Moving House artefact Wednesday - Kon moves house...

Usually this segment (when it bothers to run) doesn't go full bore with the images, but this is a bit of a special edition.

One of our readers, Kon, has recently moved house and needed to take some South Melbourne Hellas memorabilia with him, including some posters from 1988 and 1998. In his own words:

"One of the posters hung proudly in my dad's garage for 27 years. Dad passed away in 2009, an avid SMH supporter since 1964 - from memory, the last game we attended together was an away game in Heidelberg sometime in 2007/2008. His last SMH triumph was in taking his 5-year-old grandson to the final against Altona Magic back in 2006.

After 45 years at the same address, we sold, packed up and moved out of our family home. Memories. Of course, I had to take the posters with me. Damn shame I couldn't salvage the 'Barbaresso Ouzo & SMH, a great combination' sticker that was fixed to the door of the outside laundry."

Not that I keep up to date with all the different Greek language publications that exist and have existed in Australia, but Ελληνοαυστραλιανη Παροικία ('Greek Community') is a new one to me.

There are people out there who watched South in this era, who seemed to like this jersey. I can't say that I am one of those people. But the poster (see immediately below) is nice, and probably not one commonly seen.

The other poster and the news article spread are from just before the 1998 grand final. The juxtaposition between the two eras is interesting. Uniforms, stadium, branding, cultural emphasis. How the boast of 'not just a name, an empire' in 1998, even before we'd won the title, proved half true for a few years, but soon turned to dust.

As noted earlier, one bit of memorabilia which Kon and his family couldn't take with them to their new address was the sticker below, as it was stuck to the door of their laundry. But here it is preserved for posterity.

Thanks once again to Kon for sending these images our way, especially the sticker.

Lastly, since I am no good with putting names to faces, it'd be nice if all you old timers could list the players and staff members in each photo so I can create some complete captions for each image.

Social club artefact Wednesday - Phillips NSL flag

Like its Soccer Australia counterpart which we presented a few weeks (months?) ago, this would have been flown during NSL match days. Unlike that flag though, this one assuredly dates back to the late 1970s, which makes it all the more remarkable that it has actually managed to survive our various 'dissolution of the monasteries' phases. I can't emphasise enough how thrilled I was when I found this in some back room box or other.

The Dutch electronic giant Philips was of course the NSL's inaugural major sponsor, and the highlights show which was on Channel 10 at the time was suitably called Philips Top Soccer. In his mostly excellent autobiography By The Balls, Les Murray, who was both a commentator and host for the show, details the show's brief history (including how he went from László Ürge to Les Murray because of it). It's well worth picking up a copy of that book.

Of course, once Philips Top Soccer got canned and the NSL disappeared off the airways until SBS picked it up (fun fact - SBS' first game was the infamous 1980 NSL 'grand final' which Heidelberg tries to claim counts as a national title - it wasn't), Philips weren't getting the brand promotion they were paying for, and decided to end their association with the NSL.

Keep on trucking! artefact Wednesday - Global Gypsum

One of our readers, Arthur (a different one to the one you may be thinking of), sent us this photo that his brother took of a truck driving down Pascoe Vale Road in Broadmeadows the other week. Global Gypsum's CEO is one Andrew Mesourouni, who also happens to be a board member of our very own South Melbourne Hellas. Thanks to Arthur for sending us this very cool photo! (and his brother for taking it, of course)

The Case of the Mysterious Jersey

Do you know the story behind the jersey in this post?

Recently listed on Ebay, it has caused quite a stir among some South fans, mostly because no one can seem to remember when and why it was used.

And yet people claim that it seems familiar somehow. I don't have anything other half-educated guesses as to its origin.

The seven digit phone number on the back of the shirt gives it away as a pre-1998/99 artifact, but that doesn't get us very far.

My guess is that it's from the early 1990s, (perhaps circa 1992-1995 at the latest) for two reasons. One, because the use of the Vergina Sun image probably dates it to around the high point of passions about the Macedonian name issue. Secondly, 'healthy diet, try it' was a Victorian government health slogan/initiative from around that time also.

Yet one of our readers, via email correspondence, has suggested that perhaps it is a late 1980s artifact, because of the different type used for 'Marathon Foods' to that which was commonly seen. The vendor of the item was also interested but unable to provide any further detail as to the provenance of the jersey.

The lack of an NSL badge or apparel maker's mark suggests to me that it was at best a one off jersey. The sponsor on the back seems so minor, that it may have been a youth jersey, Dockerty Cup jersey, charity match jersey, or, and this is a longshot, a jersey from South Melbourne-Mordialloc, our state league offshoot.

The sponsor on the back, North Williamstown Body Works, seems to be still around, and operated by a Greek bloke as recently as 2010. Who's up for giving them a ring for us? We'd do it, but we suffer from a terrible phobia of calling people up.

Oh yeah, the major sponsor...

... was also announced at the season launch. Miroamer has stumped up the cash for another season, making them the first company to go for the major sponsorhips in consecutive years since... well, I'm not sure, but it's been a while. Good to have them on board for another year, after it looked like it probably wasn't going to be thus at the AGM last year. George Parthimos, who was on hand to represent the company, made a quip about some of the complaints they've been getting from their German customers, that the signal drops out when they're driving at over 180 kph. Those crazy Germans.

It's possible he'd had a drop or two of something

So boardmember George Triantos was on 3xy last night, from an undisclosed location - which I don't know the whereabouts of because I wasn't invited - having a bit of a natter about certain things, most particularly how well pleased he was with how South in the Suburbs went. Apparently we even got more sponsors on the day because of it. Any lingering doubts that I may have had about the worthwhility of the operation seem to have disappeared then. Because while it always looked good to have the blue and white on display with pride, it kinda, possibly, almost defeated the purpose if only regular South members signed up, because they were probably going to do that anyway. But if reports be true, there were some people who had renewed their fealty after some years away, but the sponsorship thing impresses me most. Great work by the team.

South in a Suburb called Oakleigh

You may, or may not have heard about this, but apparently South is going to wage guerrilla warfare of sorts by entering Chokeleigh territory and setting up a stall in front of a cake shop sponsor of this club and selling memberships and such. You can download the flyer for it here. Anyway, while it's nice that memberships are finally available, the whole operation does raise interesting questions about the club's status. Are we a club for the Greeks of the city? Are we a club for the South Melbourne area?

Here are some guesses of what could go down this Saturday.

1. People will be laughed at.
2. There might be some cussing.
3. Still current South supporters will buy memberships, giving the illusion that people are still interested.
4. There will be no memberships to buy, or at best, a table and a price list.
5. People will be so blown away they'll buy a membership for the first time ever or in years, and recommend the club to their friends and family.
   
6. People will stop and stare and seem confused? South Melbourne? What's that?
7. People will buy cake.
8. South of the Border will not be there, because they will be too busy working in order to earn money to pay for their membership and extravagant 50th anniversary related purchases.
9. It might actually go spectacularly well, with interest regenerated in the club.
10. No one will bring South of the Border back any cake after it's all done.

I don't want it to sound like sour grapes of bitterness, but we should give the club some credit. They're trying to reach as many relevant people (what the marketing types call 'receptive audiences'), and it's not like they're forgetting the local area they now represent - indeed the usual family day will be on next month - but because of what has happened to the club and the way people jumped off so quickly, you fret and worry about what having to almost beg for supporters means. Or maybe it's the kind of humility that was too long absent from the club, and it's better late than never to ask people to come and support this great club, rather than expect them to.

And just in case anyone asks, this is not because they're not doing it on Altona North that it may appear I'm being a little (maybe a lot for some people) down on the idea. That kind of thinking applies mostly to trains and why eastern suburbs people get new ones first while we still had to ride the old Hitachis with their spacious legroom, windows you could open, and oldskool rattle and shake. As you were.

Rock and/or Roll

Amidst much of the speculation for the coming season - our 50th anniversary don't you know - not much attention has been paid to who the possible candidates might be for the coveted - perhaps - major sponsor position on the commerative jersey. At last year's AGM, the question was asked if last year's sponsor Miroamer would be stumping up again; the answer was cautiously hopeful, but equally non-committal.

A random visit however The Age website showed that the company's internet car radio techonology is finally close to making its debut on the market. You can read about their technology, including quotes and stuff from South board member and Miroamer CEO George Parthimos in here. Who knows, maybe one day you could be driving to work and listening to the game all the way from Greece; or maybe some enterprising type could set up streaming broadcasts of VPL games to listen to when you're out on the road, maybe late for the game?

Possibly Andy Vlahos... hmm

Our sources (4Flares) indicate that it may have been Andy Vlahos... except that it had Viviennes Collection on the front as sponsor.

Kinda cool I guess

Someone made this as a kit for South on some Fifa game. Doesn't look too bad to be honest. As for Bank of Cyprus... I think they still have an ad board somewhere around the ground I think. They dumped us for some reason to become major sponsors at Sydney Olympic, and now sponsor clubs like Westvale and Oakleigh. I'd say it was their loss, but we need the money, ya know?

Sponsors of yore - Southern Motors

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

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