twitter
handles instead of their proper names. Disappointed
now that Leigh didn't go for something more exotic.

And let's not forget the anguish caused by this result, or the cosmic injustice of this game.

When you've won seven league games in a row to start the season, and there are no injuries or suspensions to force your hand, it's kinda hard to change your starting eleven. And so it was that we fielded the same starting lineup for another week, though at least some of the fringe players managed to get some game time on the Wednesday against Berwick in the cup.

While it wasn't a uniformly quality game, it was exciting for pretty much the entirety of the 90 minutes and the five that the ref added on to the end. The first half was Bentleigh's, the second half ours. While we weren't without our chances in the first half, our poor final pass let us down time and again. At the other end, Jason Saldaris pulled off some fine saves to keep us at level pegging at half time. Bentleigh defended deep and in numbers, but were able to transition quickly as well as spread the play well to wide areas.

Fucken Cypriots - how do they work? Also Ernie Tapai, fridge magnets, Redheads nightclub, and for some reason former Heidelberg and Port Melbourne player Arthur Vatsanis.

The second half was better from us in at least starting to win the midfield, but the game got scrappier and our killer pass still wasn't there yet. The good thing was that Lujic managed to pounce on a loose ball, and it was us that took the lead rather than them. Did it change the game, or was that goal reflective of changes that had already happened? I can't really say for sure, but it probably came at just the right moment (don't most opening goals?)

I explained again the issue with the social club to people unfamiliar with the situation.

You, Strawberry, hit a home run. Photo: Cindy Nitsos

Lujic should have had a second a minute later when comical defending by Bentleigh on the edge of their 18 yard box saw the goalmouth lay open. Unfortunately Lujic's poke towards goal took a deflection and ended up rolling wide. But then the most obvious substitution in the history of mankind happened - obvious because it has happened so many times already this season in this exact same way - Leigh Minopoulos came on for Nick Epifano. And that caused the second most predictable thing to happen on an NPL field in 2014, that being Minopoulos being involved in a South Melbourne goal, this time as scorer, after he sucked in the Bentleigh defender with a dummy shot, and then tucked away yet another goal to add to his super-sub reputation.

Bentleigh was by far the toughest opponent we've faced so far in 2014, and despite the win - eight league wins in a row by the way - there were flaws exposed that will need management. Along the wings in particular, Bentleigh often got through far too easily - thankfully the desperation defending by James Musa and Michael Eagar got us out of enough sticky situations. Saldaris' kicking was erratic, but his command of the six yard box also left a little to be desired. That was conceded after Michael Eagar was substituted late as a precautionary measure (after getting copping a nasty blow) was also probably no coincidence, as the Michael Eagar Fan Club will tell you. One look at the injury crisis at Melbourne Knights will tell you how quickly the limited depth at pretty much all NPL clubs gets tested when even just a couple of injuries hit.

The people who I assume actually watched the game reckon Iqi Jawadi had a great game and was probably BOG, so who am I to disagree? And does it matter that we're not that thrashing teams in the way that Oakleigh are? Apparently not. And I'll tell you something else - if you're waiting for the round where Oakleigh and Bentleigh are due to take points off one another, you're going to have to wait until round 19, the same week we meet Northcote for the first time. If it wasn't for the fact that everyone will play everyone else twice, you could have sworn that the FFV got the fixturing committee from the AFL to do the NPL fixtures for this year.

Next week
Pascoe Vale at home. They're near the bottom, but have been more than competitive in most games.

Ichthys
After being disappointed by the FFV's highlights of our win at Ballarat - there was more to the second half than a solitary goal kick - I settled in to watch SMFC TV last Tuesday, and instead got fishing. Fishing! What a terrible crime against humanity. Apparently it was all too do with technical difficulties out at Channel 31. Of course it ended up on youtube afterwards anyway, as did the latest edition of Minute with Mala.

South fans win (sorta) share (a very small one, if that) of (pretend) award
One of our readers, Savvas Tzionis, posted in the comments section last week an excerpt from Joe Gorman's A-League awards piece in The Guardian - and it's a good thing he did too, because as much as I like Joe and his writing, I wasn't going to read the article until Savvas popped with up the fact that we got a mention:

Best Twitter stoush

Scott Munn and George Calombaris, who traded insults over Melbourne Heart and Melbourne Victory. Munn made fun of Victory's 5-0 loss to Wellington Phoenix (despite Heart being bottom of the table), Calombaris called him 'Mr Munt' and the best part was when South Melbourne fans accused Calombaris of being a traitor to Hellenism because of his new loyalty to Victory. Not to be outdone, Richard Garcia and Jerome Polenz's little internet battle was also good fun.

So thanks to Savvas for letting us know about this tidbit, and well done to all those South fans who put in the hard yards, even though I think the award should have gone to 'Ezequiel Trumper vs Everyone'.

Lakeside to host 2015 Asian Cup teams
While travelling out to Berwick on Wednesday, an interesting question was raised - would Lakeside be hosting any of the competing teams? Well, after asking around, it seems we'll be hosting the Socceroos in the lead up to the tournament. Some of our more anal retentive readers may recall that Lakeside hosted the Saudi national team in the lead up to their crucial 2014 world qualifier back in 2012 - which they went on to lose, so who knows if it did them any good.

FFV Hall of Fame nominations open
Know someone worthy? Then head here to find out more. Even if your candidate doesn't get up this year, their nomination is kept on for future years.

Football Federation Victoria (FFV) is accepting nominations for the FFV Hall of Fame. 

The FFV Hall of Fame recognises extraordinary performance over a career by participants who have made a significant contribution to the game in Victoria.

This year's inductees will be announced at the 2014 FFV Gold Medal Night later in the year.

The following people have been inducted into the FFV Hall of Fame since it began in 2010:

2013 - George Wallace, Janette Melvin, Alan Davidson

2012 - Theo Marmaras, Jane Oakley, Paul Wade

2011 - Michael Weinstein, Theresa Deas, Tom Jack

2010 - Harry Dockerty, Betty Hoar, Jimmy Rooney

Click here for the FFV Hall of Fame policy and nomination form.

For any queries regarding the FFV Hall of Fame, please email Executive Assistant to the CEO, Charlotte Greer, at cgreer@footballfedvic.com.au

Around the grounds
A short lived experiment of a national body comprised of several incompatible warring states, held together by a corrupt self-serving central bureaucracy, which would inevitably fall apart with spectacular results. Was the NSL our own Yugoslavia? Discuss.
Even with their very good record at Jack Edwards Reserve - apparently they hadn't lost there since 2006 - it was always going to be an uphill battle for an injury riddled Melbourne Knights to not lose this game against the best team in the competition. And so it turned out, with Oakleigh eventually running out 3-1 winners, and it could have been so many more had the officiating and the Cannons' finishing been more compliant. Still, assembling such a great team is probably easier when:

1. You can get away with putting more sponsors on your shirt than is apparently legally possible.
2. No one is probably ever going to publish the player points tallies for 2014.

Still, on that sponsorship matter and for whatever it's worth, there were a lot fewer sponsor boards around the ground on the perimeter fencing than one is accustomed to at Oakleigh. What's up with that?

At the end of the game, the MCF people deviated from their fascist chants, the chants about Yugoslavia (like the NSL, Yugoslavia's gone for good - can't we all just move on?), the 'North Sunshine is so wonderful' chant and whatever other chants they sang on the night, to perform the Croatian language version of the 'sack the board' chant. At least, that's what I assume they were chanting - after many years on the World Game and Football Anarchy forums, I did manage to pick up that 'uprava' means 'board, committee or administration', and after six losses in a row I think it's safe to say that they weren't chanting 'this committee is doing an OK job under very difficult circumstances, so we'll be patient and support them'. The bloke running towards the fence to heap passionate (English language) abuse on the team also kinda gave it away. Tough times at Somers Street, but Oakleigh keeps rolling on, still undefeated in the league and probably still spewing that they rolled over in that Dockerty Cup game against Werribee City.

Stop the madness! Start the movie!
These new fangled referees. The match between Altona East and Cairnlea at Paisley Park was almost called off because the ref thought it was too wet. Too wet! There were no visible puddles on the field, the ball was bouncing during the warm ups, and this bloke wanted to call the game off. Luckily someone from the visiting team got on the blower to the FFV, who apparently told the ref to play the damn game, which turned out to be a very entertaining and end to end affair.

Is there any moment as transfixing in soccer, as when from a free kick the goalkeeper is rooted to his spot watching the ball fly by? When you're on the receiving end, it's terrifying. When you're on the shooting end, there's that sense of possibility, the momentary near certainty that the ball is going in. Too bad for Altona East, they were on the receiving end, with the ball cannoning in off the post. Soon after they equalised, but eventually lost the game when they gave away a fairly cheap goal. The game concluded, we all started walking back to our cars, when we noticed that a very serious looking melee had started on the field. For a match that had had no spite in it whatsoever, this was a disturbing turn of events. Thankfully, the ground marshals and the calmer players managed to sort it out before it got completely out of hand. How it started is anyone's guess.

Final thought
I accidentally left my 2014 team poster at some pizza place on Bourke Street.