It’s that time of the year when we are bombarded with the last-minute pitch by AFL clubs keen to separate us from our hard-earned membership moolah.
This week, St Kilda – a tribe to which circumstances render me all but genetically hardwired – took its turn by releasing a video called More Than a Football Club.
It’s an impressive production that tugs at the heartstrings in all the right ways. Lenny Hayes. Robert Harvey. Darrel Baldock. It reminds St Kilda types of the special kind of solidarity that comes with elusive premiership success.
Tex Perkins voices a montage that includes vision of Luna Park, Acland Street, and the Espy, along with a kind of ‘what the?’ nod to the bayside and peninsula Melbourne suburbia which Saints plotters and planners are keen to claim as officially their own.
It’s a classic example of traditional localism sitting a little awkwardly alongside the modern survival strategies employed by clubs to retain relevance in this expansionist era.
I was reminded by the place of localism in football by – of all things – an extraordinary aftermath to the Quiksilver and Roxy Pro World Championship Tour events on the Gold Coast.
Kelly Slater – the Bradman of his chosen sport – was asked by a journalist about overcrowding at Snapper Rocks after he’d been photographed on a lay day in among a tight cluster of five trying to catch a wave.
He quite sensibly expressed concern at the number and aggression of local surfers, who showed scant regard for the safety of others.
Mistake.
Slater’s statement of the bleeding obvious was poorly received by locals, who took it as whiny entitlement. The result was the vandalisation of Slater’s car, with someone using board wax to scribble ‘F-ckwit’ on a window.
No more eminent authority to comment on the state of recreational surfing, and that is the treatment he gets from a fiercely loyal local contingent, who didn’t take kindly to the casual dissing of their break.
So what’s this got to do with AFL? It made me ponder the similarly hostile geographically-obsessive passion once embraced so dearly by fans of the national code.
But almost without noticing, the outer has become – thankfully – a much more polite place to be. There remains hardcore pockets of feral fandom of course, but there’s no doubt things are a hell of a lot nicer than they once were.
Why? The overt marketability of family friendliness is one reason. I’d argue talent distribution has had plenty to do with it too.
I was behind the scenes at the 2010 National Draft. What struck me was the ambivalence of the young talents who waited quietly for their number to be called.
For most, roads trodden for half their young lives had led to that moment. They cared not for any particular club, they simply cared for an end to the journey. They wanted to play at the highest level. Being elite was the drawcard.
They’d been through draft camps and State competitions together. They’d trained at specialist academies together. They were so collegiate it was almost eerie. The colour of a jumper, or of a club followed as a kid, seemingly meant nothing.
I left feeling if the players were so unconcerned, there’s no genuine reason why we, the fans, should care much either.
But we do.
I stick to the Saints because of my mother. I was a Saint well before I’d drawn my first breath. Mum used to attend mud-caked games at Moorabbin with me in utero.
Out on the field, players were there by virtue of the zone in which they were born. Soaked wool jumpers weighed them down. All the while they were burdened by the prospect of returning to a real job on Monday.
These days, the players are full-time athletes who come from anywhere. I can’t remember the last time I saw genuine stud-clogging mud on a football field. Woollen sleeves have gone the way of cassette tapes. And Moorabbin has been usurped by a strategically-positioned high-performance centre at Seaford, one just as concerned about training as it is about demographics and St Kilda’s future economic plans.
The game has changed so much and yet supporters still live in this artificial realm of connectedness, when the reality is an unspoken loyalty to a brand.
It’s all quite brilliant, even if it totally lacks logic.
Of course there’ll be plenty of you who scowl at the accusation you’re living a lie. That’s all part of it. Your ire can be conveniently badged as passion.
Is there an answer to combat the artifice?
Mine is simple. I luxuriate in the talent on display. I accept the fact a couple of teams are going to have a more talent than others for a bit. I accept the fixture is a total nonsense, dictated by television needs.
In essence, I cave in to the construct. I do as I’m told – I switch on, soak it up and enjoy it.
Even if the game’s loyalist edge has been blunted, regardless of how many members’ scarves you own, the players remain the game’s greatest drawcard. That they don’t wear your preferred colours doesn’t matter in the slightest.
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We’re taking a look at one player from each team that needs to make a difference this week, starting with the ANZAC Day games.
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