By Rod Oaten
There was no Sir Douglas Nicholls Round, and no Dreamtime game last weekend. It’s a game I never miss. So I looked back to the Dreamtime game of 2014.
May, 2014
It’s always very special to go to the Dreamtime game and celebrate the fantastic contribution our Indigenous brothers have made to footy. This year being the tenth anniversary of the Michael Long Walk made it even more special.
I am old enough to remember the great Norm McDonald playing for the Dons in the late forties and early fifties. Many years later Michael Long and Gavin Wanganeen set the Dons on fire. Over the years Kevin Sheedy brought many indigenous champions to the club and I for one loved the way they played. Today it’s Courtney Dempsey and Paddy Ryder who continue this tradition.
I also remember the day I met a young footballer and boxer, Lionel Rose. I was appointed to Yallourn North Primary School in the early 1960s and every now and then I would head back to Melbourne for the odd weekend. One Sunday afternoon on my way back to Yallourn I saw a young lad hitch-hiking just outside of Dandenong. I stopped and picked him up. He didn’t have a lot to say so I kept the conversation up for the journey home. One thing I do remember on that trip was he told me his name was Lionel.
He told me very quietly that he was training for a boxing match in the near future and that he went down to train at the home of his trainer in Essendon. He told me he hitch-hiked to save money. Sometimes he would catch the train to Dandenong, and if he were lucky, get a lift pretty quickly, sometimes he was not so lucky.
He said he loved boxing and football, but said he was going to give boxing a good go. He told me he lived near Drouin with his family, so as we got to the outskirts of that town, as he suggested, I dropped him off at a small track just off the highway. He picked up his small bag from the back seat and said thanks and headed off.
A few months later I’m pretty sure I saw him playing footy for Drouin for an Under 19 side, and he showed a lot of skill in all areas of the game. Over the next couple of years Lionel appeared fairly regularly on TV Ringside with Ron Casey and Merv Williams and he was class with a capital C. Of course, he went on to win the world title and the admiration of millions, especially Melburnians and Victorians, which was pretty hard to do if you were indigenous in those days.
Many years later while having an ale or two with some friends in a Moe pub, I saw Lionel enjoying himself quietly with some mates in the same bar. I said g’day to him but didn’t remind him of the day I gave him a lift.
He passed away in 2011.
I wonder whether he’d have made it in football.
Tonight, I got to the ground and saw the last ten minutes of the Aaron Davey Squad play the David Rodan Squad. What a fantastic game it was, less than a kick in it until the Rodan Squad scored a goal with less than a minute to go and another right on the siren to win by eleven points. This was followed by the Welcome to Wurundjeri country, a moving ceremony in the semi-darkness of the Melbourne Cricket Ground. I should have gone home then, because that was the most exciting thing that happened for the night.
When the game eventually started it was obvious the very late start (almost past my bedtime) didn’t affect the ageless Dustin Fletcher, who received a pass on the outer wing and banged a goal through from outside fifty, within sixty seconds of the bounce. And from then on it got worse for Richmond.
Essendon had winners all over the ground, they were always there to back up, shepherd, and receive a hand or foot pass. The other rabble, and that’s putting it kindly, were insipid. At times it reminded me of last year’s game against Melbourne when Essendon completed a number of training drills to win by a bucket load of goals. Last year I almost felt sorry for Melbourne, but there is no sympathy for Richmond tonight. They were as bad as Melbourne were last year. No, I reckon they were worse.
There were a couple of high/lowlights for me on the night. With seconds to go before half time, after yet another Richmond turnover, Joey Daniher picked up the loose ball and from outside fifty launched a goal one second before the siren to stretch the lead to 39 at the big break. The other, in the early stages of the third quarter was a “ripper”. A Richmond defender, Alex Rance, got a free kick deep in the Essendon forward zone and dribbled it to Ben Howlett in the goal square, who must have been in a state of shock, but nonetheless picked it up and kicked his third goal. You couldn’t blame the colour of the jumpers for this huge clanger either, Richmond jumpers looked as if they had been left on the clothesline and had faded badly, the Dons were resplendent in black and red, a beautiful combination.
The further the game went on, the further the Dons dominated. Jake Carlisle found a bit of form, Joey Daniher got a few kicks, Courtney Dempsey showed his old dash and the regulars like Dustin Fletcher, Brendon Goddard, Jobe Watson, Ben Howlett, David Zaharakis , Dyson Heppell and the other fourteen were winning the ball with monotonous regularity.
What must Richmond supporters think of their team? They made The Dons look so good, but it’s because Richmond were so bad that I’m not getting carried away. At the back of my mind is this awful drugs saga. I am sick of so-called expert commentators saying Essendon should have the results by the end of the week/month/year. This has been dragging on for so long, if it’s bad for Dons Tragics like me, what must it be like for the players and their families?
Essendon 15.14.104
Richmond 7.12 54
Goals
Essendon
Howlett 5, Daniher3, Merrett 2, Fletcher (what a start to the game) Heppell, Hibberd, Chapman, Bellchambers
Richmond
Riewoldt 3 (and not a favourite with the crowd) Martin 2, Edwards, Cotchin
Best Players
Essendon
Howlett, Goddard, Watson, Fletcher, Hocking, Zaharakis, Hooker, Baguley, Hibberd and apologies to the rest of the twenty two.
Richmond
Martin, Cotchin (loved his long sleeves), Jackson
Man of the match: Brendon Goddard, but I would have given it to Ben Howlett.
Crowd 73,664 at the MCG.
Retired school teacher Rod Oaten has been a great appreciator of Indigenous footballers since his childhood in Essendon. He has been an MCC member for ages!