photo: phil hillyard
On Friday morning I popped in to see the two
baristas. They’re working together on Fridays now, instead of Mondays, so we’ve
changed our review to a pre. We’re on
first name terms now; let’s call them J and D. J’s the Roos man, D the Swan. We
exchanged the preparatory hello. North up and down. The loss Sydney had to
have. The battle ahead of the Scotts. And then J cut straight to the chase; it
was admiration tinged with bitterness. Hopefully my coffee wasn’t heading the
same way.
‘It won’t be a blow
out tonight, you know. Have you got a plan B if Buddy doesn’t bring his A
game?’
‘Well,’ I offered after a moment. ‘There’s this
guy, big, tall, what’s his name? Wears the number 8. And … oh yeah, there’s
another guy, won a few awards, played a while, that number 37.’
J was smiling behind the chrome. ‘You going to the game?’
‘Yep! Oh and
there’s that kid, shaved head, good mark, got a brother who plays for
Collingwood. Number 20. Read or Reid or something.’
J was nodding now. But I had one more to go.
‘There’s a little one too. Midge. One of those
gifts from Hawthorn. You know, the little one.
Number 21 on his back.’
‘I’m so impressed,’ J said.
It was quite a list. And–
I kept it to myself – there were so many more. A pair of snappy captains. A
brigade of greedy midfielders. Parker, Josh and Harry – they all like a goal. And remember
Hannebery?
‘I’m so impressed.’
J handed the coffee over the pass. ‘That you know their names and numbers.
You’re bona fide, the true deal. Definitely pass the test.’
I was quietly taken
aback. I didn’t realise that, after more than half a season with the machine
and banter between us, I was still being appraised.
He’s a serious footy nut, J. It’s couched behind his crafted barista
calm. I guess much of the footy chat he gets comes from suspected pretenders. I’ve
heard young folk talk the Friday Swans talk under the charms of his dark good
looks. But they haven’t walked by Monday. This is Sydney. I showed the correct
propensity for detail.
‘Thank you,’ I said.
The coffee was the perfect temperature, strong with a sweet caramel finish.
*
That night, I dropped the tired Cygnet to his grandparents – he
opted (post recorder ensemble and the long school day and trapeze) for reverse
cycled comfort, homemade chicken soup, a hot shower and the flat screen. I headed
to the ground, walked down Moore Park Road alone, overheard a conversation
about a virologist who accidentally outbid a banker at a charity auction to the
tune of $18 000. He thought the prize was 2 not 20 thousand. The real story was
the humiliation of conceding the mistake. I passed the bag check and was on my
way to Gate E, when one of a trio of fifty something males expressed his bemusement,
at the top of his voice, over an Instagram post of a Vespa that attracted him14
likes. When it was re-posted by a young female office worker, it attracted ten
times that many. This is Paddington, Sydney.
The O’Reilly boys were there to shield me from a biting wind. And
Gwen was there with her shortest shortbread, a (Captain) Luke Parker badge from
the MCG and a handful of card packs for the Cygnet. Bless her! The Cob texted in
from Edinburgh:
So if the Cygnet’s at Mum and
Dad’s, who’s your date?
J, I
tease. The Cob knows the stories.
Nice work. Say hi to him for
me.
I haven’t
told him about you yet.
Games are questions and answers. One side announces something. What
has the other got? The chat with the Hawks last week was superb, a proper
conversation. Sometimes there’s genuine, seamless repartee; you go and go until
one side doesn’t have time or energy for a final answer and things are left
over ‘til next time. Other times, one party can’t get a word in edgeways. Or just
has nothing to say. And sometimes the exchange you can hear over your shoulder
is more peculiar and telling than the one you’re in. I wasn’t sure what was on
the agenda tonight with Essendon.
The Swans were loud early. Up and about and the home crowd with
them. We were loving Rohan’s pace in the O’Reilly. Loving him off half back. We
were loving the man in the fluoro yellow boots, Malceski, marking
intelligently, kicking impeccably. Speculation swirled. Would he or wouldn’t he
go? We were fearing him into a ménage à trois with Ross and Kirky in the west. Rohan looked like
the right-footed apprentice.
We admired Jetta on Friday night. Turn and he was there; Jetta the
conjunction. We used to imagine them, Rohan and Jetta, in 2010 when they
debuted together, we imagined them streaming down the wings in unison. The
configuration looks different now but it looks good. And the defence, run by a
Teddy, held by a Reg. And Rampe, contesting with the same short-groined
intensity of the previous #24, down but back up like the bop bag Jude was too.
At the height of the first half poetry, I leaned into one of the
O’Reilly boys and mentioned the hands. I’m
so impressed with their hands. But it occurred to me that hands are only
good if you’re in the right spot. They’re bona fide movers this year, these
Swans, familiar with the arcs of the team conversation.
I relish going to the footy for the art of conversation, not only
with the neighbours but with the game. Invariably the internal dialogue of a
match talks to our own lives, where they stand, how they are proceeding, what
views are in need of attention. The Swans on Friday night made a certain early
assertion, a kind of pattern to which the opposition might formulate a
response.
And then in the third, they just stopped talking.
A different conversation took over. Not one to over hear but one we
couldn’t hear over. We’d been aware all evening of a traveling party in the row
behind, a hangover from multicultural round perhaps, an Aussie fella and his
friends – a solo male from the subcontinent donning a Dons scarf alongside a
clean cut couple from Canada, firmly wrapped in red and white and looking for
Mike Pyke. Rules had been dished out during the evening. And as the volume went
down on the game, it rose in the student ranks.
Early in the third, with three consecutive Bomber goals, our sub-continental
brother came to life. Each time an Essendon player received the ball – each and
every time, no effective disposal required – he would yell, at top volume: Oh yes! Come on BomBers, with particular
emphasis on the second B. And when the ball was turned over, he yelled at top
panto volume, Oh, no! Stop them BomBers!
Miss Canada, by the fourth, had consumed enough to be barracking with the same
verve as a local. Heppell lined up for goal 7 minutes into the third. C’mon number 21, your hair looks stooopid.
I’m afraid she’d learned it straight from O’Reilly Max who has taken a strong
dislike to the Hurley/Shoenmaker samurai pony. For the hard chase and contested
ground ball she cried, C’mon, let’s get
this butterball. Intermittently she stopped, What’s happening? I don’t know what’s going on? Mike Pyke where are
you? Beacon that he is. For the free awarded to Reid in the square, her
diagnosis – Oh it was a chopping, tripping, falling kind of incident. And when the
Swans scored against momentum, she cried Aoooorwl;
she was all the wolves of Canada.
Miss Canada may not have had the dialect quite right, she may not
have known any of the numbers, but I was impressed. I loved the inexpertness of
her commentary. Life is part certainty, part chaos; part strong narrative line,
part digression; part bold statement and part farce: part talking and mostly listening.
The main characters don’t always have the best lines. Sometimes it’s the cameos
that shine. No wonder football appeals to writers.
With minutes to the final siren, Miss Canada drew breath and came to
a halt. What does Q B E stand for? As
things were about to go off topic completely, that big guy, that #37 kicked
from straight in front. And with minutes to go the human conjunction sent it
long to the square, off Rohan’s hands and into the path of the little one,
McSomething, the number 21. Full stop.
