It looked to have been scripted perfectly.
The Eagles landed at the ‘G just as US vice-president Joe Biden made his own entrance with the game balls. That is part of the 'G’s magic; just like life itself, the moments it creates feel as though they wouldn’t exist without the agency of a fertile mind.
Like the moment in ’95 when a hundred thousand people felt the poignancy of the connection between Ted and his son. The tragedy of cancer links the Whittens and the Bidens; just a couple of days before his MCG appearance, the VP was at the Espy sports awards, talking about his son Beau and promoting cancer research. Now of course, they have the MCG uniting them in perpetuity.
Of course, it’s not just the tragic moments that stick in the memory. Just like life’s own roller-coaster, it’s the interchange of triumphs and disasters that generates enough imposters to fill (and sometimes) trick the memory banks. For me, though, it was a disaster played out at the ‘G that made me what I am today: A newly inducted MCC Provisional member.
I’m a Carlton tragic but it was the Bulldogs’ heartbreak in ’97 that finally made me decide to accept my good friend Michael’s nomination and start the long road to MCC redemption. Before the year’s preliminary final I’d accumulated plenty of MCG memories as Michael’s guest, or as an AFL member, or as fan in the outer.
However, it was the sight of Terry Wallace in the coaches’ box, with his head in his hands for a full five minutes, after the Crows stole a certain grand final place from them, that pushed me over the edge to finally apply.
Time stood still for those five endless minutes, as his players struggled to pick themselves up off the ground, Liberatore’s face still contorted in disbelief that his last quarter ‘sealer’ was now to be permanently ensconced as a behind in the record books.
My two sons, who were also nominated then and have also now become provisional members have become part of the woven tapestry of heartbreak and exhilaration – sometimes at the same time. Take the 1995 grand final when the seven-year-old, swept along by the frenzied tornado of Gary Ablett adulation, still exhorted the Geelong players to hold the Cup aloft, even as they languished a full 10 goals in arrears.
My ultimate Carlton joy was, of course, diminished by his tears and his need for consolation an ever-growing chain of anguish of Jacob Marley proportions. As ever, the aforementioned Eagles administered plenty of that MCG Geelong pain until no dam in the world could contain such an overwhelming torrent of supplication. Deliverance was finally delivered handsomely in 2007 – and ’09 – and ’11.
The third inductee has even more reason to feel conjoined to MCG memories. He was born on grand final day 1985 at the Epworth, overlooking the ‘G. He must have taken a keen interest in the Bombers notching up a record-breaking premiership, given that he became an Essendon supporter.
The fact that neither of my sons has seen fit to follow in their father’s supporting footsteps is either testament to my determination to provide them with respect for pluralism or their proclivity for independent thought. Or it could merely be that I’m a bad father.
When he wanted to go home at half-time of the demolition that was Essendon’s ‘93 premiership win over the Blues, I sternly cautioned him that one should never miss a premiership as one never knew when the next one might arrive. My words must have an effect as he almost missed his plane for an overseas trip so that he could stay to the end until the lap of honour had been completed in the 2000 finale. In the meantime, he’d kicked three goals at half-time in an MCG Little League game so his (and my own) rehabilitation were complete.
And so it has always been. This constant parade of triumphs and disasters, this mirroring of life itself. I can tell you where I was sitting when each of them left its mark. The spot when the wife made one of her rare trips to experience Geelong’s exhilaration and Micky Martin’s anguish as the ball softly nestled into Ablett’s arms in ’94. The spot when tears were shed when the Blues and Steve Bracks rolled both Essendon and Jeff Kennett at cricket score odds – on the same day!
I can tell you where I was sitting when family tragedy overshadowed things, including, incongruously, Sam Newman frolicking about in a tutu out on the field.
I can tell you exactly where I was sitting when West Coast was once again involved when Sheeds waved his jacket, or when Kouta exploded his leg, or when the scoreboard caught fire, or when Rhys-Jones won a Norm Smith or when Harold, the retired CIA guy, was given a lesson in goal-umpiring by my boys. Or when Fev ushered in a new millennium and a new era at Carlton by kicking 12, only for both maths purists and Carlton fans to realise that celebrations had been premature on both counts.
And it’s not just football. I can tell you where I was sitting when the Auld enemy lost the cricket World Cup Final in ’92, when serial pest Peter Hoare cost Australia a soccer World Cup place, when the Sydney Olympics began with a soccer match in Melbourne.
And so here I am. Carlton’s seven-point loss is a mere post-script to the day, subsumed in the memories of yesterday and promise of tomorrow. As ever, the cycle of life is being replicated. Michael who’s had his own issues with the dreaded ‘C’ word and who, as you’ll remember, got me to my MCC membership today, wants to give up on his own. Such has been the effect of Melbourne FC’s abject failure over the years.
However, if there’s one thing we know, in life and elsewhere, it’s only a matter of time when imposters of a different kind come calling. Hang in there, Mike, Bulldogs and Blues. Joe Biden himself said it at the Espys: “There’s always hope.”
Bob Pelekanakis, a new MCC inductee, is a translator who frequently obsesses about finding the right word or 300. The Word is often revealed to him through his wife and two adult children but also through peripatetic wonderings in search of yet more words. Although he's wandered over to many jewels in the global football crown, he reckons that not even the Superbowl, the FA Cup, several World Cups or Euros (from where he's just returned) can match the MCG on AFL Grand Final day for theatre. Or preliminary final day for meaning.
Or, more importantly, any other football day for the potential for all of that sort of stuff.
Match Summary
CARLTON 1.2 3.3 6.5 11.9 (75)
WEST COAST 2.4 5.7 10.8 12.10 (82)
GOALS
Carlton: Weitering 2, Gibbs 2, E.Curnow, Silvagni, Buckley, C.Curnow, Wright, Cripps, Kerridge
West Coast: Cripps 3, LeCras 2, Yeo 2, Kennedy 2, Hill, Schofield, Shuey
BEST
Carlton: Docherty, Cripps, Simpson, Gibbs, Kerridge
West Coast: Gaff, Priddis, McGovern, Shuey, Cripps, Masten
INJURIES
Carlton: Weitering (corked right calf)
West Coast: McGovern (left thumb), Priddis (left quad)
Reports: Nil
Umpires: Stevic, Edwards, Ryan
Official crowd: 26,389 at the MCG