I'll Swap You My Rixon Card, For Your Lujic Card
Well, there goes one of the worst kept secrets in the league, and I don't care what certain club apologists have to say. With Luke Hopper pretty much out the door already (visa issues), and with Trent Rixon back to Northcote, we needed a striker or two badly. So, now we have 2013's leading VPL scorer (from the championship winning team no less) and recently discarded Wellington Phoenix temp worker (ah, the perils of the increased casualisation of the workforce) Milos Lujic on our books.
I think that's an improvement, and it's in keeping with our 'Let's buy the cunts that fuck us up from teams that seem to have been doing OK over the past couple of seasons' policy (it's in our constitution, have a look yourself if you don't believe me), as well as our 'Juniors? What are juniors?' policy. So, who's going to partner Lujic up front? Or if we play only Lujic up front, who's going to replace him if he gets hurt? Baggio Yousif? He's gone to Hume. Nick Jacobs? We could always try Gianni De Nittis again.
It's the Hellenic Cup for When You're Not Having a Hellenic Cup (or a Bouzis Cup)
A little while back we mentioned that Heidelberg were planning to have a pre-season tournament, with an assortment of Greek teams, including interstate ones. Well, while details were sketchy then (and for those of us who lived through its horror, we entertained the possibility of having it turn into the farce that was the Bouzis Cup), it looks like this is actually real, and brilliantly broadbased and compelling. Even better, it's sponsored by one of our favourite organisations, media or otherwise, 3XY Radio Hellas. Without looking too far ahead, if we win, they would have to mention it on their sports program, wouldn't they?
Anyway, it looks like it's four groups of three. From the VPL, Northcote is missing. The rumours of Sydney Olympic coming have turned out not to be true, as they'd probably (and rightly) prefer to take part in the NSWNPL pre-season tournament. In their place is Hobart Olympia, though I'm not sure how it will effect their supposed plans to play us.
But more interestingly, back from the grave is West Adelaide Hellas. If you thought (like I once did, before being set straight on the matter), that West Adelaide were dead following the 1999 NSL season, then are you in for a shock. The junior wing of the club survived, eventually re-establishing a senior team, and after many tough years has fought its way back into South Australia's top flight this year.
They've been placed in the competition's group of death along with ourselves and Heidelberg. Click the image for a bigger version, or head to the fixtures page on the blog for our group games. It's going to be a bit of a fucking hike in the middle of the week to that joint, and even the attempt to get home on a Friday night won't be pleasant, but at least it's free entry.
Random Dispatch From The Tenth Circle of Hell
Steve From Broady, back yesterday from his holiday down the coast, where I assume he spent most of his time impressing hot chicks with his radical/tubular/gnarly surfing moves, went down to training and had this to say.
Boys looked good at training last night
Which is all well and good, except that I'm fucking well sick of hearing shit like that. I want them to look good on the field - and by look good I mean score a shitload of goals and strike the fear of (insert your preferred deity here) the hearts of the opposition.
Cool, We Just Saved Ourselves $9,000,000!
So, Melbourne Heart have been bought out. The minority stake (20%) by that Bart Campbell/Melbourne Storm dude, the other 80% by Manchester City. Cue all the jokes about Northern Spirit and Rangers.
New name, new colours, new logo. Goodbye Heart. Presumably goodbye wheelie bins. I'm taking this as a franchise that has folded and is being replaced by something else. If the wheelie bins aren't there, then as far as I'm concerned the very fabric of that organisation has ceased to exist. As one person noted on the interwebs (and which I'm stealing without his permission)
For an organisation that didn't want to sell out their name, colours and identity to another club, they sure were quick to sell out their name, colours and identity to another club.
But maybe it's not up to me to decide. Just maybe, it's for the diminishing support of the Heart itself to make decisions on such things as perceptions of continuity and allegiance - that's if it is a decision, and not something felt, you know, in that now hollow cavity that used to hold their their, ahem, hearts (only time I'm using that joke).
So what I want to know now is, are they finally going to be the team for the south-eastern suburbs? The team for old soccer people? How much are the real Melbourne City from South Kingsville going to extort from the new owners for the name? Can we have two sky-blue teams in the A-League, or will that be too confusing for the children? Will supporters of other EPL franchises be put off supporting
And what of poor little South Melbourne? Have our dreams of a return to Australian top-flight glory just been shattered into a million tiny pieces, again? How many of our small remaining flock are about to run for the exits now that our national league ambitions have been denied twice in the space of a year? Oh the pain, the pain of it all!
See you at the games next week folks. Fuck I need to see something resembling soccer being played by a real team in blue*.
*that only fully adopted the colour in a mid-1960s change of, ahem, heart, lol, chuckle, snort. OK, I lied, and I used the same lame joke twice. You try being funny and innovative when it doesn't come natural to you.
The truly unique thing about Australian soccer fans is that they’re one of the few groups to despise the history of their own sport. Yes that's 'soccer', which is what people called it before the word was outlawed as part of the drastic re-imagining of the game in this country a decade ago.
Nobody seemed to care what the game was called then (and there were far more offensive terms for it than 'soccer' let me tell you), and in most places around the world they still don't, but it seems these days that the only time you’ll hear the ‘s’ word is if somebody’s giving what’s fashionably become known amongst fans and detractors alike as ‘old soccer’ a kicking. Throw in a few references to ethnic warfare and a body count higher than the Crimean War and you’re cleared to use it, but only in a negative context unless you want the crowd to boo you.
In the blind rush to reclaim the game from 'the ethnics' the virtual outlawing of the word was taken to with glee by the same people who have gone on to ransack their entire 'terrace culture' lock, stock and barrel from Europe. The violent hatred of nearly everything that came before 'year zero' has confined not only several generations of teams, fans and players, but also a perfectly reasonable term for the sport to an historical red card. But why?
When people lament the evil that is ‘old soccer’ I know exactly where they’re coming from. They’re talking about Footscray JUST and Sydney Croatia ‘fans’ butchering each other in a car park in 1987 for reasons best known only to themselves and their grandparents, or the night Australian ‘fans’ arranged themselves in the shape of a swastika as the Socceroos played Israel in a 1989 World Cup qualifier.
What these people represented was not ‘old soccer’ but pure, white hot racism and hated. To hold them up as representative of soccer from the 1950’s until Nick Mrdja won the last National Soccer League Grand Final for Perth Glory (‘broadbased’) against Parramatta Power (‘no fans of any ethnicity’) is the laziest stereotype in Australian sport, but one which has achieved pandemic levels in the last few years.
History is obviously written by the winners, which is why the treatment of Nicky Winmar by the crowd at Victoria Park is now spoken about as a horrible chapter in our racist history but what supporters of long dead soccer clubs did in the 1980's is still relevant today. That Australian society has come a long way on all fronts in the last 20 years is undeniable, and the racism and generally horrible behaviour of the past is treated as it is from the past - unless it happened in the stands of a National Soccer League match.
It's simple enough to lay the boots into sides which have already been nearly wiped from the face of the earth, but the truth is that by the time the NSL was (quite rightly) put to sleep the ‘ethnics’ were in the minority and very much on the run. The 2000-2001 season had just six of 16 teams backed primarily by one group, and the political parties masquerading as football clubs had been long removed the national scene and either relegated to state leagues or obliterated entirely.
The problem was that none of these 'Aussie' teams was any good, and consequently without anything more than token television coverage nobody went to watch them. Even Carlton, held up briefly as the next big thing in Australian football after making a Grand Final in their first season, failed eight games into the year. One of their final matches was delayed because nobody remembered to bring goal nets along.
Carlton had briefly been the saviour of 'broadbased' football in Melbourne. In that first season when they'd played in the Grand Final against South Melbourne the two teams had even been afforded the honour of a pre-match parade down Swanston Street. That no more than a handful of people turned up is hardly the point, but let the record show that in one bright shining moment for 'old soccer' that Paul Trimboli got to sit in a slow moving vintage car, waving at bemused people who were simply trying to catch the tram from outside Melbourne Central.
It was also probably the only Grand Final where the winning goal was celebrated by somebody tearing off their team shirt to reveal Macho Man Randy Savage merchandise, but that was as good as it got for the NSL in Melbourne after that. Channel 7 even managed to run a positive story about the match instead of concentrating on the, ahem, boisterous (AKA bin throwing) celebrations by fans afterwards.
The NSL had always been Australia's premier competition for those who enjoyed a rotating cast of clubs. Even once relegation and promotion from state leagues had been abolished sides would still crop up and fold at the drop of a hat. Who could forget Collingwood's partnership with Heidelberg that started the season with big crowds at Victoria Park and ended with the team playing in front of empty stands at the same venue?
Though they already had the numbers by the turn of the century, the 'locals' further solidified their control of the competition in its last few years despite clubs representing 'Australia' dropping like flies. Carlton were the first to go, and the Eastern Pride (nee Morwell Falcons) also failed to complete the 2000-01 season. The Canberra Cosmos at least managed to struggle through the year before being euthanised. Preposterously the league managed to get through two whole seasons (2001/02 and 2002/03) seasons with exactly the same sides participating, but the long term prospects for the competition were almost nil.
A last ditch attempt at introducing some buzz around the competition in its second last year by introducing a finals series where six teams would play a ten round home and away competition as well as a Grand Final came to nothing as: a) about two weeks in 75 per cent of the matches were dead rubbers and b) the only TV coverage they could get was on some obscure Optus channel which showed Homeart ads whenever there wasn't a game on. The league didn't even bother playing one game between Northern Spirit and Newcastle. That 38,000 turned up to see Perth Glory win the title said more for the long-term prospects of the club themselves rather than the league they were in.
So I'm not here to try and pretend that this was a sensibly run and professional competition with mass public appeal in all markets across the country, because as keen as I am on revisionist history that would be a terrific lie. But what is most certainly was not by this point was an ethnic war zone where ancient scores from across Europe were settled in the stands by chain-wielding teenagers on a weekly basis.
By the time the league folded in 2004 the balance had swung conclusively towards the ‘locals’ with a majority of eight from 13, and the last time fans had disgraced themselves on racial lines had been three years earlier. Somehow though, in the rush to take ownership of football out of ‘ethnic’ hands, we were suddenly pitched into an alternative universe where every match had been Pratten Park 1985 no matter who was involved.
In my experience that was anything but the case, and at the risk of being banned from attending any major football event in this country for the next decade I come in defence of the much maligned NSL and the brand of ‘old soccer’ that it has come to represent.
I’d grown up on highlights of the English game every Monday night in the days when you were grateful just to see your team in a five minute highlights package. Every once in a while you might stumble across local highlights on SBS, but to me the references to South Melbourne Hellas on Acropolis Now may as well have been about a team playing on the moon.
It wasn’t until I’d grown up and suffered the heartbreak of seeing my side relegated from the Premier League (and worse) that I took a chance on the local game and fell in love. For three brief seasons I was an NSL aficionado, and it was magnificent.
Was it meant to be confronting that South Melbourne fans called their side Hellas? After five minutes of the first game so did I. That's who they were. Not that it was compulsory; you didn’t have to swear allegiance to the Greek flag before being allowed in. In fact, to prove how ‘Aussie’ they were the NSL made you stand for the national anthem before kick-off. Even the A-League isn't insane enough to try that.
In all this time the only ethnic rivalry I ever saw was a half-hearted Hellenic power struggle between South Melbourne and Sydney Olympic, and even then that was practically identical to the rivalry which exists now between Melbourne Victory and Sydney FC with the added bonus of better sounding offensive chants in a foreign language. Who knows what they meant, but we joined in anyway because it was fun and that's what you do when you follow a team - you adapt to their culture. New Victory fans join in the chants which have become popular over the years, we did the ones in Greek which said something horrific about the opposition fan's mothers.
The argument is obviously that it's better if a side's culture isn't 'ethnically' based and everyone can join in but that was the point of bringing in at least one 'open' side for people who were into that sort of thing. Australian football might have ended up in a totally different place if the authorities had created proper 'broadbased' clubs like the Victory and Sydney FC instead of shacking up with footy sides and instantly turning off anybody who wasn't already a Carlton or Parramatta fan. Still, at least it wasn't (as some would have you believe) Croats vs Serbs, Israelis vs Palestinians or Hutus vs Tutsis by that point.
The league itself was always going to end with a whimper rather than a bang, but having walked in just as the party was ending I found myself right at home at Bob Jane Stadium. In that last season of a rapidly dying competition the idea that a brand new league would turn away a side who had drawn crowds of more than 10,000 without a dash of television coverage seemed bizarre. It was hard to believe that the people trying to lift the game off the bottom of the ocean would turn away the club who'd have made the perfect foil to the Victory in the battle for Melbourne.
They did and it still hurts today. While nobody can argue Victory’s success (despite the belated introduction of the pretty much moribund Melbourne Heart), it hardly seemed fair that New South Wales got one club in each of Gosford, Newcastle and Sydney while there was no room the team who had represented Australia on the world stage four years earlier. All of a sudden they were relegated to playing Altona Magic instead of Perth Glory.
To be fair clubs like South hadn't done themselves any favours over the years, so desperate for anybody to pay their money at the gate that they'd let pretty much anyone in no matter how impure their intentions were. I remember standing in the Bob Jane Stadium clubhouse talking to the head of security for the club about a fan who had been banned 'for life' for some reason or another, when said outlaw fan scanned his membership at the door and walked into the ground within touching distance of the guard. He continued to go unchallenged for the rest of the season and still watches the club now.
I have no doubt that many of the isolated incidents which have now become football folklore could have been stopped if the clubs had any interest in enforcing bans or if they had access to the same sort of security and surveillance which clubs do in modern stadiums, but who knows if it would have helped when the stereotype had been well and truly embedded in Australia's psyche whether it was true or not. Play my patented NSL Superquiz and humour the next person who tells you how horrible the ethnic riots were 'back then' only to then ask them to name their top five racially based conflagrations. If they can get past Despotovski vs the Melbourne Knights you may as well declare them a winner.
How foolish it seems now to have stood under, and I think held it up at one point, a "No South, No APL" banner at the club's last NSL match against Adelaide United at Hindmarsh Stadium. Not only because the FFA made the message irrelevant by changing the name of the competition, but also the fact that we thought that we were so indispensable that the competition couldn't possibly succeed without us. The truth was that the club needed the competition more than the competition needed the club, and South nearly went out of business almost immediately after they were excluded.
Perhaps they'd have had more chance if they’d bought the licence for a team in Auckland. After all, the New Zealand Knights were admitted as the successor of a club which had attracted 950 people to its last NSL match. I suppose nobody can accuse a team with no fans of having been responsible for any crowd trouble.
Over the years I've thought about the process that severed my brief but thrilling connection with Australian top flight soccer many times. Usually it's while I'm half-heartedly watching the A-League and going for Wellington Phoenix in an equally half-hearted fashion just because in my mind they don't represent the same people who gave us the boot. In these moments of reflection I like to think that the fact that a perfectly viable but ethnically based team was excluded was more to do with the FFA wanting to clear the decks for 'their clubs' than anything else, but the blanket expulsion of any side which had more than a tenuous connection to 'old soccer' has given rise to the greatest urban myth in Australian sports.
You can see it in any story hinting at football’s past. When it was revealed that South Melbourne was trying to buy Melbourne Heart the same themes cropped up in articles and comments alike. Mentioning the “bad old days” and “old soccer” was almost compulsory, and the insinuation was clear: the return of a side which drew much of its support from the Greek community would herald a “return to ethnic violence”.
Who exactly would this violence be between? Did I miss a brief, bloody conflict between Greece and New Zealand which would cause games against the Phoenix to end with the stadium blanketed in tear gas? It makes absolutely no sense whatsoever, and the insinuation that violence is bred purely by ethnicity is hardly compatible with A-League fans being king hit in the stands or attacking police.
You wonder why Melbourne Victory fans who seem as keen as mustard for a proper local rival with more than a handful of fans can't see that instead of holding the ethnics at bay and acting like they solely own the game in this city they should be welcoming a proper rival. These are the same people who have adopted all sorts of macho bullshit 'ultra' stuff from Europe but who simultaneously perpetuate all the myths about the past while complaining about the treatment they receive from police and the media. Perhaps most of what they know about the 'evil' of the past was similarly beaten up by the press?
The NSL’s reputation gets worse every year, but how can fans behave as if the isolated violent acts in their 'new' league are somehow less offensive because there’s no ethnic background to them? A few thrown coins are dismissed as nothing much, but the behaviour of fans in the mid 90’s is still held as hard evidence against entire clubs today. Again, who are 'we' going to fight with now? Sydney FC, West Sydney Wanderers or Melbourne Victory? There doesn't seem to be any shortage of potential clashes, but if a fight happens at the soccer and it doesn't involve ethnic rivalry did it really happen?
When did it become so fashionable to put an ethnic twist on sporting violence? Imagine if 25-year-old Cameron George Frearson of Gymea had known in the mid 90’s that one day everything terrible which happened before 2004 would be blamed on nationalism. He’d have come up with a far better excuse for letting off a flare at a World Cup qualifier than "Because it creates a good visual effect when a goal is scored".
As I stood in the pouring rain watching South get thrashed 5-0 by a pub team a few weeks ago I finally came to terms with the fact that there’s no way they’ll ever be allowed back in the national competition in any meaningful fashion. Even if Heart were willing to sell, the FFA would be scared to death of a backlash from its stakeholders and would at best allow them to be called South Melbourne Heart, Melbourne United or something equally generic.
Their league, their rules I suppose, but nearly a decade on from NSL’s death it’s time that we stopped racially profiling clubs and accept that the popular stereotypes were for the large part just that? That unfortunately soccer seems to attract a proportion of dickheads no matter where you watch it, and that the first priority should be to find these people and kick them out permanently. If clubs wither and die because they've got a higher proportion of arsehole fans than others then bad luck to them.
That the 'ethnic panic' is complete bullshit is hard to argue, but the point then becomes whether South could even do better than heart. Lacking a proper geographical reason for anybody to follow a second Melbourne club was there any point in bringing one in to start with? Probably not. Would the handful of supporters who would come back from Victory contribute to a decent following? I seriously doubt it, but if the 11,000 who turned up to see South's first match back in the Victorian Premier League (tellingly the total plummeted to just over 4000 the next week) showed half an interest in seeing the club play top level football again it would be a good start.
If you were a Heart fan wouldn't you have wanted this to happen? Sure you might have to buy a new shirt and perhaps not follow a team with the pansiest nickname in sport, but your 5000 fans plus our 5000 is a start. We'll build from there, abusing Victory fans all the way. You bring the A-League spot, we'll bring the legitimate dislike for their club. You could go on as you are now, but your club's just going to go broke and you'll be left with no other options but to either skulk back to Victory and try to ignore the embarrassingly forced rivalry of the last couple of years or to give up altogether and wait for the next fool to come along asking to be parted from his money by launching a 'broadbased' Melbourne club.
That there was perhaps 1500 South fans at that Victorian Premier League preliminary final a couple of weeks ago would seem to indicate that there's no coming back for the FIFA Oceania Club of the Century. I can certainly understand that viewpoint, but there's a big difference between playing on the largest stage in the country (where we belong) and against Northcote at at a park in Port Melbourne.
Admittedly I'm not exactly doing my bit for the club these days, it was the first game I'd bothered to go to all season myself. What's the point in following your team through a mickey mouse competition every week throughout winter? I'd done it for a few years and enjoyed myself but the chronic mismanagement of the league (not to mention the rampant corruption) is enough to grind you down eventually. There's still life in the club, just no reason at the moment for it to be revived.
All the while as we're looking on with jealously the A-League continues to grow. Plenty of us sneered at the idea of it taking off, but it seems to be doing just that. I'm still not sure investing your money in a team is any more sensible than buying an NBL side or giving your credit card number to a Nigerian prince but the crowds in most venues are well above what might have been expected a few years ago, and other than a couple of hastily created expansion teams (as well as the Knights who were practically dead before they'd even began) most clubs appear to at least be keeping their head above water. The FFA are even happy to bail out major market clubs who fall over and help them back on their feet.
Yet while all this is happening a generation of fans sits on the sidelines waiting for a chance at redemption, looking at A-League fans waving banners that read 'against modern football' and falling about laughing at the idea that they know anything about hardship. It's fun to play the victim, and we're still doing it almost 10 years later, but the idea of once again having a team to spend my summer following is enough to make me pay more attention to the A-League now than I have in the last few years.
If we're going to be kept out please at least let it be for the right reasons, that we don't have the appropriate financial backing and have shed most of our fan base, not because of some antiquated racial notions of what European people are likely to do at a soccer game.
The Dockerty State Wide Knockout Cup was played, and won by Green Gully over Dandenong Thunder. Gully were presented with the State Wide Knockout Dockerty Cup for doing so. Confused? Why should you be confused by the actions of an organisation which has promoted an A-League team's special junior membership season ticket offer more than it did for one of its own showpiece events for the season.
Speaking of the A-League, old mate Patrick Kisnorbo has ended up at Melbourne Heart. You may recall that in this article that we reported how someone else reported that Kisnorbo wanted a lot of money. Bleed them dry, Patty.
When I went to go on the Victory forum to see them gloating with their usual 'yoof!' catch cry (or to do it first myself), it turned out their forum had been hacked. What's the future for that site? I don't know. I hardly visited there any more, all the debates that were worth having (in a manner of speaking) were sorted out a long time ago, in everyone's else's favour, of course.
More Syson vs Lynch hysterics on Twitter last week, which lasted for a good 3-4 days this time, as people dropped in and out before eventually getting bored. Bloggers from all over the place, fellow Fairfax hacks, people who hate Ian Syson (and there's a lot of those on the net it seems) - just who didn't get sucked into that vortex of stupidity? Incidentally, this latest edition of their feud was kicked off by Lynch's paranoid response to a Bonita Mersiades tweet. Was anything solved or sorted out? I don't know. Things got so absurd at one stage that I was even dubbed 'the nation's most under-appreciated football writer' in Joe Gorman's rather good article on the matter, and 'a funny man and if only he could be tamed he'd be a great columnist' by another writer. It lead to a moderate boost in my Twitter following, which was good for my ego I guess.
Elias Donoudis blathered on more about the shadowy (yet full of morally upright Hellatzides) group looking to take over the board, without saying much at all.
Bob Jane T-Marts is back on board as a sponsor.
I went and saw Altona East beat Westgate 2-0 in a catch up game. Ex-South player Andy Bourakis scored one of the goals, a first minute penalty.
Back to the FFV for a moment, some of the zone reps have apparently called for an EGM to get rid of the current board.
In addition to that, the NPL keeps on keeping on, but some people at Bulleen aren't so happy about their club's direction. They're looking to get their own special meeting thing going, if the link is correct.
So all in all, a pretty quiet week in Victorian soccer. This week, back to the horror that is the real world of actual on field South Melbourne action.
Finally here - post took a little longer to put up than usual because I was waiting for Steve from Broady's reports. The delay however means that this is a fairly bumper edition.
The scoreline perhaps flatters us a little. At least from the point of view of the first half, while we were the better team, Hume missed some outrageous chances. OK, three of those came within the space of about five seconds, as we somehow managed to keep out three consecutive point blank efforts, and a later one on one opportunity against Gavalas - who was in goals yesterday instead of Maynard - should also have been put away. Instead, with the opportunity to shoot left or right or even round the keeper, the Hume player hit the shot straight at Gavalas.
Still, those complaints aside, thanks to Rixon's Resurrection, we managed to go into halftime 2-0 up, and we were not without chances apart from those two goals. Hume started the second half in a sprightly manner, but didn't necessarily do anything spectacular. We scored our third, Hopper with his first of the day, and we looked more or less home. Hume pulled one back, and our propensity for being defensively rickety made me get the jitters, but the team soon put that to rest.
The final three goals came towards the end of the match as Hume threw everyone forward with unusually reckless abandon, not only getting themselves humiliated but damaging their goal difference, while we got a well needed boost in that area. Hopper managed to get a hat-trick, while Soolsma opened his South account with a fine free kick into the top corner, temporarily silencing those in the stands who were asking for Fernando to be brought on. Admittedly, there was also a festive atmosphere as the rout reached its apex, when the old Mighty Ducks quacking was brought out of the woodwork.
I reckon Rixon should have been taken off earlier. Old mate Perry was reffing, so that means a lot gets let go (though unlike that other old mate Bruno, Perry will actually punish the heinous stuff), and that means with the game wrapped up, all that was left for Rixon to do was get hacked within acceptable VPL standards. He got subbed off eventually for Kearney. Cartanos even got a few small minutes at the end of the game, pulled out one party trick on the sideline, though I think fewer people would have been amused with his attempt to dance around three defenders. In comparison, Rhys Meredith seems to have joined Fernando in South's version Guantanamo Bay.
Speaking of Perry, even though I reckon he leans towards the more physical side of the reffing ledger for my tastes, he usually puts in a good effort, lets players compete physically, and doesn't give players who flop over too obviously after losing a battle of strength what they think they deserve. Still, we probably should have got penalty at one point in the second half, but with Perry reffing it's pointless asking for it and even more pointless getting angry when he doesn't give it.
Anyway, word is that Chris Taylor isn't satisfied. No clean sheet, too much showboating, maybe even too much entertainment. Is this why the Knights and Taylor parted all those years ago? Can his no-nonsense grind it out style fit into the culture of a club that demands excitement and results? Will anything less than a championship satisfy anyone? Or is this plain speaking exactly what we need? Does this discord between wish and reality make things even more exciting?
Steve From Broady's Under 21s Report
South Melbourne's under 21s were coming off a 3-1 midweek loss to Pascoe Vale on Sunday afternoon, when they took on Hume City at Lakeside Stadium. With the title now looking out of reach, South was still looking to finish as high as possible on the table.
Hume kicked the game off and it was obvious early on that it was going to be a tight game. Chances were few and far between and both teams shared a decent amount of possession. In the 25th minute South made a fast breaking attack and had the first serious shot of the game. The ball was not cleared and got caught in a massive goal mouth scramble and Baggio Yousif poked it home for his 11th goal in five weeks to give South the lead.
Not long after the goal South were forced into an early substitution due to injury. Sebit Muon was the man to come on after 30 minutes. And not long after that substitution a Hume City striker who looked offside was on the end of a beautiful long ball from the centre back and he strolled in and fired past the South keeper to level the scores, and level it stayed until the half time break.
South kicked off the second half, but it was all Hume City early trying to get into the lead and in the 60th minute they did just that when a failed South clearance went so wrong and the Hume City striker put the ball past an already off balance keeper to give Hume City a 2-1 lead. South could not get into the game and had few chances to get an equaliser. Hume City rode the game out comfortably, the game finishing 2-1 to the visitors, as well as being South's second loss in a week. South's next game has been rescheduled for Sunday 1:00PM, until then, see ya next week.
Steve From Broady's Canteen Report
It was back to the South food van on Sunday afternoon. I had a souv - it was pretty decent, and it's getting better each week. I'm getting my hopes up for South to crack the perfect 10 before season's end. I give this week's souv an 8 out of 10. We are at Oakleigh next Sunday - I don't know what to expect from that canteen. From previous experience their souvs are shit, the only ever good one I had there was when Oaks played Victory, and Oaks were trying to impress everyone that evening.
Pascoe Vale 10/10
Hume City 8/10
Bentleigh Greens 7/10
Richmond 6.5/10
Northcote City 3.5/10
Southern Stars 2/10
Green Gully 1/10
Dandenong DQ
South food truck
Week 1 - 4.5/10
Week 2 - 7/10
Week 3 - 8.5/10
Week 4 - 5/10
Week 5 - 5.5/10
Week 6 - 9/10
Week 7 - 6/10
Week 8 - 7.5/10
Week 9 - 8/10
Next Week
Oakleigh away in another crunch game. Win, we keep ourselves in the finals race, and knock out Oaks from contention if they aren't out of it already.
Please note - this game will not be played at Oakleigh's usual Friday night timeslot. Instead, it will be on Sunday, at 3:15PM.
Tom Kalas on Soccer Stoppage Time
Soccer Stoppage Time is some sort of Sydney radio program. First time listener, and I was impressed. If they were a Melbourne based show and I was a fan of an A-League team, I'd listen in again. But neither of those things are true, so it ain't going to happen. More's the pity.
Anyway, the magic of the internet alerted us to the impending appearance of one Tom Kalas on this show. But first we had to wade through some John Didulica stuff and how the Heart have signed three 35 year olds or something. "Yoof!" as Victory fans would say. Interestingly, Didulica claimed that Heart aren't for sale. Also talk about Heart making a profit, which seems to be news to some of the presenters, even though I figured that everyone knew about that news. Next to no mention that I can recall of how they made that profit - selling a truckload of players for some decent coin.
Then Ray Gatt.
Then news or rumours or something. Patrick Kisnorbo asking for too much money apparently. Ah, here we are.
Tom Kalas 'the' director of South Melbourne? First up he starts by disagreeing with Didulica's assertion that Heart aren't for sale, pointing out how Scott Munn had been talking about Heart's meeting with overseas investors. Maybe investing means not for sale? Buy in, not buy out?
Then the questions about South's A-League ambitions. Where's the money coming from for a South A-League bid? Kalas replies that we have guarantees from a 'Big 4' bank, but it's all down to firstly doing your due diligence and such. What a relief.
Are we ready? Kalas replies with talk about our now four year old transformation program. Third largest broadcaster of football in Australia (pretty easy when no one else outside Fox and SBS does it), mention of our youtube stats, with no mention of it being it watched by Russian gamblers. But Youtube stats have always been a rubbery concept to me.
Sustainability seems to be the main selling point. We can do the job of being Melbourne's second team better, and more efficiently. Mention of Heart's alleged $75k cost per home match at AAMI Park. But what about South's facilities? Surely they're not up to scratch? Kalas and one of the hosts make the point that the lighting and corporate facilities are what need improving, and those can be done fairly quickly, with government support.
The questioning moves on to what form a South team would take in the national league. Kalas makes the very interesting assertion that 'The South Melbourne Football Club brand will always be a state league based club'. It's the FFA who will have the final say on what would happen in that situation, what we could call ourselves etc. The follow up questions are obvious - if all of that is the case, could a South Melbourne takeover bid take over the entire Heart licence and remain as Melbourne Heart? Well yes, that's an option.
Now, a brief break from me. Kalas is seriously having a laugh here, and more or less repeating the same routine that our erstwhile friend Jim Mellas performed so many years ago - a whole five of them, my how time flies - during the Southern Cross bid era. Remember this stuff? Will it, won't it be South Melbourne? Is it a Trojan horse bid? Broadbased and compelling? Kalas tried to make the point that 'a broadbased club in the A-League' is what we hope to get, as well as a member run (owned?) club in the top flight (who's members?) and that we are football club, not an ethnic club.
So, under the model that Kalas was discussing, South as South would stay in the Victorian system, and whatever this new thing is would be 'our' national league representative. Who would support such a thing? And without my trying to second guess what our fans would do this in situation, Kalas seemed hopeful that enough Heart fans would come over to make it a genuine combination of efforts. You must be kidding. Regardless of how pitiful and inconsequential I think Heart's raison d'etre is, and by extension the feelings that their season ticket holders have for that organisation, in their fantasy world that feeling of belonging to something important is very real.
And before anyone jumps on that sentence, let it be clear that I consider that fantastical sense of attachment as scarcely more ludicrous than the fantasy we South fans have about our club being the biggest, best, demanding of excellence etc. Because that fantasy is real, the idea that they could easily switch allegiances to this supposed mulatto entity is just absurd. Maybe some could, but most wouldn't. And to do so would require a certain amount of magnanimity and humility from our end, traits which South has seldom if ever possessed.
Kalas tried to talk about the soccer demographics that only go to Melbourne A-League derby games. What makes him think that those people could be relied upon to commit to a full length season? The next question is why aren't South attracting more people if we have so many people on our database, and watching our TV show? A truly daft question, but it gave Kalas a free hit. It's because we play in winter, in a state league competition, with no marketing from the FFV and no mainstream media attention. Could the Heart or Victory do any better? Kalas reckons it's apples and oranges, and he's surely right on this point. It's why even Collingwood can only get a couple of hundred to VFL games at Victoria Park.
So how did Kalas go about talking about our history? By deliberately goading me with references to 1884. Now I'll preface this part of the discussion by not claiming divine authority for the accuracy of this history, only for where my understanding currently lies of the limited details we have at present. Any corrections, new info, send it our way.
For those not up to speed on 1884, here's the deal. The original South Melbourne soccer club began playing way back then. That club went through a number of changes and periods where they (and soccer in Melbourne in general) didn't exist. At some point in the 1930s - 1936 according to this article - they amalgamated with South Melbourne Juniors (a separate club previously called Middle Park Schoolboys).
South Melbourne United would of course become one of three clubs to merge to form the South Melbourne Hellas we know and mostly love. It is my strong opinion however that when Kalas makes these claims about claiming that history - and I've warned him about this - he makes serious factual and cultural errors. Factual, because we aren't even sure what and who the original South Melbourne were for large periods of time. Factual, because even the article mentioned above which claims South Melbourne United involved a merger of South Melbourne with another entity in 1936, is clearly missing some important detail, as both the South Melbourne and South Melbourne United clubs are listed as being in existence after that year.
In 1937, South Melbourne was in Division 1, South Melbourne United in Division 2. The same goes for 1938 as you can see here and here. In 1939 they finished first and second in Division 2. In 1940 both teams played in Division 1. South Melbourne ceases to exist after this season. South Melbourne United struggle during the war years, but re-emerge after them.
When looking at the 1959 foundation date for South Melbourne Hellas, this is a bit of misnomer. 1959 is when Hellenic and Yarra Park merged. The merger of that new entity with South Melbourne United happened in early 1960. The Greeks needed a ground, and United took a chance that the Greeks would respect their identity and history. That lasted just a few years, and the most visible part of United's contribution to the new club - outside of the venue itself - the red 'V', was ditched, and little to no pretense seems to have been made that this was in any way a local club. Callous perhaps, but at least eventually honest. I reckon it was an awful thing to do, but it was done and most people never gave it a second thought.
On rare occasions the official wing of the club has dug out the 'heritage' shirt, but not often. Again, if that's the way the majority of the club's support feels about South Melbourne United, that's OK. But having overwhelmingly rejected the history of the clubs that preceded South Melbourne Hellas (and this includes the complicated Greek club history), and focusing only on what was created in 1959, I find claiming that 1884 date is unconscionable, and a ruse designed to get away from the real problem.
At best, we can claim that we are a living representative of the soccer tradition that has existed in the South Melbourne/Albert Park/Middle Park area - perhaps the original heartland of soccer in Melbourne - since 1884. That also includes teams like Hakoah, Park Rangers, Middle Park, Albert Park, St Kilda, and both defunct and new teams with those names.
Some more temperate minds may try to claim the 'custodian' tag, but I consider that an illegitimate attempt to monopolise a history and local tradition that is not completely ours to claim, especially considering the over 50 year rejection of that tradition and history mentioned earlier. To even begin to be able to start claiming that history as our own, we have to show a humility that is not in keeping with the traditions of this club, and for better and worse I have seldom seen here.
Which leads us to the real problem. Who are we? When we talk among ourselves, we are pretty sure of who we are. While some still hang on to an older style Greek nationalist or patriotic identity - as is their right - most younger supporters I think are able to easily claim the identity of being a club with a mostly Greek past and heritage, with an Australian future. These two ideas do not have to be mutually exclusive. We can be both, and I would argue that we actually exist in that manner right now.
So why can't we take that to the outside world? Why do we have to lie about who we were and who we are? In some deranged way, I can understand why we tried to do it back in the Southern Cross days - because we knew (even those who argued otherwise) the FFA and general public was utterly against us. But these days we go out there with the claim that the FFA is encouraging us to make a push for the A-League, a claim which was reinforced by one of the radio show hosts.
To finish up this discussion, let's just say that one of the hosts made the point about being ourselves and owning our history - the parts we actually had a part in creating - and his response to one of his co-hosts, who brought up the spectre of the old NSL was just as good.
'You use the term old NSL like it's contaminated'.
Hit the nail on the head right there. It's time to get out of the trap of the cringe and the cringe inverted, and take up instead AA Phillips' notion of the 'relaxed erectness of carriage'; the state of being unconsciously ourselves, not inherently better or worse than other clubs, just different, yet with something worthwhile to bring to the table.
Finally, there were no questions about the more pressing matter of NPL Victoria, which was disappointing.
Film Festival Follies
Saturday was the first time I'd been to the cinemas in over a year. I can't even remember the last thing that I saw. I didn't even make my usual trip to the animation festival in June. So, when you get the chance to see a North Korean football film, let alone one which has been described as 'the best North Korean football-themed movie of all time', the decision is more or less made for you.
So it was off to the Melbourne Film Festival to see Centre Forward, a black and white soccer flick from 1978, a bit of a Rocky via Pyongyang production, replete with your typical sports montages. The story is pretty basic. In Son, a young forward, after sitting on the bench for three (?!) years finally gets his chance in the starting line up. Needless to say, he completely blows it.
He gets dragged, the team loses its first match, and somehow after this one loss they go into crisis mode. I'd call it an overreaction, but this is a South blog after all, and thus we can relate to that. The rest of the film follows the well worn path of athletic redemption. What's interesting here are the necessarily different values used to get to that redemption point. The triumph of the individual for his own sake is not enough. The triumph of the individual is done for the whole of the North Korean people.
So yes, there are the requisite musical propaganda numbers, references to the Juche system, the Fatherly Leader, the Motherland. It's an uncomfortable aspect of watching this film, knowing that these same values are what keep the North Korean people under a brutal autocratic regime. Would this film have been played had it been promoting fascist values?
The players are hardly pampered. They sweep the yard, mark the lines, live in relatively spartan quarters at the club, and take part in a new and frankly brutal training programme, where hard work and loyalty are valued more than skill.
Still, some things remain familiar. The difference in generations; youngsters doubting their abilities; older players realising that fame doesn't last. The chairman of the club and his henchmen becoming involved in team selections and even tactics! Family angst played out via a grandmother and mother watching the game at home on TV (strangely, despite having a TV set, they don't seem to have a washing machine).
Oh, and the absolutely best part? Apart from the team bonding session montage, which included a scene on what looked like the world's most boring roller-coaster, the best moments were the comic relief provided by two fans in the stands. They're there every week, but when the team struggles they love to complain - one even sends weekly letters to the coach with suggestions on how to improve the team. When In Son and the team have their big success at the end of the film, the main complainer somehow manages to get into the locker rooms (which for some reason reminded me more of a hotel foyer or lounge) and more or less gets back on board the bandwagon. It was unnervingly like looking into a (North Korean) mirror. Just goes to show that the peculiarities of football fandom cross all borders.
You Kiss Your Mother With That Mouth?
Back to Sunday for a moment. It was a largely enjoyable afternoon. However, it was made less pleasant by some disgusting sexist banter from a very, very small portion of the crowd, directed at the lineswoman on the far side of the field. Now whether you think this kind of behaviour is or isn't acceptable - and it isn't - one should at least have a sense of self-preservation, if only to prevent the club getting punished due to your own easily preventable stupidity. This isn't some attempt at implementing some kind of PC mandate by stealth. Indeed, the kinds of comments being bandied about were so daft that they don't warrant being repeated here. Just leave that kind of garbage outside the ground.
Miss the members info sesh last night at Beachcomber? Here's the gist. NPL
Pretty much sticking to the line that we're all united and that we shall overcome. But this issue is so volatile, it's hard to know what will happen.
Social Club and the Lease
Apparently, hopefully ,'1-2 months' away from finalising the deals so we can get on with this. Government and the Trust tried to make the deal better for themselves; we had to 'peel back the layers' of the additional stuff they had added, in order to try and get it back to what we want. One of the issues is the requirement of signing all four agreements simultaneously before anything gets done.
We think the Memorandum Of Understanding we signed and agreed to is a foundational/binding document of sorts, and that it has legal weight. Our counterparts on the other side of that ledger don't seem to think that. Court action seems unlikely. Pavilion issue out at Middle Park seems to have been sorted out. Football exclusivity apparently maintained.
My thoughts went back to January when we were told that we were close to signing off on everything back then. The ox is slow but the earth is patient and all that.
A-League
Offered $7 million for the Heart licence. Heart rejected that offer. Offer now withdrawn by South. Assertion made that we had been asked by the FFA to discuss bid takeovers with the Mariners and Heart. No comment made on who or where the money would come from.
Football
More or less club sticking to its story with regards to Tsolakis, Matthews and Byles. Confirmation that Andy Vlahos and Dimi Hatzimouratis have walked out. The rumour that Fernando had also left was categorically denied.
From me
Much rolling of eyes, raised eyebrows, cynical expressions, snide remarks. Some occasional laughter. Bemusement at prices. The odd question asked.
Ephemera
Very civil meeting, until there was some passionate 'debate' at the end. I expected a lot worse. This club continues to confound me.
I'm entranced by the fascinating collision course of the melding of oldskool members and new junior parent types. Like two galaxies running into each other, it's unknown whether we'll end up tearing each other apart or if we'll create a new super galaxy. Please be super galaxy!
That S.M. Hellas constitution probably needs some updating. Who's up for making some amendments?
Never did find out if that curtain was soundproof.
Under 21s
Lost to 3-1 Pascoe Vale last night in a catch up game.
Final Thought
A child is a mass of cells and tissues and muscle that will grow up and will become Jack the Ripper or the president of the world. Maybe. More likely it will grow up and become a dole statistic. Worse, it will grow up and become an accountant.
Cripes, normally I forget to tune into the channel 31 show, but it might be worth checking it out tonight. Apparently board members Tom Kalas and Andrew Mesorouni will be on the show to discuss the Melbourne Heart takeover shenanigans. I'm sure those of our supporters who love to stir the pot on the FourFourTwo forums will be keeping an eye on this for more trolling material. You know who you are.
We normally never visit The Roar wesbite, let alone promote it, but Joe Gorman's piece South Melbourne saga shows the divisions in our football familyiscertainly worth a look, and not just because I spent a lot of years peddling much the same arguments on several forums. Gorman looks like an Australian soccer writer worth watching.
A whole two years ago now, we had a jersey presentation night at Kinisi. Among the guests on the footballing panel was that was a part of the event, was one Mark Bosnich, of Socceroos, Aston Villa, Manchester United, Chelsea, cocaine, down and out followed by rebirth as the rehabilitated crazy thing on his head, stupid laugh and tell it like it is pundit on Fox Sports soccer coverage.
Back then, whatever my opinion was of what he was saying, at least it seemed like he actually believed in it, and wasn't trying to pander to our la la land hopes of getting back into the top-flight. Here's what I noted as the gist of what he said about that issue back then:
Unlike Les Murray in the past, Mark Bosnich at least had the courtesy not to humour our delusions of grandeur, by being unapologetic about his and/or the FoxSports team's stance that change was necessary in the game and that we should be relegated to the toxic waste dump of Australian football.
Though he did not use the phrase 'toxic waste dump of Australian football', his message was pretty damn clear: South, and clubs like South, had had their time in the sun, but everyone else had moved on, and it was time we did, too. No offense, you still have good tradition and that.
Two years on, and his opinion seems to have softened on the matter somewhat.
The person who posted this video has called it an endorsement of our A-League ambitions. I wouldn't go that far myself. But Bosnich goes further in this piece on the Fox Sports site.
How did he get from his previous line of thinking on the matter, to where he is now? Two years ago he would have politely knocked this on the head. But now when talking about our great tradition, he's not pushing us aside as yesterday's news, but claiming that we actually have something to offer.
To be honest, it's all a bit confusing. And we don't even have a game this weekend to take our minds off this rubbish.
Following yesterday’s media reports on SBS World Game Fox Sports and Statements made by the CEO of the Melbourne Heart.
South Melbourne FC wishes to confirm the following:
South Melbourne FC that it made an offer to acquire 100% of the Melbourne Heart Licence.
The offer was in excess of 3.5 million
The offer was made after several discussions between Heart & SMFC Directors.
South Melbourne FC has received an expression of interest from Emerson (Brazilian Legend) to coach & has already secured Major Sponsors for its A League ambitions.
I am Gabriel, the messenger, the teller of astonishing truths. Now I am dying, my temperature soaring, my hands and memory tremoring: perhaps I should be held accountable for everything I say.
Gabriel, in Sonya Hartnett's Surrender
I get home early from work. That's what happens when 80% of my students - in a class of five - don't do the required reading. At least they got a kick of reading Jas H. Duke poems.
Then instead of doing my usual thing of getting straight onto the net to check my messages and forums, I decide to put the dishes away.
I follow that up by making a peanut butter sandwich, and putting on an episode of Rocko's Modern Life - trying my hardest here to be ahead of the 1990s revival curve.
I eventually log on. Emails. Tweets. Even phone calls. People (apparently) refreshing the blog looking for news. For the second time this year, things have gone off tap - and Scott Munn is forced to concede that this is the second time an offer has been made by South. Well, that was certainly news to me.
After the attempt to do whatever it was with the Central Coast Mariners (here and here), it appears that we've lined up another target, this one closer to home, and kicked off the South Melbourne Heart rumours again. And you also have the rumour, as seen on soccer-forum, that we're calling up up every A-League franchise on the fringe of real or imagined imminent disaster trying to buy our way in.
It begs the question - why not just try and buy our own way in, as ourselves? Anyway, for those waiting by their keyboards, the scuttlebutt that I'd heard – not from a committee member, mind – was that South was going to 'go for the jugular'. And let's be honest here - we'd all heard that phrase too many times before.
Well, maybe not exactly that phrase, but re-entry to the top flight was always something that was sought by our supporters. A hope occasionally dangled in front of us by the club, by fringe parts of the media, and even occasionally by the FFA. But mostly by ourselves, wallowing in our hubris and sense of entitlement.
It's strange how in the company of some, you can not only find such statements as plausible, but also as tangible, almost done. And then in the company of others, you can only laugh at the audacity of hope that people at this club still cling to.
But beneath this veneer of objectivity and stoicism, I'm just as likely to get swept up in the ludicrous moments that this game, this Australian game, and our club, our Australian club, provides on an equally ludicrously frequent basis.
So much so that I write the most heinous sentence in any of the at present over 1400 entries on this blog. It helps that Steve from Broady has only started writing recently here I suppose.
And then my internet breaks down, again, and I find myself in an early 90s technological silence. No way of dealing with cacophonous forum fallout, at least for a little while.
Before that happened. I managed to get one or tweets in, an email dealing with other correspondence. But the majority of this was done the old fashioned way, on an eight year old computer with no internet access. And the thoughts on the matter that I have had for quite some time still ring true.
South Melbourne as South Melbourne, playing in blue and white. No more compromises, no more lies. We are who we are, and the rest can take it or leave it.
And maybe a special section in the ground for those of us who stuck it out in the bad times, guaranteed for life. Did I mention our famous sense of entitlement? LOL!
Finally, the new season is just about here. Let's get stuck in.
On-field, the expectations will of course be high. That's what South fans expect, and finishing inside the top three, with the double chance that comes with that, is the only acceptable outcome in the home and away season. For better or worse, there's no more Joe Montemurro on the sidelines for the first time in three years - and now it's all down to Gus Tsolakis and his crew. During this pre-season, however much you can take out of that, we've moved the ball forward more quickly, and haven't been reliant on two or three chances to score all our goals - even if our finishing has been poor this so far.
Defensively, the English trio of Matthews, Byles and Kelly, provided they stick together for most of the season, should provide a more solid defensive framework than last year. With Kiwi Rhodri Payne seemingly finally out of favour, the left-back slot will be a hotly contested position, though there don't appear to be any obvious replacements yet. Will much maligned utility Brad Norton get the gig? Will Phil Petreski be shifted out of his midfield roles to fill the gap? Or will they pull a rabbit out of the hat and give the passionate/temperamental Anthony Giannopoulos a gig?
Since waking up finally when he got a back pass against Port (all praise to mighty Baal), Peter Gavalas has actually looked hungry. He got benched against I think it was the Bergers and instead of a doing a casual warm down he was doing sit ups and push ups like a bit of a maniac. Rumour has it that likely second choice Seb Mattei doesn't give a shit about football anymore, but since it seemed like we had one of those last year as a first choice, who'd notice the difference this year if it turned out the same?
As usual we have more midfielders than you can poke a stick at, and how we fit them all into a starting eleven will be very interesting. With Carl Recchia done for the year, you'd expect Dimi Tsiaras to have the defensive mid slot sown up. Alan Kearney will hopefully add some much needed toughness to the middle, but the attacking midfield roles and wing positions are still all up for grabs, with most of the contenders not completely grabbing the bull by the horns just yet.
Marinos Gasparis looks fitter than he's ever been, but will that help him to overcome his chronic inconsistency? Joe Keenan has been given a fair bit of time this pre-season to show his mettle, but the Keenan of old, who was able to slide past players, slot lovely curved goals and put in good crosses hasn't been spotted for some time. Dimi Hatzimouratis's 2012 season was cut down by injury, and while he hasn't done anything remarkable this past month, there are still those who rate him highly
There are also several young players - among them James Karvellis and Andrew Cartanos - who got game time last year and during the pre-season -, who may be called upon if the above players don't perform.
And what of Fernando De Moraes? He didn't have one of his best seasons last year, and even though his work rate did go up to unprecedented levels for him, that's not what he's there for. A role off the bench role may be what's forthcoming, but will he bes satisfied by that?
There's also the question of Andy Vlahos, who could be used either forward or in midfield. While surely coming to the end of his career, he seems content with coming off the bench, and he was useful in that role last season. His greatest strength may lie in his several years of coaching experience, perhaps adding to the tactical arsenal available to Tsolakis.
Further upfield, Renco Van Eeken, and the Queensland pairing of Tyson Holmes and Rhys Meredith have looked fast and dangerous, without putting anyone other state league two Malvern City to the sword. I can't wait to see how they fit Trent Rixon into this line up. Hell, I can't wait to see Trent's reaction when his first touch in an attacking move isn't 15 metres in our own half.
Let's Digress and Have a Look at the Other Teams Green Gully
What disaster will happen to us there this year?
Port Melbourne, Bentleigh Greens, Oakleigh Cannons (combined preview)
Richmond
I don't care about their management switch, or which players they've lost or brought in. Like Michael Lynch, all I want to know is, will the food still be as good?
Hume City
Back home again, no need for a trip out to Epping.
Melbourne Knights
Our very own Gus Tsolakis reckons people should keep an eye out for them this year.
Dandenong Thunder
Thanks to the FFV (and for me on two fronts!), this is where we'll be watching this game from this year.
Pascoe Vale
Another team going for the night game angle.
Southern Stars
What now after the end of the Irish Free State? I suppose there'll be some prurient interest in seeing in how Rama is getting along, a bit less so for Jason Ricciuti.
Northcote
Should not be underestimated.
As usual there will also be the myriad off-field shenanigans.
The social club's progress - or rather, lack of it - will be felt more and more as the season wears on. What was meant to be one of the linchpins of our return has yet to materialise, and the dispute with the government about the social club redevelopment fund could well drag on. What would be good would be to see some information from the club on this issue, and though there have been inferences that it is forthcoming,
The end of the year also sees elections for the boards of SMFC and SMH. Will there be any rival tickets this time around? We've not had an actual election for so long. There's been much dissatisfaction from among certain former board members, but will they make a move? And if they do, what will their platform be? Who else will be on their ticket?
Another question to ponder is what role will the expanded suffrage will have in determining our future. Now that voting rights have been opened up to a whole lot more people, will there be increased interest in the behind the scenes working of the club? There were signs at the AGM that outside the ranks of the old social club clique, there were people who were willing to turn up and participate or at least be witness to the nitty gritty of our club's planning.
There's also the question of the National Competitions Review. There are those out there who are claiming that it won't come in next year - witness the splurging by some state league 1 clubs for a promotion spot that probably doesn't exist - and yet you also have certain VPL clubs spending cash like it's going out of fashion for what exactly?
Assuming that the NCR does go ahead next season, how will we be forced to adjust? Will the rumoured 280 point cap - instead of 200 - come in? If it does, will it be permanent, or phased down over subsequent seasons? Will the FFV allow us to keep charging our $3200 a year?
Of course, there is the ongoing issue of the re-conciliation efforts with SMWFC. Progress seems interminably slow on this front, and yet a women's unit will be an essential component of the NCR. Does SMWFC even want re-conciliation, or just co-operation for the sake of the precinct? If they want to remain a social/community outfit, what are our options after that? Is there demand for $3200 coaching for junior girls' teams?
And how much more South for the A-League nonsense will we see this year? Every time I think this issue is going to finally go away for good, it comes back with a bit of vengeance. What will be the next phase in this consuming obsession?
Hint: Another Melbourne Heart is doomed or moving to Geelong is already gathering steam.
As For The Blog
Expect more of the usual sweet nourishing (Krusty Brand Imitation) gruel from myself: match reports where the actual game is almost incidental, more calls to give 'Gia' a run, rushed experiments in stylistic alternatives to our normal writing (thinking about Our Man in Kandahar style things - I'm halfway through Egon Kisch's Australian Landfall at the moment), and the usual South of the Border Cheap Eats guide - we've already lost our original and most loved fall-back place Es Teler '77 on Swanston, now that they've moved somewhere else and re-branded themselves as some sort of Indo-Malay place instead of just plain old Indo.
Maybe even a a retool of the blog's look, because I'm not convinced that we've got close to plumbing the depths of hideous web design that only looks semi-decent on a seven ( I think) year old Benq notebook.
There will also be the usual off the wall observations from the Kiss of Death that has earned this blog its cult audience of movers and shakers, and boy are we looking forward to its contributions before the KOD's usual late season slide into 'too much busy farken, can you do it for me farken' status.
Of course if anyone else (lol, bahahahaha) wants to write for us, just drop us a note. Some more comments would be nice, someone apart from the ever reliable Savvas Tzionis and whichever board lackeys decided to add their two cents of propaganda. Also, maybe this year we'll actually get to see Steve from Broady pitch in with his long promised regular comments or even some stats or something.
I have no idea how much time I'm going to lose for this project now that we're working(!) three days a week and are also expected to do PhD level research and writing, but if my honours thesis year and half was (or more like three months of actual half-arsed effort) is anything to go by, I don't think you'll notice any difference, except for the soccer fiction reviews I'll have teed up for the off-season at the end of the year.
Final Thoughts
I've already seen Oakleigh Harismidis at two separate matches at Chaplin Reserve, once with a knock off Brisbane Bears scarf, and once talking to the canteen ladies telling them how valuable they are to that organisation. It's going to be hard top off that spectacle, but the VPL hasn't disappointed before. Chances are another farcical loss at Gully this Saturday will do the trick.
Now this is a Facebook page that could surely do with a bit more publicity.
Previously, we here at South of the Border have covered the 'South should merge/takeover with Heart' phenomenon only sparingly, and with the utmost reluctance. Most notably, there was the moment of comic relief at the end of the 2012 AGM blog entry, from January 2013. More substantially, there was this article from December last year.
Still, most of the talk on this issue is refers to possible takeover plans rather than a merger, so it's nice to see someone put up the merger point of view, if only for a bit of variety. On their page they've put up videos from both teams, tried to come up with a home strip - the Paraguay national team style thing on the right hand side, with hooped socks no less - and one person, I assume the page's creator, tried to post a comment on the official South Facebook page in order to advocate for this idea. Sadly, it appears that comment was taken down by one of the humourless drones who monitor that page.
And even though we disagree with this idea on principle, we'll be keeping an eye on seeing how much support - legitimate or otherwise - this campaign is able to muster up.
PS.
And then, just as I hit submit and schedule this article for a later date, someone comes up with this. Good grief. How long until this nonsense ends?
PPS.
And then the Facebook page's creator puts up a thread on the Heart forum, which quickly gets locked. Need him to post a comment here, lol.
Remember this crap? Well, because Melbourne Heart got another crappy crowd, we're once more at the stage where two things are happening. First, the usual South suspects have come out to dance on the Heart's impending grave, without noting the inherent ironies of doing so, while on the other side of the equation, Heart's supporters are by and large looking either to blame everyone and everything bar the model their club is based on, or attempting to come up with ever more ludicrous solutions to their plight.
I won't bore you with the full range of those ideas (examples include moving the team to Geelong, buying a Greek marquee player, getting a 10k capacity boutique soccer stadium built at Glenferrie Oval), but one idea that comes up from both sides of this issue is a merger/amalgamation/takeover scenario with our very own South Melbourne Hellas.
The South supporters who are keen on this train of thought put forward the idea that our club should wait until Heart is just about dead (or not, in some variations), and then buy a stake in that franchise and change it South Melbourne by stealth. Never mind that like any half astute Australian sporting body, the FFA controls the licensing and naming arrangements. Never mind entering a competition with high overheads and almost no one making a profit. Never mind that our main goal should be to try and get what we're doing now right, because there are a lot of people who would love it to fail.
The Heart fans' idea tends to run a different way - that they should play out of the cheaper and smaller Lakeside Stadium in order to tap into the supposed latent A-League support buried within the South Melbourne community. Never mind that:
Our actual active support, like every other state league club, is poor.
Most of those people who could become enchanted with the A-League are already there.
If you want to find big numbers of Greeks at sporting events in Melbourne, you're more likely to find them at a Collingwood or Richmond AFL match.
And what's the obsession some Heart fans have with attracting Greek-Australian fans anyway? Aren't they meant to be a 'mainstream' operation?
The best parts of this situation (which seems to come up at least once every season) are the ever more ludicrous lengths people will go to back up their particular point of view. The person who created the two logos included in this entry deserves a prize for creativity, and for highlighting the difficulty in establishing whether anyone on either side of this issue is being genuine in this debate. That they are the views of a small minority of internet warriors is not much consolation.
Melbourne Heart are off to some sort of pointless Hawaiian invitational. And they've padded out their squad for this trip with an assortment of VPL players, including South's new recruits Jason and Glen Trifiro. While I'm sure it'll be a lovely opportunity for them, I can't wait until one of the brothers does a season ending injury ala Joe Keenan playing for Adelaide United during an injury replacement stint.
In last Thursday's Neos Kosmos, tucked away in the sports pages, there was an editorial cum letter from a Melbourne Heart fan, Dimitris Konteleon. In this piece, he lists the reasons for his supporting the Heart - their colours match his first love Olympiakos, and he wanted to belong to a club here in some fashion.
Calling himself a Heart member since their founding, he goes on to lambaste Neos Kosmos' main rival, Ta Nea, for ignoring Heart entirely, and focusing exclusively on the Victory. The insinuation is clear - that Ta Nea's owner, the Greek Media Group, in turn owned and controlled by Harry Stamoulis, who also happens be a Melbourne Victory shareholder/owner, is deliberately starving the Heart of coverage.
Kontoleon goes on to talk about how discussions he had with one of Heart's admin personnel, a Mr Kentel, which included measures designed to attract members of the Greek community. He came out of these discussions slightly disappointed, as there was no follow up, though he was glad that his idea of regional games was taken up, as well the handing out of free tickets to youngsters.
He finishes up by talking about the quality that Heart has on the field, hopes they finish in the top six and that their coach is in the top five coaches in the league, if not the top one, (with a probably unintentional nod to Brian Clough). Somehow, when you have only ten teams, finishing in the top six is still considered a significant achievement.
To some of his other points - Heart played a game in Morwell because every club had to play at least one game in regional areas. Despite Morwell's soccer past, Heart still managed to get less than what most South games in the area would get back in the day. As for calling himself a member, it just goes to show how far this new notion of membership has carried - there are no members at A-League teams - only season ticket holders. Still, that lie will persist, another victory of marketing over reality.
What really grinds my gears with his letter was what was all too predictably absent. Where was South Melbourne? Where was Heidelberg? Where were all the other tinpot Greek community clubs?
As a reluctant nationalist as the very best of times, I'm uncomfortable with making appeals to patriotism in the name of South Melbourne, or indeed, Heidelberg or other once high profile Greek backed clubs across Australia. So I seek to turn the focus away from peasant nationalism to the sense of community. After all, there are many opportunities to be Greek outside of soccer clubs in Melbourne.
What I, and I imagine that many other South fans would have liked to have seen happen, is to have been proven wrong. That when the club was in its greatest hour of need, that people wouldn't abandon what they perceived to be a sinking ship. That a sense of belonging, of community, even of duty would have prevailed instead of the bandwagon cliche that has attached itself to the Greek-Australian nationalism of convenience.
So many people put so much money into this club, so many hours, to build it up from nothing to something remarkable, in spite of its many faults. And these people that have turned away from the club are ignoring that sacrifice, one that was made by people that they likely know.
Also confusing is Kontoleon's assertion about the need to attract more people from the Greek community. As a mainstream franchise, why should Heart seek to isolate ethnic groups like that? As much of a furphy as Heart targeting Melbourne's south-eastern suburbs was their apparent targeting of fans of the former NSL clubs. Every man and hos dog knows that those left at those teams are few and far between on all but the most special occasions.
It's a fair bet to say that most of the Heart's support is made up of Victory bitters. People who for whatever reason supported the Victory or went to their games, until such time as there was an alternative that was even remotely more pleasing to them. Sure, they may have picked up a few odds and ends of people from a club like South, who were able to convince themselves that the Heart are an entirely different ideological beast to the Victory, but there's no real benefit in targeting such a small spectrum of soccer supporters.
I've often wondered about the notion of club ownership and belonging - not in the sense of being a financial member, but that 'sense' that the club belongs to you and vice versa - and I've always been flummoxed by the notion that there is more scope for that sense of ownership to exist at something like an A-League franchise. While arguments have been made as to why people can't or couldn't support one of the ethnic teams - some of them quite sensible - I have not been able to understand this new found sense of increased ownership when there are heightened significant barriers to the club's management structure, less history to attach oneself to.
That lack of history, politics and specificity may just be the lure though. A clean start, and less responsibility for a club's success or failure. No clubhouse, no trophy room. And the illusion that you're at the forefront of something new and exciting. But we're now in the era where even the local Greek press, whose priority should be local Greeks and their institutions, are more worried about, in a sporting sense at least, those entities established to eclipse the social place of our community organisations.
Twenty years ago it was a fight between South and Heidelberg for press coverage. Now it's a fight between tweedle-dee and tweedle-dum franchises on our back pages. Says something about the Greek community and its sense of loyalty and kinship in this matter.
In a bold fixturing move, the A-League decided to play five games in a row on a working day Wednesday, one after the other, starting in New Zealand and ending in Perth.
Day 2 at the SCG was what cricket is all about. Minus the rain delays, of course.
People have begun posting so-called strong rumours and inside information that a merger between South and the Melbourne Heart is on the cards, sooner rather than later. Cue bored and aimless speculation of a weary minority.
Despite his protestations, it was evident to all that Ross was not comfortable with Rachel's relationship with Joey.
I thought Melbourne Heart was supposed to have been broke by last September. People had sworn they'd even seen the paperwork.
Angela's ex-husband comes back into the picture, to tell her that he plans to remarry. He also wants to have his son, who is in Angela's custody, to be his best man at his wedding in Los Angeles. Somehow this becomes a pretext for the show to have a California special, bringing along the entire cast, with the requisite beach montage letting us marvel at Tony Danza's physique. The episode was to be continued.
I thought the A-League was supposed to be dead by now.
For reasons that escaped me, The Fonz was sporting a beard.
Whatever happened to that bloke who went by the moniker Western Greek? He used to rock up to our games dressed in exotic football jerseys based on the colours of the opposition, as part of some superstitious gimmick. He went over to the Heart, said he'd still follow us, and hasn't been seen since.
That 70s Show is just a Happy Days remake with marijuana. Discuss.
I wonder sometimes - despite the loss of 90% of our supporter base since the end of the NSL, are there still people supporting this team who are doing so only because they think our return to the top flight is imminent?
The Simpsons golden age is so long ago that it is but a distant memory. They could have stopped ten years ago, perhaps even five years ago, and that golden age would still have been deemed characteristic of the show's output. Now they're fishing for plotlines in the lives of Rod and Todd Flanders. Good luck with that.
How much have I backed myself into a corner, for the sake of a probably phony ideological purity, by resisting not only the charms of the A-League, but also of almost all overseas football?
While The Cleveland Show is for the most part a successful and funny spin-off, there is a meanness that has been added to Cleveland's character that is troubling to me.
The Hellenic Cup released its draw yesterday. Within a few hours, they released an altered version. In about a month's time, the annual pre-season public transport and walking trudge to the south-east begins for me again.
