Two In The Think Tank - 413 - The History of the St Kilda Football Club

Starting point is 00:00:00 Hey everybody, Jess and Dave, just jumping in really quickly at the top here to make sure that you are across all the details for our upcoming Christmas show. That's right, we are doing a live show in Melbourne Saturday December the 2nd, 2023, our final podcast of the year, our Christmas special. It's downstairs at Morris House, which usually be called the European beer cafe. On Saturday December the 2nd, 2023 at 4.30pm, come along, come one, come all and get tickets at doogawonpod.com. Hello and welcome to another episode of Dugo on my name is Dave Warnke and as always I'm here with Matt Stewart Hello Matt. Hey Dave quick question how good is it to

Starting point is 00:00:51 be alive. I think it's pretty good. Okay you don't normally answer I appreciate that. Well let's get a second opinion this week we are joined by a very special guest we are joined by Nick Splitter from the Unplugged podcast and zerohanger.com Hello Nick. Hey fellas how you doing? Good thank you. So good Nick. Nick how good is it to be alive? I'm rough to be alive. At the time recording, Saints playing a final tomorrow and it feels pretty good. It feels pretty good doesn't it? Yeah. Doesn't happen that often. No. First time playing one at the MCJ in 13 years. It's been a while. It has been a while. Some was a grand final. Lionel Richie played.

Starting point is 00:01:27 But more of that later. We don't talk about that. Sorry, it's about us. We don't talk about that. We don't talk about Lionel. So yeah, you're a big Saints fan, Nick. You're a Pokkarsum pluggid. I was on a racing episode.

Starting point is 00:01:40 It was a lot of fun. If people want to listen, come out on August 31st. I talked about my journey. Your journey. Your podcast is pretty emotional. It's a bit of a therapy session. It's a bit of a therapy session.

Starting point is 00:01:52 We talk about everything, security club and yeah, it's a bunch of us just talking about how tragic our lives are really each week. No, no, no, there's a few of our listeners who listen as well. So I'll be pretty stoked to hear you over here. It's the crossover that everyone wanted. Absolutely. Yeah. Listen, I've been asking for it for years.

Starting point is 00:02:08 Being back in the courts. But zero hanger. I, that's a website I love. I did realize you're like, what are you the boss? I'm the general manager. Oh, zero. Oh, yeah. Oh, there's a big dog here.

Starting point is 00:02:19 I don't know. Oh, I did. Yeah. It looked bad down. That's so good. Yeah, and it's, there's, I fell, is the, so is bad down. That's so good. Yeah, there's IFL is the, so is that how it's put up? There's different sites with different codes.

Starting point is 00:02:31 That's right. Zero hangers, IFL. Zero hangers, the Aussie rules site. I just don't see rules independent content site in the country. Zero tackles. Zero tackles. Zero hangers, a rugby league site. I was going to say humble, but I was just a straight out break.

Starting point is 00:02:42 Just a break. No, no, no. Yeah, I mean, that's how we do. We split out all our sights for different sports, but here keeps us busy. So Dave, I don't know if you've got any inkling as to what today's topic might be about, because Dave doesn't know until you get going, Nick. I think there's been a couple of subtle clues so far. Do you want to explain to Nick and maybe any new listeners how this show works?

Starting point is 00:03:04 Absolutely. Nick, what we do here is we're taking in turns usually to report on a topic, often suggested to us by one of the listeners we go away do a bit of research then bring it back to the group, sadly Jess Perkins and while the co-host is taking ill this week, she's been benched. But we wish her well. We do wish her well. She pulls through. And we thought she will. But usually what we do is we start with a question to get us on to topic Do I have a free here that this one because I felt Nick might be aware of what yeah? Nick is aware Nick helped me write the report so Which is maybe in part why it's the longest report I've ever written. It's a two two hand up. Yeah, that's right

Starting point is 00:03:40 So Nick I don't know if you know this but but so we asked the question, and there is a, and a steam listener at home is keeping track of who gets the most correct answers. Right. And I am currently third. Yes. So this free hit is actually really good for me. All right, Dave, here's your question.

Starting point is 00:03:56 Here we go. Which sporting team is this quote about, while other clubs are defined by the number of premierships or rich veins of success, is the undeniable spirit of blank and it's people which is remained unshakable. Oh my gosh. Is it a tough one? I mean, I don't remember winning any premierships or championships when I was playing on the

Starting point is 00:04:18 War and Art Hospital cricket team in 2004. Did the people have undeniable spirit? Oh, it was huge. I was the 13th man. I made up position so I could go along on the bus and give out orange slices to the other guys who had actual talent. I'm gonna lock it in.

Starting point is 00:04:36 I'm looking around the room. I'm just gonna say whatever I see here, St. Kilda Football Club hat. St. Kilda Football Club hat here. Is it the St. Kilda Football Club? That's right. We're doing a report on the St. Kafor Club hat. St. Cudafor Club hat here. Is it the St. Cudafor Club hat? That's right, we're doing a report on the St. Cudafor Club hat. I've heard that's what people have been asking for that.

Starting point is 00:04:51 They want it, they want it, and they're gonna get it. So this has been suggested by quite a few listeners. Let me read through some of these people. So they either wanted to hear about the club in general, which is what I'm gonna talk about as they're celebrating their 150th year this year. Congratulations. I've been feeling the pressure of doing this for a while,

Starting point is 00:05:10 but I thought 150th year, we've made the finals, we've got to do it. Other people did specifically want the year 1966, but we'll probably get to that, we'll see if we have time. But have is in the first 150 years? Yeah, that does. So that's been suggested by these listeners, Phoenix from Delaware,

Starting point is 00:05:30 Nile White from Wayne, Newth, in County, Kildare in Ireland, Stuart West from East Moulvin here in Melbourne. He wrote, as a long time listener, it was a first time submitter, I'd love to hear about the saints, and their one and only premiership. At the time of recording.

Starting point is 00:05:45 At the time of recording. The show. Matt from Missouri City in Texas, Jeff Rosman from Laurenstale, Georgia in the US, Maddie Layden from Melbourne here, Cory from Pleasant Town or Pleasanton in California in the US, Josie Penning from Brisbane,

Starting point is 00:06:02 Yieldy's Basel from Istanbul and Turkey, who wrote, because I love hearing you guys talk about the things you love, IE River Dance. And I don't think Matt loves anything more than he does this. Bruce Kelso from Brisbane Queensland, Gatty J from Birmingham, he must have requested that a while ago, he's now known as Gatty J for the UK. Stefan Prince from Cardiff in Wales, Jeff Weiss from Snowcowlme in Washington, USA. Paul Mellor from Oldham in the UK. Julian McMahan, Hard from Curl Lewis, Alex from Perth,

Starting point is 00:06:35 Nathan Damon from Sawyer's Valley in Western Australia. Lewis Angle from Cardiff Wales, Ryan Hoskin from Sydney, Matt Arna from Mitchem in Melbourne. He's a college supporter, particularly wanted to hear about the 2010 Grand Final. I'll mention it briefly. Adam Moody from Adelaide, Laura Baker from Victoria. I wanted to hear about the G-Train.

Starting point is 00:06:55 I don't know if I mentioned the G-Train much. I'll have to remember to find the G-Train for Laura. We'll find a spot. And finally, the first ever topic suggestion in the hat by a guy called Dickie Jones who wrote under the section that said, why do you think this would be an interesting topic? Dickie Jones wrote, lol, it wouldn't. It's a bottom in me.

Starting point is 00:07:17 I think that was you. You were testing the system. We were testing that it worked. I forgot to eat the joke. That's so funny, because that's how long we've been talking about it. That bus of eight, six years ago, something we set up that online forum. Yeah, oh my goodness. I can't believe people from all over the world suggested this.

Starting point is 00:07:36 Yeah, I say soccer off of balls the world game. I'm pretty sure I'll move over. Yeah, I'm very impressed. I'm very impressed that there's a request from Turkey to talk about the security climate. That's incredible. That's incredible. That's so good.

Starting point is 00:07:49 Well, this one's for Dickie Jones and the rest. I watched an interesting six-part YouTube series on the club's history on a little YouTube channel called The Gasman. And I've quite a few times had a couple of fun episode titles like as bad as it gets and the invisible man. You can tell this is going to be a good story. Yeah, as bad as it gets. I'll lead to as bad as it gets in the show notes. Very interesting stuff. And he goes into way more detail than I can. If people have seen the runtime of this episode which I assume is going to be really long, they'll be like what more detail than I can. If people have seen the runtime of this episode, which I assume is going to be really long, they'll be like, what more detail than this could they have? Well,

Starting point is 00:08:27 they did, okay. Gazzman went in a huge detail. I want to ask you what the gas, it was a Saints fan. Was he the Gazzman? It could be the Gazzman. He was like, cricket team, I was handing him slices of orange. The Gazzman. So I thought to get us in the mood of us a couple of uh, saint supporters to uh, tell us what they think about uh, being a saint supporter, why they love the club and that sort of stuff. And first of all I thought I'd play one from Charlie Clausen from two guys one cup and Tofop to try and explain what it's like to be a saint supporter. Hi Charlie Clausen here, actor, writer, podcaster and saints tragic. When Matt asked me what it is, I love about the Sinkilda Football Club.

Starting point is 00:09:09 I thought of the words of the great John Legend, who in his song, all of me, describes his lover by saying, I love your curves and all your edges, all your perfect imperfections. And that is Sinkilda to a T, a collection of perfect imperfections. You think of the most bizarre trivia in VFL, AFL history, and the Saints own it. The only team to lose a premiership on count-pack, the last team to play in a draw, the most amount of wooden spoons.

Starting point is 00:09:35 Yet despite all this, they have this fiercely loyal fan base. And to be part of that group is something special. Someone wants to describe that, like like having a family member who is just dysfunctional, like a drunk uncle or something, that you know could be so much better if they just got their shit together and you just love them so much. But you also criticize them and you also put them down and you can do that because you're family. But the minute someone else says something bad about them, you'll defend them to the hilt. And that to me is a St. Gilda football club, a dysfunctional family member that you love for all that they aren't. I've got tees in my eyes. So good. Because really, there's a lot of nodding there.

Starting point is 00:10:12 You get, you get to, yeah, he's now that as a, Charlie van Oniole, a part of a few times in Ireland. Yeah. Yeah. It's a great play. I think that, that could sum up. That's such a good summary of what it's all about. I think. I think so. Is that the end? That's the end. That'll do for us. I wasn't, I've got so many words written here, but I think that'll do. Yeah. It's more about the vibe than he got it. So he can sub recording, but just for you Dave, I'll let you know about the Saints history. I need to know. Okay, great.

Starting point is 00:10:39 Well, let's go all the way back to 1873. The Saints, or the St. Cure Football Club, was born on the the way back to 1873. The Saints, or the San Quilta football club, was born on the 2nd of April, 1873, when the South Yara football club merged with the San Quilta cricket club. South Yara themselves were formed in 1858. So you can make the case that the club's history stretches back even further than 150 years ago.

Starting point is 00:10:59 So you can cover those? Yeah, right, let's go in. 15x sheet. Yeah, it's interesting that clubs were sort of being formed and dying a lot in those early years. It was sort of like I guess humans back then. The life expectancy wasn't so high for football clubs in the 1800s, but being formed in 1973 makes the Saints among the oldest football and sporting clubs in the world. For context, the oldest major league baseball team, the Chicago Cubs were formed only three years earlier in 1870

Starting point is 00:11:32 and the oldest NBA, NHL and NFL teams were formed many decades later. The oldest football team, as in soccer, is the Sheffield Football Club, which was formed in 1857 just a year before South Yarra. So this is right at the start. Yeah, ma'am. Clubs coming together. The St's famous red one, black colors came about with the merger taking the red and white of South Yarra and merging it with the black and white of St. Kilda. Do you know where the black and white was at the St. Kilda cricket club? The cricket club had had the black and white. So yeah,

Starting point is 00:12:08 sometimes teams colors come about over a long time or newer clubs, they'll have a, you know, like GWS, they'll have a, a committee or come together and they'll do like testing. People come in, what does this orange, what does it say to you? With that, I think you feel. What does this charcoal do for you? The color swatch, yeah, the heater up. You go down to the duolocks color wall.

Starting point is 00:12:27 But for the sides it was, I'll just merge those two that we've got and make sense. Pretty good. Yeah, that works well. So, but even when you look at it now, do you think that half the white is one and half the white? Yes, to me that's right. Let's split right down the middle. Half is cricket to me.

Starting point is 00:12:43 You're cricket white. It's to me, that's right. Split right down the middle. Half is cricket to me. You're cricket white. So they did have the red, white and black, but it wasn't the tri-colored design that's now synonymous with the club. You know, the famous big thick red, white and black straps down the front of the Guernsey. It started as a horizontal black and red with a white hanker chief tied around the neck. Bring it back.

Starting point is 00:13:05 It's like looking in those old photos. It's fun. I like, you know, the coaches are wearing top hats and the players are wearing long trousers and it's different time. The big leather boots and so it's really interesting to watch. Yeah. How do you run around in the mud wearing those? There was a recent episode where Dave talked about the origin of

Starting point is 00:13:28 of shoes built for sport. And this was before that, I guess. I think it was a long time, yeah. Which is so funny. The Saints' home ground initially was somewhere called Alpaca Paddock. You know much about that, Nick? There's not a whole lot of information on it, but from what I can gather,

Starting point is 00:13:47 it's just about where the St. Kilda railway station is now, and it was essentially named that way, because the Council of St. Kilda wanted to raise Alpacas as a commercial venture, they wanted to be able to sell them, sell the whole thing and all that sort of that stuff which obviously worked out really well because there's people wearing our packer clothes all over St. Kilda these days. We know it's so Kilda we think of sacred we think Al Packard. That's right. Next to Linnapar you've got

Starting point is 00:14:14 the Al Packard pen. I think I read somewhere that it's maybe partially where Al the Park is now as well but yeah it seems it's funny. It wasn't that long ago, but people don't seem to be able to lock down where this place was. I think that's a fun place for the Saintsaw started. Oh, I move out of the way. Like, I'm picturing outpackers all around as they're training.

Starting point is 00:14:37 It does make sense that the first home ground was a failed commercial venture. Yeah. The early days were pretty rough. You might be thinking of the Saints always found it tough on field. Yes, they have. The first game was played in June of 1873 against University. And while they held University to just one solitary goal, unfortunately, St. Kildred didn't score at all. So they got done. A lot of this is so long ago that it's not witch university. It's just a university.

Starting point is 00:15:05 The university. Yeah, I guess it's sort of what it's Melbourne University, I think, and their team is called the university students. It was pretty fun. It's fair to say things were a little less professional than they are today. In their second season, one of their games was delayed by over an hour,

Starting point is 00:15:22 because there wasn't a ball available. Which is pretty key part of the game of football. They had the feet, so they were halfway there. Right. They actually was a ball, but when it was being pumped up before the game, it exploded, and there wasn't any others around. So someone had to jump on a tram or something. Got a rebel sport. Yeah, got a rebel sport. Become a new one.

Starting point is 00:15:45 Can we get a refund on this one? Exploded. The Saints website has a great history section which I'll quote a bit which I'm guessing was Russell Holmes B who's like the Saints official historian and has been for a long time. Fun fact, he babysit me once when I was a kid and I was pretty star struck because back then he wrote the in the red one black section of the Morabin standard which Was the local newspaper and every week there was a section about the science and then he was babysitting me I couldn't believe it What was the family connection to get him in I think he must have just he must have had kids enabled as well

Starting point is 00:16:20 I'm not sure what it was exactly, but I think my parents made were in some sort of babysitters club. He's always lived around Bentley, that's sort of area, Ben and Rob and yeah. And then I met him a few years later on a like a booze bus. He was like a cricket club fundraiser, maybe the big Bentley cricket club and I think I told him the story about the babysitting and he was enthralled. Anyway, so I'll be quite a russle, quite a bit throughout this episode. And he gives the early years a slightly more positive spin, saying the club quote, saw a spirited beginning to life as a football club and showed themselves capable of pushing the most skilled teams in the state, but Lars and Moral and drop-offs in form saw the club come incredibly close to extinction. Despite a short-lived merger with University in

Starting point is 00:17:09 1875 to stay afloat, St Kilda competed well enough to become a foundation member of the body that would govern Australian rules football, the Victorian Football Association or VFA in 1877. The Saints continue to surprise every now and then, with their nafforallion together against the best sides in the competition, serving as a precursor to the fighting St. Kilda spirit that would manifest over the following decades. But their brilliance would never last. Flip and form inadequate playing numbers and general inconsistency, so St. Kilda dip in and out of the VFA's senior ranks, with the club fighting itself on the brink of collapse

Starting point is 00:17:44 several times. Lingerying stories self-players missing games to go to the races or simply not showing up. You would tell me that there was one guy particularly you heard of doing this. Yeah, he was the first captain. Yeah, not any guy. Not just any guy.

Starting point is 00:17:57 He was the first captain who literally missed a game because he went to the races. Well, it's his name. I think you should name and show him. Name and show him is Billy Shaw. Billy Shaw. Billy. Although some people won't be like, name and show him, I think you should name and show. Name and show is Billy Shaw. Billy Shaw. Billy.

Starting point is 00:18:06 Come, Billy. Although some people won't be like, name and show, I'm like, good on him. Footy's footy, but you know, the races of life. If he had known about the next 150 years of history, he probably would have said, good decision. Yeah, yeah, he probably got the races every week. The Saints stabilized during their absence from the VFA

Starting point is 00:18:23 and achieved full reentry in 1886, now adorned with the famous red, white and black vertical stripes, and a new residency at Junction Oval, which became the gateway to the new VFL competition with its central location and size guaranteed to draw large crowds. Another merger with Pran in 1888 left the Saints as one of the strongest clubs in the South, and saw a slight alteration of the uniform with the inclusion of blue shorts. The amalgamation was all but forgotten as St. Kilda kept its name, home ground and colours with the blue shorts fully discarded in 1909. What do you, you're a bit of a fashion man, Dave?

Starting point is 00:18:58 I love a pair of blue shorts. Blue short down is long too, beyond the knee. With red and black. With red one, black jumper jumper, what do you think? I was not sure, the color blue though, you see, but that does not sound good. It was a rich blue. It was a very navy, very navy blue.

Starting point is 00:19:13 Navy next to black, not sure. No, you're traditional. Yeah, but I love the idea that other club that they went, oh, this is obviously a mistake. Well, just get rid of it. We'll take you short. We'll return this never after. Yeah, well, we'll get of it. We'll take you short. We'll return this never after. Yeah, well, well, you won't get the name.

Starting point is 00:19:28 Or the club, the ground. Well, I'm gonna fans. Okay, but I can't leave without driving a hard bargain. You're wearing our shorts. What do you? I'm just funny, the navy and the black. That's how I remember as a kid, because I couldn't tell the difference sometimes.

Starting point is 00:19:44 I'll again in argument with someone, I'm like, no, it's black. And they're like the navy, and the black. That's how I remember as a kid, because I couldn't tell the difference sometimes. I'd get an argument with someone, I was like, no, it's black. And they're like, no, it's navy. And then I put an extra black thing, and I, oh, that's only when you know it. Yeah. Then I go to the saint, watch the saints in the late 1800s. And I go, and I put it up next to them,

Starting point is 00:19:57 but beautiful, and we go, okay. And you also mentioned to me, Nick, when we were talking about this, that wasn't the only reason they kept the blue shorts for a while. It was cheaper. Yeah. For some reason it's just about the die for the fabric or whatever. It was just cheaper, the Navy was cheaper.

Starting point is 00:20:12 I don't know about you guys, but I always was told when I was growing up that you don't wear Navy and black together. It's just, you just don't do it. Yeah, that makes sense to me that you wouldn't. Yeah. I've heard also as a kid, blue and green should never be seen. Beard that one. But I think that one of that is the rhyme. It sounds good. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it could easily be blue and green should always be seen. Yeah. That's right.

Starting point is 00:20:32 Together. Also sounds good. Yeah. Now I'm confused. It easily sweeps. Now I don't want to do. In the VFA, the Saints had their ups and downs, although their ups were never particularly high in their downs, or as low as you can do. In, here's a great one. Are you on a rave this quote from the Australasian Nick from 1894? The Australasian wrote, there are two classes of men who play football. With one, the pleasure of participating is more than sufficient recompense for defeat. The other class thinks the win is above everything else. To the first class, I think those happy genie will saints belong. Which I think really it's like To the first class, I think those happy genie you'll saints belong.

Starting point is 00:21:05 Which I think really it's like in the sports world that would be seen as a put down, but to me I kind of liked that. Happy to be included. Happy to be playing. The proof is in the pudding in the Westerly Hill laughing about this football club. But they have been playing this whole time. And like Thomas said, we can. If you start laughing about him, it's trouble. In 1897, a group of the stronger teams wanted to form a new breakaway league.

Starting point is 00:21:34 So there's all these symptoms in the VFA. And apparently they were a bit unhappy with how the VFA were running things. They were trying to split income, even amongst the clubs and stuff like that. And like, hang on, we're the rich powerful clubs, we should be getting a bigger share. So they broke away and formed the VFL, the Victorian Football League. And that was with teams, eight teams, including Collingwood, Eston and Fitzroy, now Brisbane, Jolong Melbourne and South Melbourne, now Sydney. And then they brought in two battlers as well for some reason, Carlton and St. Kilda. And, yeah, I don't know why.

Starting point is 00:22:06 We're possibly lucky to get an invite. There's a rather club who are much stronger at the time, particularly lucky with the Saints. At that point in their existence, they had a less than one in three winning percentage. And I've heard the Port Melbourne still thinks it should have been there. I think, have you heard that?

Starting point is 00:22:20 I've heard that. I think it was the stadium. I think it was the ground that kind of got St. Kilda that final ticket. Yes. So it just, it's so funny, they just had a great bit of land. That was the only... Yeah, I'll pack and save them.

Starting point is 00:22:32 All they had moved a junction over by this time, which is there right at the junction between, you know, it's still there, the junction over Dave. It's right, where all the streets split off. I've explained that pretty well. Yeah, I think I've heard these sort are junction. You know what I mean? Yeah, like thank you for the ride there, I think it's it is an oval right on the junction.

Starting point is 00:22:51 It's an oval on the junction. Check out. I can't Nick for the sake of putting that in words bit easier than me. That's why you're the GM. And you're just the M. Yes. Matt. So yeah, and that and home's be agreed with you there Nick. He said the home ground of Junction Over was a contributing factor in their invitation. The ground's central location and size help draw large crowds in the fledgling lead.

Starting point is 00:23:17 But success proved to be elusive early on. St. Kielder received six consecutive wooden spoons from 1897 to 1902, winning just 20 out of 168 games in the first decade of the century. Wow. Do you have to explain what a wooden spoon is? The famous wooden spoon? Oh, please do. I don't know what the origin is.

Starting point is 00:23:33 You know, I don't know the origin story of the wooden spoon, but it's just for those who don't know about the wooden spoon, it's what you call the team that finishes last. Yeah. It's the reverse premiership. Correct. So the premiers get a gold shiny cup and the losers get a wooden spoon. wooden spoon.

Starting point is 00:23:51 They have the same spoon. I don't know if they have it down from generation to generation. I don't know if they have a literally gave out a spoon. I bet you they did. You want to check see if you find the other one's spoon while I talk a little bit more about these early success we use. I've said check, see if you find the other one. I want to check, see if you find the other one. I want to check, see if you find the other one. I want to check, see if you find the other one. I want to check, see if you find the other one.

Starting point is 00:24:07 I want to check, see if you find the other one. I want to check, see if you find the other one. I want to check, see if you find the other one. I want to check, see if you find the other one. I want to check, see if you find the other one. I want to check, see if you find the other one. I want to check, see if you find the other one. I want to check, see if you find the other one.

Starting point is 00:24:15 I want to check, see if you find the other one. I want to check, see if you find the other one. I want to check, see if you find the other one. I want to check, see if you find the other one. I want to check, see if you find the other one. I want to check, see if you find the other one. I want to check, see if you find the other one. I want to check, see if you find the other one.

Starting point is 00:24:23 I want to check, see if you find the other one. I want to check, see if you find the other one. I want to check, see if you find the other one. I want to check, see if you find the other one. I want to check, see if you find the other one. I want to check, see if you find the wrong reasons. For instance, St Kilda score of 1.899 is the lowest score in the league's history. And that came against Jolong, who scored 162. Jolong score that day, remained the highest in the league for over a decade until round 169 in 11, when Estonet scored 163 points.

Starting point is 00:24:41 They're a pony of that day? St Kilda. No. Jolong's winning margin of 161 in that 99 match. Also remain the league's biggest for many years until round 12 of 1919. When South Melbourne won a game by 171 points, they're a pony of that day, Dave. Any guesses? Oh, no, don't tell me. It was St. Kilda. They won 189 to 18. Wasn't till their full season in the VFL before they recorded their first win, finally breaking a 48 game losing streak.

Starting point is 00:25:09 Because people stopped going to the races finally? Yeah, they were on. They just happened to be a day where the races were washed out. Far and I guess we'll play this week. Yeah. According to Holmes, the win came about in unusual circumstances, writing, the round one match against the eventual premier's Melbourne originally ended in a draw before St. Kielder protested the result due to a scoring error. You know a bit about this,

Starting point is 00:25:35 didn't you? A little bit. From memory, I think it was that there was a ball went through for a point, but it was given as out of bounds. And so they didn't score the point. And because they didn't score the point, the score was a draw. Yes. And then the the the Singular Fuddy Club challenged that decision and took it to the high court of the VFL. That took it all the way. To all the way, all the way. And a week later, they reversed the decision and called us and killed a win. So good. Yeah. There was a being triumphant. Oh, the other call. Actually, you did win. Finally. Yeah, also being triumphant. Oh, the other cool. Actually, you did win finally. Yeah, it's an important The celebration imagine the celebrations and so because you're like you want to just you want to celebrate as the siren goes

Starting point is 00:26:12 But they're even that we weren't able to do we have to do it midweek. Well, they're all probably at work plumbing or whatever Uh, farming. Yeah, probably riding our packers or whatever Oh, yeah, I heard it that way. I also heard it that Melbourne were awarded a point that it was after the siren sounded and then they took it off midweek to give them the win. So either way, Asen Kierlder climbed their way off the bottom of the ladder by 1903, but victories were sandwiched in between hefty defeats. The recruitment of Tasmanian duo Vic Cumberland and Vic Barwick gave the Saints upside,

Starting point is 00:26:51 and with the addition of talented forward Dave McNamara, Long Dave, the success staff side began their painstaking crawl up the ladder. The Galsman found an article in a 1904in-oh-four edition of the Pran Chronicle that says that at the Saints Annual General meeting that year, new player Vic Cumberland entertained the audience with some slight of hand tricks. Just ordered a magical... A magic of the AGO. And I think that's, you know, I don't really know if that was worth mentioning, but I thought, Hacquodonol. As well as being a magician off the field, Cumberland was a gun footballer. As was McNamara, who's nickname was Long Dave,

Starting point is 00:27:30 which is so fun. Any guesses to why I'd be called Long Dave? Have you ever been called Long Dave? No, short Dave. Short Dave, ironic. Regular Dave. Regular Dave. Just Dave.

Starting point is 00:27:42 Just don't know, yeah. Yeah, emphasis on the just. Plain Dave. Just Dave. Yeah, emphasis on the Justin playing Dave. So he was named Long Dave because he was a huge kick of the football. Once King Joel from 86 yard out, he also had a shot that traveled 93 yards. This was with the now defunct place and drop kick souls. There is two favorite souls. So he's putting the ball on the ground and kicking it, kind of like a rugby league player You're allowed to do that now if you wanted to I don't know you can't put the ball on the ground can you and you can't put the ball?

Starting point is 00:28:13 So you team-back un hold it there sort of like it's sitting on the ground I guess you could do that the balls already on the ground was the ground can you just sort of put your hand on top of it? You probably could like it's on a tee. Yeah. And then they come in and just boot it. Yeah, I guess yeah, maybe you can do that. Make sure that no one else in the other team comes anywhere near you. Yeah, got a big run. The drop kick you don't see anymore.

Starting point is 00:28:33 OK, I think maybe there was one accidently done a few years ago, but yeah, they're meant to be kick styles. You can go further, but they're also way less accurate than the drop punk, which is a relatively new invention. Wow. So yeah, his two big kicks that I just mentioned, they're not only three and 86 yards,

Starting point is 00:28:50 they happen during games, or actually those two I think happen during one game. You know what I mean? The balls were exploding. Like that's a long way. Yeah. That's a long way to kick a ball into what he kicked them into oblivion.

Starting point is 00:29:02 He kicked them so far they didn't exist anymore. He kicked them into oblivion. He kicked them so far they didn't exist anymore. He kicked them into the ocean. Yeah. So they happened during the games but one time that he was invited to have a crack for the official world record. And that happened on Thursday, the 9th of October 1913 at the Royal Law and Sesson Show and he set the official world-placed kick record with a kick of 86 yards and one foot, now 79 meters, which is like it, I don't think there'd be an A4 player today who could kick that far. It's huge. There's a long way. Cumberland, McNamara and these other new talented players had the Saints on the

Starting point is 00:29:42 improve, winning seven games in their seventh season alone. Which obviously it wasn't enough to make the finals. So good. I think it was like they won seven in a row or the last seven something in the season. Well when you compare that to the first six seasons total of two rounds, two wins in six seasons and then they're seven season they won seven. Like people couldn't believe it. Like what's going on? We're not and that in win the one spoon for that reason. Wow. Yeah, pretty cool. By the start of the 907 season

Starting point is 00:30:15 they were flying winning their first six games in a row Dave. Now we're getting started. Yeah, six in a row. I was expecting more. It's huge! But I mean, what happened after that? Things took a bit of a turn mid season. And that was in part because their staff will back Harry Leaver got injured. At his day job, Leaver cut off two of his fingers in a sawmill accident.

Starting point is 00:30:39 But he dressed the wound himself and still played the following day against a long Oh my god. But unfortunately, it's more bad luck that day. Their train was late, so the game was delayed and they finished playing in darkness and the cats over and then I guess they could see better in the dark. I guess cats can. They got cats can.

Starting point is 00:30:58 They got cats can. They got cats can. They got cats can. They got cats can. They got cats can. They got cats can. They got cats can. They got cats can. They got cats can. They got cats can. And they lost my fire points from the end and that sort of and and maybe Unsurprisingly leave it in play another game for the rest of the year. It's missing two fingers.

Starting point is 00:31:08 It's missing two fingers and it's like the wound would still be open. Oh my god. Yeah, I mean, we've become gangrenous. It's really? Yeah, he's rusted all for that game. And yeah, things sort of went downhill from there. Leave it did return the following year and continued playing until 1922, becoming the first same to play 200 games. Without leave, they're only able to win three of the last eight.

Starting point is 00:31:28 And this would still be enough for the team to make their first final series, though. Oh, great. They got eliminated in the first game. But they made it. And that's the main thing. Which is like, where you are right now. That's where we are right now. So at the time recording, we're playing in a final, the MCG tomorrow. This podcast will come out after that. So at the time of recording, we're playing in a final, the MCG tomorrow. This podcast will come out after that, but we're not draw or lose, which I guess is an

Starting point is 00:31:50 option. It doesn't matter because this podcast always will exist when the Saints were a current finals team and premiership threat only four wins away. It's a forever story of hope. That's right. This will be lingering out there. And if you lose, which God forbid, of course, it won't happen. Are you out? It's knockout. It's literally called the elimination final. There's only two finals through the whole series where you can stay in if

Starting point is 00:32:19 you don't lose. If you do lose, sorry. And they're the two qualifying finals in the first round for teams finishing the top four. Every other game is cutthroat. Where did you finish on the lot of this year? Sixth. Sixth. A beautiful spot. In a competition of 18, that's top third day. That's great. And people said, oh, yeah, we were not a finals team. And actually, journalist Carol Amelson said that this week, which is strange because how can you say that when we are literally a finals team? I don't understand how you can still be saying that. Carol, I think there should be a little recount. There's two finals teams that she think are finals teams that are below us. They finished seven.

Starting point is 00:33:00 The she thinks that the final eight should go from one to five. And then I guess from six to nine. Maybe she thinks she should pick some wild cards. So it's like, what else can you do but win enough games to be in the top eight? Anyway, good on her. And good on all of them. She's not the other one. The footy media in general has not gone on board this year. They have not. We'll teach them. Yeah, we'll teach them. Yeah, will teach him.

Starting point is 00:33:25 Well, you got to remember when this is, it comes out, the lessons already been taught or flunked. Either way, either way. We're a final scene. You can't take that away from us, no matter what the media says. The Saints made the finals again in 1908, finishing third and things were looking up. Obviously, there's still a smallish competition there,

Starting point is 00:33:44 I think there may be nine teams at that stage. Still top-tiered as well. Exactly. If you're where you're born to be. The trust, top-tiered. But they weren't up there for long. They won another wooden spoon in 1909, which of course was famous for being their final season with the blue shorts. Oh yeah, the blue shorts curse. Is anyone saying that? Yeah, so people like, oh, finally the end of the blue shorts curse. Is anyone saying that? Yeah, so people like, oh, finally,

Starting point is 00:34:05 the end of the blue shorts curse from 1910 onwards, things are gonna be going much better, but they were wrong. That's it. They only avoided another win this season in 1910 with a final round upset victory over top of the table, Carlton, but that wasn't enough to avoid another wooden spoon for finishing last. So, the only one won match. Yeah, the last one.

Starting point is 00:34:25 The last game, yeah. Against the best team in the league. Yeah, that's a weird thing that we've got a history of doing. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do. We do you're all I'm sorry. I'm gonna tell you one of those nights for bedtime. Yeah, yeah. And so the other thing I had of his at the time, because he published a book called The Encyclopedia of FFLFL Footballers and I had a copy of that which was Dad's, a school library was getting rid of books and he brought that home for me so I had a copy of the Encyclopedia and then I was getting babysat by the guy who compiled it.

Starting point is 00:35:11 I mean frickin' hell! The guy who knows everything. Exactly! Wow. David is flabbergasted. You've never mentioned this before. Yeah. You look like the peak of your life.

Starting point is 00:35:21 I know. You never mentioned it? Sure, I mentioned when I met him on that booze bus. Booze bus? That's the... What did you pull you over? The booze bus is the bus that stops you to breathalyze, isn't it? I mean, it was a bus with booze.

Starting point is 00:35:38 It's got the opposite. Not the least, making sure you're not drunk driving. Yeah. So, yeah, things are bad, but after the 1910 wooden spoon, the Saints started climbing up the ladder once again, and they even made their first grand final in 1913. Do you want to tell the listeners a bit about this, Nick? Where do you, where do you want to start? 1858? Well, I think we've covered a lot of that already, Nick. Where do you start? 1858?

Starting point is 00:36:07 Well, I think we've covered a lot of that already. You mean, I know I've got a pretty soothing voice, but I did, did you find out about the wooden spoon? I did actually, I did find out at the wooden spoon. So according to a website called topendspots.com, the wooden spoon is the unofficial title for the last place team at the end of the regular AFL season. Why is it called a wooden spoon? The wooden spoon is an award usually given to an individual or team which has come last in a competition. The custom dates back to at least the early 19th century,

Starting point is 00:36:31 where a wooden spoon was awarded by the students at the University of Cambridge to the student who achieved the lowest exam marks, but's got a real nerdy origin, sorry dad. Is that peaking your interest? Love that. I'm listening. You got a maths degree, but you kind of suck. Here's a spoon. Here's a spoon. You're the dumbest smart person I know.

Starting point is 00:36:56 You still went to Cambridge and got a degree, okay. But here's a spoon. I thought Nick, maybe you could tell us about the game leading up to the 1913 finals where we had to be Carlton to get in. Sure, there was a rumor going around that maybe our hearts weren't in it. Well one of the St. Spes players was a guy named Billy Schmidt and one of the rumors heading into that game is that he'd been paid off. I don't know where the rumors started but had been going around kind of the VFL rumor mill I guess which would have been in hyperdrive, given St. Kilda were a decent team then.

Starting point is 00:37:30 And the rumours that he'd been paid off to play dead, to knock you at his all, ahead of that carton game, carton are a massive team, and maybe they had some more money though, willing to pay. St. players to not play the other team. The only way to be able to pay for that was the blues. They've never been found out for doing that. Always above board. They have been. Oh, right.

Starting point is 00:37:50 They, they, they, what do you know? Ah, 90s. All of them. Or 80s. One of the quarter of the 90s, but it went back a while, I think. Wow. But just over paying players in Brown Paper Begs, rather than through the salary cap officially, so they had this team of all stars.

Starting point is 00:38:05 They're all on it, they're all on 200 bucks a week. It's amazing. Yeah, so they got done for that and it's led to a few decades of strife for the blues but they're back again as well. They're also playing in finals for the Sominages this year. Any brown paper bags? You know, in this shoe, all that happens to our hard. So it goes back to 1913 this. Yeah. It does, in this shoe, I would have it so hard.

Starting point is 00:38:25 So it goes back to 1913 this. Yeah. It does, yeah. At least. Turned out that Schmidt actually had a pretty good game, Matt. That's right. Yeah, so much so that he had a shot for goal after the siren. And he made the shot, kick the goal.

Starting point is 00:38:43 And this is the first recorded example of a play kicking goal after the Saren to win a match. Oh, wow. So for overseas listeners, you explain sort of how that works because, you know, a lot of like American sports, you know, you have what the song goes all over. That's it, or unless the ball was in the air, buzz a beat or something. Yes. But you get a shot at it.

Starting point is 00:39:02 Yes, so he had a mark, and he caught caught the ball and he had a free shot at goal and And that the sign went then so he you know, he had his it's 30 seconds out But probably then it was a week or so to have his kick and So he went back and at the time it must have been going through his head if I do if I kick this poorly this all you know make people believe the room is true. So this is an extra level of prayer. Imagine if he just accidentally kicked it out on the full. But imagine if he was actually trying to kick it out on the full.

Starting point is 00:39:35 I actually did it. You got my question. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, like, you're gonna break my legs. So actually, Slip does he keep it? Yeah, that's it. Accidentally just kicked it straight. Stagged it so well I can cry. No, I have quite a lot of money. Yeah, it was weird, I don't know why, but his knees were broken the next day. Ha ha ha.

Starting point is 00:39:58 Yeah, I've read different lengths, but one was that his kick was from 45 yards out, but I've also saw 60 meters out, which is a huge kick Which is a better story. So I think even today 60 meter kick after the siren like that's a big not many players can do it So but does that mean they won? they won and they made the finals and In the first round of the finals they met South Melbourne who they beat comfortably top place

Starting point is 00:40:23 Fitzroy also easily beat Collinwood in their semi, setting up a showdown between Fitzroy and St. Kilda for the Premiership, which St. Kilda won. What? What? Their famous first Premiership victory. Unfortunately, though at the time the VFL had a strange system, the meant the team that finished top of the ladder, which is Fitzroy had the right to challenge the result

Starting point is 00:40:43 and play again if they lost the grand final. Or any final I think, is that right Nick? That's not right. I'm pretty sure they, if they lost any final along the way they could challenge and play another grand final. There's a one. Challenge. It's a one.

Starting point is 00:40:57 It's a one. It's just a, and Nick, I don't know, I can't break the list. There's how did the following week go? It's in kill to lost. Okay. What? It got really close. I think Fittroy kicked away early.

Starting point is 00:41:06 Yeah. Saints came back within two points in the last quarter. So you know about five goals up or something at a half time or something? Fittroy about five goals up and Sinkilda went on a run and kicked four in a row or something got to within a couple of points and then... According to the gas man, he tells it quite dramatically.

Starting point is 00:41:22 Of course he does. There was a shot from the goal square to put us up when we were two points down or three points down and it and they missed from point blank range. Sounds like a brown paper back to me. Of course. Billy Schmidt. It was Billy Schmidt. Oh, that's sorry, but if some kind of one would fit so I just challenge again. I think you could have one. So if the rules were as they are now, the Saints would have won the

Starting point is 00:41:47 Premiership in 1913. Apparently at all, this rule came in because in 1900 Melbourne won the Premiership from third last on the latter. That is weird system and they're like uh the team who finishes on top of the latter should have more of an advantage than that. So but the whole system was stupid. In 1900, they split at the end of the season, they split the competition into two-hast,

Starting point is 00:42:11 thought teams that finished odd numbers, first, third, fifth, etc. and the team that finished second, fourth, etc. and then they both had these round-robin competitions and then the teams on the top of those two round robins. If neither of them was the minor premier, they would play off in a grand final and the minor premier wasn't there. So it just made, they took the wrong lesson out of it.

Starting point is 00:42:35 That sounds like a Cambridge maths degree. What's going on? Wouldn't switch the William and Adela over the shop. Can you just imagine how much, how different this story would be if that actually kept that Premiership in 1913? It probably changes the story quite a lot, right? I want to win three and a row four and a row.

Starting point is 00:42:53 Abs. Five, six, seven. Who's to say? Yeah, underfeed. Maybe never have lost another game. We don't know. Yeah, momentum starts somewhere. Exactly.

Starting point is 00:43:02 And the Saints captain that day on the replay ground final was Harry Lever the man who lost two fingers. And the team also included another legendary name. Roy Kazali, does that name mean anything to you Dave? Pop there Kazali. Is it that guy? That's that guy. There you go. So he played 99 games with the Saints. And won the Saints Best and ferris in 1918 and yeah, he's also

Starting point is 00:43:29 Famous for his high-flying marks, which has been a bit of a Saints thing for the whole journey I think always yeah great players great players not great teams great teams right and so is often one great player Right, and so it is often one great player. Oh, sometimes it's even more. Yeah, sometimes it's 18 great players. It's still, they still lose. Champion beats a team of champions. So yeah, we were so close to winning our first premiership way back in 1913.

Starting point is 00:43:58 And that was, I think that's what Charlie was alluding to when he said we lost a premiership on countback before. Yeah, that pesky, fricking challenge system, which was a banded bett that's what Charlie was alluding to when he said we lost a premiership on countback before. Yeah, that pesky, fricking challenge system, which was abandoned about 20 years later, I think. I don't think we were the only team to lose a premiership, though, I think there was a couple of others, but it does feel like it. Yeah, it's a very secure thing to happen.

Starting point is 00:44:20 It only happened as a guilt. Yeah, exactly. You've got a section on your show, on Unplugged, that's so st. Kilda. Yes. And I love it because it's just every week, it's this thing, I could have only happened as st. Kilda.

Starting point is 00:44:31 But of course, every club could have that same thing. That's right. It actually happens to every other team every week, but it feels like it only happens to us. That's one of those biases that just makes it feel like it's only happening to you. Anyway, as tough as that stolen grand final was, things were about to get worse for not only St. Kilda,

Starting point is 00:44:47 but the world. No. No. Corner Holmes, the heartbreak of grandfather defeat was quickly overshadowed by the outbreak of World War I in 1914. Are you suggesting there is some correlation? I think they're mighter being.

Starting point is 00:45:00 But history, you say it would change the history of the club, but also, maybe the world, if you hadn't have been robbed. People talk about France, Ferdinand kicking it off. But I think if they change their gaze from Europe down to Melbourne. The real assassination happened on the 40 feet. Exactly. 14 saints were killed in action during the bloody war, which claimed the lives of almost 40 million people, obviously.

Starting point is 00:45:25 So yeah, and there were many other saints who went over, but 14 gave their lives up. You know about one in particular, isn't it? Yeah, one of those 14 saints was Claude Crowe, who played three games for St. Killer in 1911. And he actually died in the landing at Antekkova, Gallipoli. And he's won off, if not the first of to be a footballer to die in World War One. Right, Claude Crowe. It's a great name. Yeah, it sounds like a Bond villain almost. Oh Bond villain. Well, I see him as a Bond hero, but maybe that's where you and I differ Nick.

Starting point is 00:45:55 I got nothing. Many other players fought in the war as well including stars like Vic Cumberland who we talked about before So many players from the Saints went to war in fact that they weren't even able to field a team in 1916 and 1917 Meanwhile Cowley clubs like Collinwood, Carlton, Richmond and Fitchwood remained in the competition. Ah, what feather clubs? Yep The Collinwood like you know, it's so funny to me Whatever obviously not a big deal And I was just saying how we were ripped off in 9 a 13 and I would definitely count that if we won it But it's so funny that

Starting point is 00:46:34 Supporters talk about you know calling would support us talk about all their premierships a lot of them were happening You know in before TV before while people are still wearing pants, and even while most of the competition was in war. They won one of their premierships while there was only five teams in the competition, I think. But I still can't do that, whatever. Um, no biggie. No biggie. Oh, that doesn't mean anything. Do you want to talk a bit about this, uh, what happened next?

Starting point is 00:47:04 The war affected the Saints in a kind an unexpected way, I guess, Dave. I'm Nick. Oh, yeah, I'll say I'm the Dave, but then. I was sorry to you, but I'll say I'm the Dave. That's the setup you there. Nick, tell me more. Well, according to Russell Holmes' beat, due to the war, the club entered a period of recession during 1916 and 1917, but not before changing their official colours to red, yellow and black to disassociate themselves

Starting point is 00:47:29 from the colours of the German Empire. It was also a sign of solidarity for the Allied forces and Belgium, who stood with Australia and had several current and former St. Kilda players fighting in Belgium. That's right. Yeah, so there was quite a period there with the sense for the red yellow and black team It's very noble. Hmm very noble and obviously pretty clever. They got ahead of the game the kind of colors If you don't want to be associated with Germany go red yellow and black I found it so confusing as a kid. Oh my wait, so we starved as red yellow and black and then

Starting point is 00:48:03 To get away from Germany. We changed to red, white and black. And we went from red, white, black to red, yellow and black to get away from Germany. But Germany at the time were red, white and black. Belgium were red, yellow and black. And then, yeah, it took a while before they changed back to the red one, black. They returned to the league, this back to Holmes B. Returned to the league in 1918, the Saints proved a more competitive outfit, but once again fell short of the ultimate glory this time to colling with in the semi-finals. 1919 marked a low point in the club's history,

Starting point is 00:48:39 with a divided St. Caudillin up obliterated by South Melbourne in a 17-go goal for final quarter, 106 points in one quarter. Oh, we've scored against them. Yes. It feels like that would be the low point in just about any other club's history, but I don't think it's low point in our history.

Starting point is 00:49:00 No, I mean, we started with no wins for three years. Does that mean you, but like for the quarter, you didn't touch the ball? I would have been close to that, I mean we started with no wins for three years. Does that mean you, but like for the quarter you didn't touch the ball? I would have been close to that I think. I mean they would have, there wasn't enough time for them to be doing anything else but kicking goals. They would have been like, oh god, they would have been so mad. That's a scoring shot every minute. Yeah, yeah. So I got to get it out, back from the center down forward through the girls every minute

Starting point is 00:49:26 Amazing. Yeah, the Saints mustn't have touched it much. Oh, no, they Maybe there's a lot of times. I went to the race and they're on the races Maybe carbon and putting an appointment even though they weren't even playing They just can't help themselves Several players were sent to have walked off the field midway through the onslaughtught. Well that's not going to help. Oh my god, what are you doing? That's why I got worse. Everyone left the field and the other child and I'm going to be like, alright we're on here. Yeah, our best defense was having no players to kick in from their behind.

Starting point is 00:49:59 It's amazing from there, they actually started scoring less. But through the highs and lows, more St. Kilda legends emerged. Wells, Ike, championed the red, white and black and claimed the clubs in Orgall, Besson Ferris award in 1914 before adding another two to his name in 1915 and 1919. So there's a lot of these names are quite famous, at least in the Saints. Well, I think it probably AFL historians would be well aware of all these names of talking about, Arc, Cumble and Cousinile, of course, long day. Tongue Dave, I can't forget long day.

Starting point is 00:50:31 No, I mean, like we said, football club has always been known for its great players, rather than its great teams. And I think over the course of 150 years, there's been so many champion players, it just hasn't translated to winning titles. And back then, was it a draft system? Like you'd get picked by a club and made to play there or did you just get you signed up for whoever you wanted to? I think oh I wouldn't put my life on this but I'm pretty sure it was just you you recruit your own players. Right. How you can. And that's why we got a few great players from Tasmania so they were obviously thinking outside the box a little bit. And we've done that a lot over the journey got some some of our best players ever been from Tazzi

Starting point is 00:51:11 Yeah, which is why we played in Tazzi home games in Tazzi for a while Right for a period. Yeah. Yeah I think that was the one we shouldn't anyway Talk about that later Nick off air Vic Cumberland returned from the First World War and fronted up for a final season in 1920. This was after a four-year absence, suffering multiple debilitating injuries during the war.

Starting point is 00:51:34 Oh, gosh. His comeback was the cause of celebration. As the eventual AFL Hall of Famer was 43 years old, which is still the oldest player on record to ever play VFL AFL football. Wow, Andy has been through a World Ball. Yes, and severely injured. Yeah, that's right.

Starting point is 00:51:51 Got all. According to Holmes V, the Wally veteran helped stabilize a divided St. Kilda at the moment he returned from service, with his wisdom, experience and skill guiding the Saints to one of their two victories for the year. At the time of his return, 29 out of St. Kilda's 36 players have not been born when Cumberland first made his debut all the way back in 1903. Is there a better descriptor for a 43 year old, multiple injury, war vet than Wiley Veteran? Yeah, Wiley Veteran, yeah, feels a little underwhelming, doesn't it?

Starting point is 00:52:23 Ah, it's pretty wily. He's a goddamn legend. All right, Russell. And if he ever babysits me again, I'll say that to his face. Ha, ha, ha. He looked in full of two and other babysitting sessions. Cumberland was a rockman, the position for people

Starting point is 00:52:38 that don't know, the position the tolls players generally play. And to show how things have changed over the years, he was 182 centimeters tall, which is my heart, about six foot or just under, I'd like to claim six. Dan Butler, small forward for the same seas days, is that heart? Or where the smallest plays on the ground generally.

Starting point is 00:52:55 Small forward, wow. And Mason Cox, Collingwood's current rockman, American, the Texan, he's 211 centimeters tall or 6'11". So over the 100 years, also, it's yeah. Just growing a foot. He's, yeah, the Rockman of growing a foot. Do you reckon in the next 100 years will another foot?

Starting point is 00:53:17 Yeah, I think so, yeah. I think we're gonna keep growing a foot every century. Yeah. I think that's just science, Dave. And science is, like you said, incredible. So the red one, black colors for the 40 club, came back in 1923s, as the Saints powered into a decade of success led by Brownlee Medalist Colin Watson, another great player in the history of

Starting point is 00:53:38 VFLAA football. And by success, I mean only finishing last once and making the finals once while enjoying sustained mid-table mediocrity for the rest of the decade. How, yeah, that's an improvement. That's, look, it's a step in the right direction. And it's sort of closer to our more recent identity is the club. Mid-table mediocrity. And again, the player that you were saying won the Brownle medal, which is like what the best and fair is best, best player in the league.

Starting point is 00:54:04 So you've got You do have a history of having really good. Yeah, do Way more brown low metals than premierships as a team so the brown low metal like Dave said that's for the The fairest and best or best and fairest you got to be the as voted by the umpires The best player for the year, but also you can't have been rubbed out for any games Which is only how I think it's a haven't once or twice where someone would have wanted if they hadn't been the best player for the year, but also you can't have been rubbed out for any games. Which is only, I think it's a once or twice where someone would have wanted if they hadn't been rubbed out for doing something violent on the field.

Starting point is 00:54:33 That's a couple of times in the 90s. And the Scrant. They saved a player. What a guy. He was robbed. Set up. I think a same player won at that year too. I got a lot of those. I was robbed at half a year. One of them I think they would player won at that YouTube. Yeah, I've always heard those.

Starting point is 00:54:45 I've been using it for years, but Robert Harvey years. Yeah. One of them, I think they would have drawn maybe. Yeah, one of them was a tie and one of them, I think he was one vote behind. Yeah, yeah. But I thought the right result was found there. Definitely. And this period was tricky for a bunch of different reasons.

Starting point is 00:55:00 The internal disputes, financial wars, which have always been. But, yeah, players were striking. But during that time, financial wars, which they have always been. But, uh, yeah, players were striking. But during that time, like Nick said, Colin, what's the one, the brown low? Things were, there were high points, but so many low points as well. And you say, like, they're striking. How professional is the league at this point? They're like, people getting paid to play. Yeah, I think they want it and they're looking for it to become more professional. Yep. And I guess the Saints were struggling for money. I'm not sure exactly what happened.

Starting point is 00:55:27 It doesn't sound right. No, it doesn't sound right. No, that can't be right. It's got to be something else. But yeah, home's we talked about what's insane. He had the reputation of one of the best footballers in the league, but he left at the end of the year. I think this is the guy who tried to, he got a job in the country or something.

Starting point is 00:55:44 And he wanted to go play foot in the country, like the year after winning the Brown of the year. I think this is the guy who tried to, he got a job in the country or something and he wanted to go play foot in the country like the year after winning the Brownleau medal and the club didn't release him so he had to just sit out there next season. Then he asked again the year after and then he sat out again and he ended up just playing anyway so he was banned from playing VFL football. The thing he was trying not to do anyway. Well that's it. Well if you don't want to play VFL football you can't play for the next three years. Yeah that's what I've been asking for. What do you mean you quit? You were fired! Yeah exactly. And the league expanded during this time with teams like Hawthorne North Melbourne Richmond and Footscray joining the league. But according to Holmes V the Saintsuit restaurants by 1929 breaking into the top four to snap an 11-year finals absence.

Starting point is 00:56:25 While the year would end, again, in heartbreak, the emergence of a Sprite youngster from WagaWaga would begin a new era for the red, white, and black, and his name was Bill Moore. And you're going to tell me about him. Well, this guy, he's so funny how many of these legends, I couldn't really picture them, but in my head, they all look about the same like you know early 1900s men but which is what they were. Yeah you know skinny-ish white guys because I guess they were all probably units at the time. Probably. They look very slick hair cuts which was just the fashion of the time. A necarchief. But Bill Moore was probably of all the ones we've already mentioned and we've already mentioned

Starting point is 00:57:08 a few literal NFL legends and Hall of Fame members but Bill Moore was probably the first genuine gun, right? I mean, he was one of the first superstars to hit the VFL. Yeah, he led the league in goal kicking in 1936. He became the first and killed a player to kick a hundred goals in a season. He led the club's goal kicking for 12 straight years. 12 years in a row.

Starting point is 00:57:29 He led the goal kicking. He kicked 735 goals in 195 games. When he retired, he was third on the all-time goal kicking list between behind only Gordon Coventry, who's one of the greatest goalkeepers of all time. And Jack Titus, who I think is the greatest Richmond goal kicker of all time still. Yeah, still today.

Starting point is 00:57:46 So even today we're talking 100 years later nearly. He's still in the top 20 of all time for your fill A fill. That's amazing. Yeah, that really is quite incredible. And having only played 195 games as well. So his average is nearly four goals a game across a nearly 200 game career. I don't think there's any current players who have a game goal average of anything like that to me. Maybe buddy Franklin, maybe, but well, he's retired now.

Starting point is 00:58:20 Okay. Just got you on a technicality there. I mean, there wouldn't be too many players that have played that many games that have averaged that many goals per game. Yeah. Yeah. I might maybe five or six. Yeah, if they let me play one game, I probably could average more than that. I'll probably because I probably kick eight goals. Yeah, I retire. I retire in thee. In the current app? In the current app, yeah. You are a user. I wouldn't play back then. I wouldn't tell you that. I'm not a scab. And it sounds like most of the team was rocking.

Starting point is 00:58:52 So what do you think of what Dave, you don't know the saints that well, you don't really follow football that much. What are the things you think of when you think of the saints like icon, like icon style? Colors? Yeah. They're little stick man stick man Yeah, what about the logo the shield does that mean anything to you? Yeah, I'm looking at it on your hat right now

Starting point is 00:59:17 No more like that one oh Yeah, I'm looking at the nicks hat now Yeah, but is that the very so that's the very same thing that's not just a footy. It's a very same thing. Yeah, well, they're the first club who had their own logo on their jumper. Oh, gotcha. And it's called the crest and Nick, I love you to tell Dave about it. So according to the saints, it's unknown who actually created the crest, but the crest

Starting point is 00:59:46 was immortalised in 1933 with the iconic emblem, not only commemorating the great with just 15 men on the field, seven of whom continued to play on injured. One of the injured players being the legendary Bill Moore, but the stilly resolve of the red white and black persevered. So good. And all good is that. Just if you chill, doesn't it? Oh no, it does. It was like apparently it was just a ridiculous victory. Shouldn't have won. There's no reason they should have won. And at the time, the August newspaper reported, nothing finer, nor more inspiring than St. Kilda's magnificent win against overwhelming odds, has been witnessed at the seaside oval. It's amazing because the the world had just come out of the bloodiest war it had ever seen.

Starting point is 01:00:39 And people were talking about this game as like wartime environment. I was that violent and tough. And that's how the crest was commemorated. They struck shields. They struck medals to give to all those players. That's right. And the Saints president at the time, Fred Arlington Burke, was a veteran from the First World War. And I think he also served in the Second World War.

Starting point is 01:01:00 He was so impressed that he made these medals, gave one out to every player. Only a handful of them are still known to exist, but one of them can be seen at the Saints Museum in Morab, which I believe you've seen it. I have seen it. It's very special. This is what it looks like, Dave. Oh, that's a beautiful medal. So good.

Starting point is 01:01:16 It says St. Kildred defeated North Melbourne with 15 men, May 27, 1933. That really is a wartime stuff. Back to home speed, it has become synonymous with the club motto, Fortius Quo Fidelius, which is strength through loyalty. Remains as one of St. Kilda's most enduring symbols, which obviously Dave proved before. When he said, yeah, I think so. I think I've recognized it. The legend of the crest continued to shine through the remainder of the decade, as the

Starting point is 01:01:46 Saints consistently pushed for finals and found themselves on the cusp several times in an increasingly strong competition. It wasn't until the end of the decade that the club recorded its first finals win since 1913, with a victory over Richmond at the MCG in 1939, snapping a 26-year dry spell. Do you remember that? Oh, that was a great day. I was there with my dad. And your babysitter?

Starting point is 01:02:14 And my babysitter. We were through the oldest men in the world. And we had a great time that day. I don't know if that year means anything to you, Dave, 1939. Because despite the return of finals, things weren't going so well off the field at St. Kilda and as it turns out, for the world. Again, I think there's some correlation here.

Starting point is 01:02:35 The world was heading back to war. 10 more Saints players died fighting in World War 2, including Best of Farest winner Harry Compti, who fell at the battle of Tarakhan and across the two World Wars 286 former St. Coler footballers serve for their country. Do the other clubs obviously just keep going? Gollumwood.

Starting point is 01:02:56 Yeah, clubs always. Which, it's a bit rich they play the Anzac day, go. One six premierships. Yeah, between 90, 39, 45. Six perfects. Yeah, I don't know, makes you think, doesn't it? What do you think about the Saints as an emblem, Dave? If you're going to pick an emblem, a mascot for a team called St. Kilda, what would you go for? You happy with Saints or you think of someone else? Oh, it's in like, am I happy with that being the nickname or it should be something

Starting point is 01:03:24 else? Yeah. No, I like some kiltershands. Yeah. Makes sense. From st. kilter. I mean, you could be kilters. I don't know what that is. You go with the sands. Yeah, that's easier. Yeah. Imagine that you start, you know, you got Roger Mawl as the st. Okay. Yeah. Ready to go. I think Val Kilmer played him as well. So there you go. Two of the great actors. Thanks. Any of your clubs? They could be our mascots. Yeah. I think Val can't win play to him as well, so there you go. Two of the great actors. They could be our mascots. Yeah. Roger and Val.

Starting point is 01:03:50 We could be the same kill to Roger and Val's. Sounds like a sitcom. Yeah. Which is pretty much what this story is. Just a comedy. But even though it does feel like that's what it always would have been. It's not always been the case. Really? Yeah. Oh, I've seen it a year. When you think of St. Kilda, you've seen Kilda beach, like the Seagulls. The Seagulls are nice to see. Seagull, okay.

Starting point is 01:04:13 Yeah, or you can get a crab. Fishing chip shop. Gamer crabs. Gamer minimum chips. That's not bad. Okay. The mini chips. That's not bad. Okay. But many chips. But it actually was the Seagulls for a little while.

Starting point is 01:04:28 Oh, you were Seagulls. I was serious. In the late 30s, early 40s, the club actually used the Seagull logo to relate to St. Kilda's famous beach. Okay. St. Kilda Seagulls. You got the Eliteration Gulls, that's all right? St. Kilda Seagulls, countergallies.

Starting point is 01:04:44 But then in 1945, the club again went for a different mascot and they went for a panther. You couldn't really go to different. Obviously, people that don't know some killed us famous for two things as the beach and the panther's been trolling that beach. In the famous and killed a book, the point of it all, which I think Russell had a bit to do with as well, actually.

Starting point is 01:05:04 The historians write, the hierarchy perhaps hoped the team would show more tenacity, but the new nickname did little to change the direction of the team's play. The Panthers, battered and beaten, finished at the bottom of the list again. Okay, worked out real well. I thought the mascot was the problem. I was hoping it would be a nomative determinism. They should've called was the problem. So I'm going to do a bit of nomative determinism. Make sure to call us the winners. If you come last that you that would be incredible. At some point I read only yesterday that at one point we tried to be the penguins as well at one

Starting point is 01:05:36 point which is... Oh yeah, those penguins down in secure. I'm not sure. The penguins are right. Yeah, Panthers doesn't seem to fit in. And I don't think I've ever seen a Panther in St. Kilda. No, well, they're very good. They're interesting. There was that one time. Yeah. Yeah. I'm sure. But did you have the ticket around that time? A lot of clubs are going for more full-on emblems. Like that was around the time the Fitzroy became the guerrillas. Although they had the lines, which is the guerrillas of vegetarians, I don't know. They're like lines and more ferocious.

Starting point is 01:06:10 And the horse one become like the May flowers. I think they started out as mustard seeds or something. Yeah, yeah, there was some real fun names early on. I'm pretty sure I went through most of them in episode three or whatever of the show, maybe episode two, which we recorded a while ago. Okay, so there's been a bit of history since. A bit of history since. Wait, obviously that was on the history of AFL as a game, but what about, has there been

Starting point is 01:06:34 any mascot changes in the last eight years? What do you need to get people up? No, I don't think there have been any more recent ones. Yeah, I think there's a few that probably should. I think Galko's sons could probably redo their whole thing. The bombers. The bombers are talking about taking the jet plane off their logo. I don't think they're talking about changing the name though. Just changing the logo but and that's got people up in arms. You know people are getting up in arms. Oh it's bloody about the history.

Starting point is 01:07:03 What about the history? We've someone drew that logo 20 years ago, and you're gonna throw that away. We've still got the Photoshop file. That's so, that's so fucking slow. The original. Yes. You got the original. Yes, we do.

Starting point is 01:07:16 We're gonna try it all the time. Oh, not the same one, obviously. We've stuck with our same emblem basically since 1933. So at this point in the history of the club, second world war, we haven't won any premiership flags, but the trophy cabinet wasn't completely bare. So this is something that I didn't really know know much about until a couple months ago, and the Saints actually released for their 150th year a website that showcases a bunch of this history in their triumphant tragic moments and and that website, Saints150.com.au, says the VFL Lightning Premiership or Patriotic Premiership was organized between rounds 14 and 15

Starting point is 01:07:57 of the 1940 VFL season to raise funds for the wartime effort which had broken out the year prior obviously. The one day knockout competition saw all teams compete in 20-minute matches with the last team standing awarded a fine cup in reverence of their accomplishment. Bill Moore recovered sufficiently from injury to take part in the tournament, playing a hand in steering, security to victories over Hawthorn, Carton and Richmond, leading to the team taking out the trophy. And those teams were all pretty good teams at that point in time. Hawthorn, Carton and Richmond were all pretty good teams at that point in time, Hawthorne, Carton and Richmond. We're all pretty strong teams.

Starting point is 01:08:25 Right. And I don't think it makes sense that we'd win the Patriotic Cup. Yes. Not the Premiership. No, not the Premiership, but where the ones, Colin would obviously weren't mentioned there. No, sending out guys to war. Why don't you guys to ward the flag on? What you didn't mention, but was that gameplay down the trenches?

Starting point is 01:08:42 I imagine. Metaphorically speaking. Metaphorically. metaphorically. They do love that football commentators to use a bit of war imagery. And I'll be there in the trenches. Even so funny how the strong culture gets into a bit of that. Back when my friends were having our 21st birthday, the speeches would be had.

Starting point is 01:09:03 And I reckon every second speech I went to with some mate, the speech would be like, you know what John, he's the one guy I'd want next to me in the trenches. So you're studying a hospitality degree. When are you going to the trenches? For that, my 21st, my mate goes, well if I of other people's 21st, we've heard a lot of people say, they're the only one I'd want next to me in the trenches. Well, that's not the case with Matt. He's the last guy I've want next to me in the trenches. He's like, he'd probably be feeling it online,

Starting point is 01:09:36 forming about animal welfare or something. Got me! Got me a beauty. So, we've got a cup who won something yeah and I read yes as well that in in the 1800s in the brief time that I think it was South Yara but you know the team we formed out of they won trophy which went missing until I think the last decade it turned up in Bristol and it was someone in the UK. Yeah in the UK so I'm going herited it and he emailed

Starting point is 01:10:16 the MCC saying oh is this important so they're like oh yeah that's we have to end up there that no one really knows why but it's now online online at a sports museum here Melbourne On display. Yeah, you know, we got a history of cups and and a good history of holding on to them They didn't try and take that one office. No, either. That's the most important Yeah, you're a challenge the week later not robbed Not robbed the Saints also went on to win the reserves premierships in 1942 and 1943 Which is kind of inexplicable because the team was not particularly good at that point.

Starting point is 01:10:48 You have the seniors team, but the reserves, normally the reserves are the players who can't quite make it into the seniors team. So normally there's a bit of a flow on effect if the first aren't very well, then the seconds probably aren't, but for some reason our seconds were very good in the early 40s. But the decade again finished without the ultimate success. In fact, the Saints were far from it winning further wooden spoons in 1943, 1945, 1947, and 1948. So we're racking up the wooden spoons. The new decade though, the 1950s, brought about more spoons, the 952, 954, 955, which took the club's tally up to 19, which I think today would still be a record in the late. I think it would still be the most.

Starting point is 01:11:34 Yeah, but you're not done yet. No, we're not done yet, and there's 70 more years of competition to go. But they did start to turn around after that, after those latest wooden spoons in 54 and 55. That's right, yeah. Things did start to turn around after that. After those latest wooden spoons in 54 and 55. That's right, yeah. Things did start turning around for sure. And this was with the appointment of this coach called Alan and no Dave. That's not the Alan you're thinking of. Before Alan Yabbie jeans. The same time coach named Alan Killigrew, who got the gig in 1956.

Starting point is 01:12:02 And according to the club, this was a big turning point in the size fortunes because Killigrew was a really tough coach and he famously declared that nobody will laugh and kill her. Not sure that worked out particularly well because most of the league laughs and kill her. But Killigrew undertook one of the most ruthless and substantial list turnovers in VFL history. He's astounding clean out resulted in 17 Saints who played in 1955, never donning the red, white and black again. While 11 untried players were called up for the club's first match of 1956, the tough love approach and killer group's insistence

Starting point is 01:12:33 for the sake of the faithful to get behind the boys, wrenched the club off the lower ungs of the ladder, but never into legitimate finals contention. Yeah, it was the start, right? It was the start. Sometimes you hear about that, like a coach will get sacked, but then the next coach will come along and have success. And some of the groundwork was done by the coach before. I think it was just the mentality. Like you hear sporting teams tell you about the culture, you know, winning culture and all that stuff. And he brought that in that kind of ruthlessness that tough love, really driving standards. And the club had really never had that before. Yeah. I love that kind of ruthlessness, that tough love, really driving standards, and the club had really never had that before. Yeah, I love that line of no one will laugh at St. Kilda.

Starting point is 01:13:11 Probably one of the best jokes ever written from years ago, this guy Bob Monkhaus, I think, is it an English comedian? You know, this joke, he goes, they laughed at me when I said I was going to be a comedian. Well, no one's laughing now So good But yeah, the wildest thing and I heard this on your podcast that his list curl was so great I'm killer grew that When the new season rolled around a lot of the players never met before yeah And that happened like two of the players met on the day of a game Not not just any two but two who are nearly the most important on the field,

Starting point is 01:13:47 the two that start next to each other in the centre, the Ruckman and the Rover. So Ray Barrett, who was the Ruckman, Paul Dodd, who was the Rover, first met on the tram, to North Melbourne, going to the game. That's so funny. What do you do for the club? Are you playing? So do I. Yeah, they're like, I'm just... Are you a supporter of the same, sir? No, I. Yeah, they're like, oh you're supported the same, so no, I play.

Starting point is 01:14:05 Oh, me too. So funny. Oh, yeah, I'll be tapping the ball to you later today. Oh, I'm right there. That's so funny. This is when we were turning things around. Real professional type standards, like I said. For how bad was the previous players for the coach to come and be like,

Starting point is 01:14:22 you suck so much, I will bet everything on these people people I've never met. Yeah, they've never met They probably never even heard of the game football But they look like they're they want to know But it did work it worked. Yeah, it did work because I actually won something a couple years later That's right in 1958 the Saints won another bit of silverware taking out the VFL night series Premiership was which was basically just a consolation competition for teams that didn't make the final four but still it's something best of the rest Oh right so as I play off amongst the losers. Yeah exactly and played it night. Yeah yeah how's exciting Yeah it was before they had light towers of grounds but um candle lit yeah

Starting point is 01:15:03 Everyone's running around. All of their players are just coming back from war, so they were pretty good for it. They're paying on their face, crawling around. Back to Holmes B. Although the on-failed results did little to reflect it, at the time the Saints boasted some of the best players in the league, who were recognised for their efforts across the competition. St. Kilda picked up three consecutive brown low medals from 1957 to 1959 through Brian Gleason, Neil Roberts after he switched from half-order to center-half-back and Vernon Howe, while Bill Young snared the Coleman medal

Starting point is 01:15:36 for most goals in the league in 1956. Good year for Melbourne. I was the Olympic cheer. Have you done that story yet? Melbourne Olympics. No, we've done the Sydney Olympics opening ceremony It's very specific It would done a few Olympic topics though, but we haven't done the Melbourne Olympics I've heard there's a few interesting stories there like the equestrian at the Melbourne Olympics was Contested in Sweden. Of course. We had expato Sweden in the month.

Starting point is 01:16:10 There are some pretty good stories from the 56 Olympics. I don't know if you heard about the Olympic rings. Normally, the Olympic rings are incredible, beautiful, historical rings. And they travel to different countries and they put them together. They put them in the actual rings. I didn't know that. Do you know that actual rings, though? Yeah, okay. But in 56, they came off the back of a plane and just lumped on the back of a yut and just driven around the city. That's fun. It's very Australian. Back with that bad yut. Yeah, we're AC, we're recording a film clip on the yut later that day. So good. Yep, we're ACAC recording a film clip on the U later that day. So good.

Starting point is 01:16:45 Back to Hoesby. Gleason, sudden knee injury and forced retirement in 1958. Thrusty young Alan Moro into the spotlight, whose profound impact would be etched into the club's folklore almost a decade later. But the 1950s birthed a champion of another kind, and one whose legacy would be immortalized in the St. Kilda history forever. Yes, Dave, it's time to talk about the great Alan Yabe jeans. Alan Yabe is that a name? What is that? Yabe jeans? Yabe is a nickname. Where did you get the nickname? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah,

Starting point is 01:17:17 yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, sure, actually, I don't know. I'm guessing you just sort of like to swim in Dames. He was a cop. Not a fisherman. Right. But he started so young. So he was a player at the Saints, and he played between 55 and 59. Then he, I think you went and coached in the country maybe, and it was doing good things there. And then in 1961, took over the Saints head coaching job,

Starting point is 01:17:41 and he was only 27. Oh, wow. Yeah, so he would have been coaching players older than him older thought absolutely yeah absolutely and plays that he played with yeah which would have been uncomfortable and you would have thought not really the ideal scenario but as it turned out you didn't hold him back as he took the Saints back to the finals in just his first season breaking a finals drought going back 22 years back to 1939. They were in the frame to make the finals again in 1963, but it came down to their last game against North Melbourne.

Starting point is 01:18:09 In the 1960s, Australian music and TV legend Molly Meldram was a member of the Saints Chairsquad. What, how would you explain Molly Meldram to listen to this day? What does he, he's like, is an Australian icon these days, but he's a music journalist that's famous for wearing a large, gallon hat. Yeah, like a cowboy hat. Cowboy hat and he, yeah, through the 70s, 80s, the 90s would interview all the touring musicians who came out, you know, you're out in Jones, you're Madonna's, Rod Stewart. And he was and then became friends with all all all those Yeah, it sounds like he's still mates with a lot of them. Who's that British interview? Graeme Norton. He's a more flamboyant version of Graeme Norton. Yeah, he's Graeme Norton. Finally more flamboyant. Yeah, that makes sense.

Starting point is 01:18:57 I'll remember one time you ever been in the edgy Nick. Of course. Yeah, of course. I was down there one Wednesday night years ago and I saw Molly's hat sort of bobbin through the the crowd and He was just he just walked in did a you-to turn walk back out and there's only way back out of the door He was obviously looking for someone or something I said hey Molly about the Saints and it was packed like you know It's shoulder to shoulder. He turned around again came back to me goes. Oh, we're we are on the up and we chatted about the Saints like five minutes He looked like he was faced went from like this sort of concerned looking for someone to like Beaming and wanting to chat about some of the other side. Yeah, there's a statue of Molly

Starting point is 01:19:43 Yeah, that's right. Is it called Richmond Junction? It's that kind of little side street. Is that where some streets meet? Yeah. That's how I'd explain it. Yeah, that makes sense. Dave, do you know junction? No, I've never heard that word. There's a gold statue of Molly Mildred. So good. I think he's got a science tattoo. I think it's the shield on his face. I think so.

Starting point is 01:20:07 And he's been known whenever the club's been in the grand final or a final series. He paints his front fence and it's like a tourist attraction. So cool. Anyway, so he's part of the chia squad back in the 60s. The science have to be North Melbourne to make this final in 1963. But he realized

Starting point is 01:20:26 that they didn't only have to win that to win by a certain amount of points to make it. And he wanted to let the players know during the game. So he took drastic action as non-news reports. This is quoting Meljum. I don't know what possessed me. I was in the chia squad and for some reason I jumped the fence, run out onto the ground and the umpire was about to bounce the ball. The umpire yelled stop and I said hold on a moment. At that point Meldrum made a b-line for St Kilda players, Kevin Cowboy, Niel and Rockman, Alan Morrow to deliver his important message saying, listen, apart from winning, you need better percentage to get in. And Molly, who was working at a bank at the time, had done the sums. Not only did that after win, that to win by two more goals to jump over the top of the vessel, and Mel, Meldren said.

Starting point is 01:21:13 As Meldren was running back to his seat, he was confronted by a barely police sergeant who was scorted him off the ground. And there's footage of it. That's him there being talked to by the Empire. I still got a hat. Still got that. Yeah, there's another photo where he's running out with the hat off. But yeah, he's always been a hat man. I did tell you this report was about the St. Kielder hat. For what? Yeah, there it is.

Starting point is 01:21:35 Now while the Saints went on to achieve the result required and make the finals, Molly scampered through the streets of St. Kielder hoping to evade police. I told the officer I needed to go to the toilet, but I took off down Fitzroy Street and then down Gray Street, well, I'm recalled. So he's he's got a bit of a history of not seeing the final sirens of important games. That was one time. Kornhoseby, famously Jeans, Yabby, said this Saints could have gone harder after keeping Richmond goalless for an entire game at one point a feat Which had last been achieved in 1921 so he was bringing in an even more ruthless attitude Oh, you kept them goalless you could do better than that you could have murdered them. Yeah

Starting point is 01:22:17 Sorry, coach. How could we do better than keep them goalless? Ah murder He wouldn't he didn't want to say but he sort of just nodded. Amazing to wink. Yeah. I'm not saying anything but you know how you can do it. You know. You know deep down. It was the uncompromising standards refusal to yield an insatiable hunger to succeed that would put the saints on the road to Premiership Glory. Under Jean's tenure, Saints vied for September action in 1961 and 1963, but were eliminated in the semi-finals on both occasions. It was during this time where some of the club's greatest champions began to emerge. The blonde bombshell Carl Diderich forged himself a reputation as one of the most intimidating players who ever graced the field, with his partnership with Alan Morrow and Brian Maynott.

Starting point is 01:23:06 Why not? Why not? Yeah. And Brian Maynott in the rock, one of the best in the league. Carl Ditchwich. I don't know if it doesn't sound like it because you kind of talk him out in his, as one of the most feared players in the league, but they actually called him the secure beetle for a while.

Starting point is 01:23:20 Oh no, here comes the beetle. Yeah, there's a really intimidating John Lennon and Paul McCartney. Yeah. Hello. Hello, I'm going to do some rock work. Okay. I do both doubles the bowl. Okay, you rock it down to you there.

Starting point is 01:23:33 You run it. Uh, yeah, I think it was just because of his hair cut, right? Yeah, that's right. Yeah. The blonde beetle. The St. Kilda Beetle so funny. Neil Roberts and Vernon Howe continue to shine down back, Brownlow Metauss and Stuart, who won 3 and Ross Smith, who won 1, dominated through the center,

Starting point is 01:23:50 while legendary captain Darryl the Doc Baldock was in a league of his own. With a team of champions and all the ingredients to write themselves into legend, James helped pave the next era of St. Kilda's history, furthering their ambitions to be there in that last week of September. As the club was putting together, it's best ever team. They're also embarking on another big change, moving from their home ground at Junction Oval in St. Kilda to a new home at Linton Street in Marabin in 1964. This came about after ongoing disputes with the St. Kilda Cricket Club over the use of facilities. I guess in those shoulder seasons especially after finals into cricket season and the cricket club is coming and we're trying to do pre-season here.

Starting point is 01:24:33 Yeah, we're about to play in a finals. We're doing an actual season. We need the ground. Let alone there and then the packers would probably get involved. According to Holmes B, six months of direct involvement from the St. St. Stars in building their new footballing residency, right down a walking and lines to pick up stones from the newly laid playing surface were done in the hopes of ushering in an era of prosperity for the club. They were building both literally and figuratively a new home and a new beginning as the base

Starting point is 01:25:02 side club entered a new and unknown frontier in the South Eastern suburbs. So yeah, the players were literally, as they're laying the new turf, the players would line up and go through picking up pebbles and rocks. Yeah, literally out of the grass. Out of the grass. I mean, imagine now you taught like Leo Messy in Miami starting a new franchise with David Beck. Can you imagine David Beckham and Leo Messi walking through grass picking up pebbles? I don't think I can really picture it. But these were literally the best players in the VFL at the time, which is amazing.

Starting point is 01:25:37 Yeah, they were just, yeah, they were really born in and that showed in the success they're having on the field. But it wasn't without controversy, the move, which you can imagine, like they played at Junction over for many decades, they were the St. Kilda football club and always existed in St. Kilda. So to move from St. Kilda and Marabin, which is probably today, it's probably maybe 20 minute drive.

Starting point is 01:26:03 If that, it's not that far, but back then, Marabin would have been like the edge of the world. Because I grew up in Marabin, my grandparents moved there a little bit of the decade before in the 50s. And when they moved there, they were the only house on the street, it was sort of farm.

Starting point is 01:26:21 It was industrial and stuff, wasn't it? It was factories. Yeah, there's factories and stuff, and there's also like farmers, gardens and stuff. And I mean, the industrial area is also there. Back to homes, the move caused widespread division internally and externally, but always forgotten when a record crowd of 51,370 people flocked to the new home to witness a stunning triumph over Hollywoodingwood which is

Starting point is 01:26:49 Hard to imagine I've been to a bunch of games there never without many I don't think legally in the non-easery lab to have that many in there I think that capacity was more like 30 something about that 35. Yeah, so I don't know how they got squeezed in but even More recently when they've played preseason games and and AFL W games there, the capacities, I know it's different, but capacities like eight or 10 to 10. And it feels pretty full. It's packed, eight thousand packs it. It's pretty hard to imagine. I think the stands were slightly different and whatnot,

Starting point is 01:27:18 but still, the time to imagine that many people there. And say, kill to rock it into the top of the ladder, in 1965 with 14 wins, securing its first minor pre-myship, which is finishing on the top of the ladder 1965 with 14 wins securing its first minor premiership which is finishing on the top of the ladder after the regular season in 1965 it's the first time they finish on top of the ladder Dave finally so yeah a bit of time nearly 70 years into the competition about 92 years to be precise unfortunately Dave despite their great season 1965 ended in heartbreak when they lost the grand final to Ascendant. Yeah. Kick in the face. What a kick in my face.

Starting point is 01:27:52 Damn it. It's too hurt. But did they challenge them for the next week? Yeah that's the problem when they finished on some of the latter so if their challenge system existed, they could have done it, but unfortunately they weren't using the challenge system anymore. Robbed. Absolutely Robbed. Robbed more. Exactly. I've always said that the system is a good system.

Starting point is 01:28:10 Well, they get rid of it. So yeah, the next season, 1966, I don't know if anyone's going to be interested in that. No, it's skips out on. Yeah, I've heard it. I heard it. All right. Well, let's not talk about that then. Let's talk about the theme song.

Starting point is 01:28:27 The song, the Astronomist with the Club, is a version of the traditional spiritual song when the Saints go marching in. At the junction oval though, they use an adaptation of, I do like to be beside the seaside as their song. Right, but rewritten at all? Probably. Very. I'd actually probably not sure. I don't think it was. No.

Starting point is 01:28:49 That one known as the Seagulls then. Okay, right. That makes sense. There you go. The song is not very rousing, really. Is it? It's not. It's like a Mary Poppins song. But yeah, they changed to when the Saints go marching and when they moved to Marabin. This is from the Harold Sun. When the Saints go marching in was written by an unknown songwriter in 65 or 66 when the Saints were moving from Junction to Marabin.

Starting point is 01:29:17 Now, written seems like a stretch to me. Yeah, I don't think that's quite accurate, Harold Sun. I mean, even the, I think what they're saying is written is changing, I want to be that's quite accurate, Harold Sun. I mean, even the, I think what they're saying is written is changing. I want to be in that number to I want to be in Marabbon. And they're like, that's a right as credit. Good, nothing else changed. The melody, most of the lyrics, all stayed the same. But yeah, they just abbreviate it.

Starting point is 01:29:42 They took out all the verses. Very unlike the, the Haroldund to get something so wrong. As a media man, should you be throwing stones like this? Oh, I'm picking up stones. Pigeons. That is very thank you, Lord of Life. Well done. The Hellsund continues. There are only 14 words in this theme song. The original tune is an American gospel hymn.

Starting point is 01:30:03 This song was famously recorded on May 13, 1938 by Louis Armstrong and his orchestra. The current and favorite version of St. Kilda fans was recorded by the Fable Singers in 1972. The Fable Singers recorded all the current teams songs in 1972 and they're still the ones that for the most part get played at the games. They're the, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, For the most part get played at the games So yeah fans doesn't evolve usually the fans love them. Yeah, yeah, there was a revolt when I fell had a more re-record a couple years ago Yeah, and they've brought mostly old ones back. There's trumpets and trombone. Yeah, it's brilliant The Saints like the Saints song it's a great song But they've sucked a lot of the fun out of it by killing the verses

Starting point is 01:30:44 It's a great song, but they've sucked a lot of the fun out of it by killing the verses. It's basically just, it's the chorus, and then the chorus again. Yeah, it's a great drum solo. There is a great drum solo. Yeah. It's a lot of I have a lot of fun hitting my brother in the head with that after wins. Yes. I guess you want to explain to international listeners what the song's about. I don't know how unique that is to...

Starting point is 01:31:01 Well, the first probably not that unique is it. I don't, not sure what it's like in other sports, but in Osiris' Fuddy, every club has a theme song that kind of plays on the ground over the loudspeakers when they run out on the ground and all the fans sing along and chant and whatever. And then at the end of the game,

Starting point is 01:31:18 the winning team goes back in the locker room, they all kind of huddle up and the players sing it together, which is kind of a cool little thing. Yeah, I don't know. And they're doing that the whole time like I do like to live outside the sea. Yeah, I don't know when it would have come in, but it's been, it's definitely been in as long as I can remember and I'm quite an old man. It happens in some other sports, you are an old man, but it does happen in some other

Starting point is 01:31:37 sports. I don't know in college football, a lot of the big colleges have their theme songs that they kind of huddle up and sing chant in the locker room. And a lot of the AFL songs are based on old American songs. A lot of genre songs. Oh yeah, the National French National Anthem is one of like two longs maybe. Brisbane. Or Brisbane, Brisbane? Yeah.

Starting point is 01:31:59 I don't think the German Anthem is any of them though. No, I don't think it is. Maybe calling words. Sounds right. Must be true. Yeah, so that, yeah, the play is singing. But as the siren goes, they'll play the winning team song as well, so the crowd will sing along.

Starting point is 01:32:16 And now they've got MCs at the games. The MC will often say, should we hear it again, Saints fans? No, just play the damn song. Play the damn song. I've got to admit, it's doing his job. It's the card of job that Dave would have done a million times before. I know what you're going to say, but they're told me I've got to say this. But here's some of the verses from the original Dave that we cut. They all start with, or they all end with,

Starting point is 01:32:39 I want to be in that number when the Saints go marching in. But what about, or when the drums begin to bang, or when the drums begin to bang, I want to be in... So in Kilda, when the drums begin to bang, or when the stars fall from the sky, or when the stars fall from the sky. Oh God, that's very dramatic.

Starting point is 01:33:01 It's so dramatic. When the trumpet sounds it's cool, when the trumpet sounds it's cool, when the trumpet sounds it's cool, I want to be in St. Kilda, when the trumpet sounds it's cool. When the horseman begin to ride, or when the horseman begin to ride, I want to be there in St. Kilda when the horseman begin to ride, but my favorite I think, I when the moon turns red with blood, I want the moon turns red with blood. I win the moon turns red with blood. I want to be there in Marabin. I think we should bring a couple of those back.

Starting point is 01:33:32 At least the last one. I think it'd be sick. I think all the other clubs have got these fund verses with fund imagery, like Sydney Swans One, which is definitely an old American patriotic song. And I think they lifted this line straight from them. them but they say shake down the thunder from the sky something sick or calling wood saying that every premiership's a cake walk you know but we don't know that we've just got marching you know in the sense of marching in want to be there in the sense of all and the same for watching in. Repeat. Let's get the moon,

Starting point is 01:34:06 beloved with, red with blood. I, yeah, I just, You've got links to the club, Nick, can you, I'll have a word, have a word. But I want to get the horseman into this story too. I want to get those horsemen riding and then the moon dripping with blood. I reckon we take a couple of them.

Starting point is 01:34:21 Horsemen and the moon would be fantastic. But I need to sign some sort of petition I will. As you might have heard in my 21st speech, I love to do it. No, no, I still don't know what he was talking about, but anyway, all right, David's time. Nick, you ready? Let's talk 1966.

Starting point is 01:34:40 You sure? You sure people wanna hear this? I think they do. I guess so. I mean, if they're still to hear this. I think they do. I guess so. They're still listening at this point, anyway. So the Saints got off to a hot start winning the first eight games on the trot.

Starting point is 01:34:52 Oh, wow! Things got a little bit wobbly for the rest of the season but still won six of their final ten games to finish second on the ladder with 14 wins just won behind the Collingwood Magpies. In 1966, it was the final four system. The top two teams Collingwood and St. Kilda played each other and so did the third and fourth teams Joe Long and Assetton. Unfortunately for the Saints, the blonde beetle,

Starting point is 01:35:18 Carl Dittrich, was suspended for six weeks during a previous match for striking. Yeah, I don't know the exact incident, but he must have punched someone six weeks during a previous match for striking. Obviously, yeah, I don't know the exact incident, but he must have punched someone six weeks back then would have been something pretty bad. Six weeks now could have been like accidentally tackling someone wrong. He did get, he got spent a lot. Yes, he did get to spend a lot. So it makes sense. Oh yeah. We've had a few plays like that as well. But anyway, he would miss the whole finals campaign. The winner of the Saints Pires game would go straight into the granny and the loser then would have

Starting point is 01:35:49 to play the winner of Jolong and Essin and Third vs. Fourth. So first vs. Second, he had a bonus chance. Third vs. Fourth, it's elimination. Losers out, the winner of that game plays the loser of first vs. Second. Gotcha. The state started poorly against the pies and were down by 31 points at quarter time. While they rallied strongly for the rest of the game, they went down by 10. And the other final, that's an abit, long. So the states had to play the bombers in a replay of the 1965 Grand Final matchup to get their ticket to the Grand Final. While the bombers were two strong in 65 and 66,

Starting point is 01:36:25 the Saints flogged them, flogged them, flogged them, flogged them. That was a cakewalk. Whatever that means. And that set up the blockbuster Grand Final between the Magpires and the Saints, which brings us to the big game. On the 24th of September 1966, in front of more than 100,000 spectators at a packed MCG, Colin Wood and St. Kielder went head-to-head with the Premiership and all the glory that that entails on the line. Do you know how many Premierships in Kielder had won at that stage? We talking night Premierships, Reserves Premierships, Patriotic Cups. We're talking trophies that were one before we existed. Just day VFL Grand Final.

Starting point is 01:37:11 We're at rounding down, or rounding up, zero. Correct. And Collingwood? Collingwood I think at one, 15. 13. 13. They have one 15 now. They slowed down from this point in that they did all all during the World Wars Yeah, it was funny once other teams were playing in the competition at the same time They haven't won very much once all the other players came back of course

Starting point is 01:37:37 I'm in a glass house as a saint supporter right now throwing stones But I did pick them up in a line. So I think that was okay to throw it. It is about as David vs. Goliath a matchup could be in VFL. It's a figure of throwing stones. It's good by you. Okay. Have you told that story? That story versus Goliath? Yeah, I don't think we have. There's one. Yeah, I don't know. There weren't. I don't think Russell Holmes has written a book about it yet, makes it harder. Ask him next time he visits.

Starting point is 01:38:11 I will. But not just the histories of the two clubs, but the Saints obviously, like you mentioned, missing some of their biggest stars, Carl Diderich, Ross Oakley, who later went on to become the CEO of the VFL, did his knee a week earlier against Essin and Darrell Baudok, who was the captain of the club, had injured his knee about a month earlier, maybe six weeks earlier. And bowl reports that leg should have been in plaster. He shouldn't have been running around at all.

Starting point is 01:38:35 And he might have been like football. Like all the premiership stars of our team, many brown-lead metalists, legends, like literal legends in the Hall of Fame. I think they all basically say he was their greatest player. That's right. His nickname was Mr. Magic. That's how much people loved him. Is there any magic tricks on the side?

Starting point is 01:38:53 Sliderpand. Sliderpand. Rick Cumberland taught him everything he knows. Oh, wow. I didn't know. I don't think I knew that. Yeah. Yeah, wow.

Starting point is 01:39:03 Our captain, he was like an undersized center forward, but he could sort of play anywhere... Should have played every position on the ground. And he was just a freak and... I think it was about 182 centimeters. Right, just about... Oh, that's a pretty tall. Not modern 1966.

Starting point is 01:39:20 That was in 1913, he would have been the roughman. Yeah, that's true. So the game was tight all day. And a quarter time, the Saints were up by four points. Half time, the Pies and Kickback were leading by one point. At three quarter time, the Saints were back up by four points. It was sea-soring, but it stayed close the whole way through. Then, by the 25-minute mark of the final quarter,

Starting point is 01:39:44 the Pies and Kick defer the three goals to way through. Then by the 25 minute mark of the final quarter, the pies had kicked a further three goals to the Saints two goals for, meaning that the scores were level, with only a couple minutes to go. And I'm going to let the great man and the great babysitter, Russell Holmes be summarized the final moments of the game. Hearts are in mouths as hysterical panic and excitement coursed around the ground in the deadlocked final minute. All it would take was one point. As the ball bobbled up in the Saints' 450, and the crowd continued to screen their lungs out, an opportunistic Barry Brin found himself with just enough space to seize the Sharon

Starting point is 01:40:21 and fight towards goal. His tumbling kicks sailed high for an agonizing few seconds, crossing the line for the most famous minor score in the game's history. Probably the most famous wobbly punt ever been kicked. With the Saints up by a solitary point, Collingwood were presented with one final role of the Dice, advancing the footy through the centre and barreling long to centre-half forward. Bob Murray's match-saving mark on the last line of defence all but confirmed the dice, advancing the 43th of the center and barreling long to center half forward. Bob Murray's match-saving mark on the last line of defense all but confirmed the result with his clear and kick to the boundary averting across us, the would have shattered the

Starting point is 01:40:53 hearts of the St. Kilda faithful. So in the dying moments of ball was right deep in Collingwood's forward line. If Collingwood fought was able to take a mark there, would have at least been a draw in a replay, but probably, you know, they could have won. So yeah, and you've watched this quite a few times. I've seen it a few times. You can actually hear the commentators are imploring St. Kilda to win this game. It's never happened before and they're yelling out, hit the boundary line. Hit the boundary line. Yeah, absolutely barricading for St. Kilda. Ted Witton, the former footscrap player, was commentating that day.

Starting point is 01:41:26 And he was just telling the Saints to slow down and just run out the clock to the siren. So I'm just giving them advice. I see. They're interesting. Yeah. It's one of the most famous pieces of VFL commentary now. Be up there with Jezz Alenko, you beauty.

Starting point is 01:41:40 Yeah, right up there. And what else? One of Dennis Committies, one, probably one that I don't want to mention about thief in the night or whatever. That was about it. That was a less positive St. Scram final, bit of commentary. Back to home speed. As the Sharon sailed into Alan Moro's Outstretch hands, the siren sounded to end the longest

Starting point is 01:42:01 premiership drought in VFL, AFL history, where it currently trying to build up to it. Be that record at the moment. No words can do justice to describe the sheer emotion that followed, but the tears that flowed in pure happiness, the unbridled outpouring of joy, and the historic celebrations that were 93 years in the making had finally blessed the red, white, and black. At long last, St. Kilda had its first ever-premise ship, and all of those men were immortals. Man, even just reading, I must get hairs on the back of the neck, tingle up. That's the, I think that's as much as, I'd

Starting point is 01:42:37 say, the saints have got a part of that. I think that's all Russell Holmes people. He didn't add a right. He or does. Oh my god. I thought you had some bad news for me. He'll never babysit again. I read that writing, I think. I trust my child with that man. Just like I trust my life. There were a few quirks in this game. It was back in the Black and White day. So you, it was, it was Australian TV was still black and white then. So all the footage of the game is in black and white, which is funny to watch now because you're watching black and white stripes versus black white and red stripes with, you know, they're pretty similar looking. It's hard to see. It's hard to see. But one of the weird things was that generally after

Starting point is 01:43:19 the grand final, the two captains on the grand would swap their jumpers and swap their gurnsies. So no actual photo exists of St. Kilda's Captain Darrell Baldock actually holding the Premiership Cup. The magic one. The magic one. He's wearing a collingwood jumper in the Premiership photo. So there's obviously that there's some versions now that been retouched with the St. Kilda jumper, but there is no photo of any St. holding the premiership cup in a secure jumper. Not the day on grand five. Obviously there's photos of wizard cups being held up by and set cups. We'll talk about them briefly later, but my friend had his 21st

Starting point is 01:44:00 and there was black and white thing and my plan and I didn't quite have the guts to follow through with it Because I didn't want to wear be wearing be like bulldog and being photos and colors Which I was my my plan was because he's become its portaries like everyone has to wear black and white I was gonna wear I was gonna go dressed as bulldog and hold that have a fake saints premiership cup Yeah, black and white, but didn't have the guts. What you end up doing? I think I planted my beard and tie it made it look black and white and put black and white, but didn't have the guts. What do you end up doing? I think I planted my beard and tie it made it look black and white and put black and white things in it. I just wore whatever I had in the house. I think I wore my brother's

Starting point is 01:44:32 op-shop white suit, finding the cup. I said I didn't have the guts, but I couldn't be, I just couldn't find the cup. I couldn't find a cup. That's only one. And it's in a pretty well secured cabinet in Sturra. It's actually the other thing from that game is that it's the first time that the winning team of the VFL Grand Final did a lap of honor around the MCG. They invented the lap of honor. They invented it.

Starting point is 01:44:59 They've never happened before. The Securra website says it's still hazy to this day as to who suggested the Saints walk around the MCG with the Premiership Cup With coach Alan jeans and chairman of selectors Desnizba the two names thrown up in discussion The only thing undisputed is that that iconic lap was done for the fans who according to jeans on Nizba had waited long enough To witness the ultimate success. Oh good. Yeah, I love that It's sort of similar to a story about Future Captain Danny Foley in the 90s when the

Starting point is 01:45:27 Saints were done pretty hard. I think there was a game that was pissing down or no it was really hot. The weather was extreme and maybe it was in at the gabar or something. I'm butchering the memory. But anyway, for some memory of being Hawthorne a Wavelie. Oh, a guy Hawthorne a Wavelie? Maybe. And then he took, so, probably took the whole, uh, Saints' team over to applaud the fans who hung out and watched the game. Which, yeah, it's just, it's just, that's that kind of club. Whereas calling the doll, jumping in there, convertible limousines.

Starting point is 01:46:00 Convertible limousines. Convertible limousines. They, you know, they don't give a shit about their fans, but why would they? All this country. They don't care about anything. Molly Maldon was also that game. Oh, Molly, of course. And I sort of alluded to this before that he never actually saw.

Starting point is 01:46:19 He often didn't see the final saw on at important games. He's always arrested. He, this saw he wasn't arrested. Unfortunately, he can't recall the moment theiren at important games. He's always arrested. He, this sari was an arrested. Unfortunately, he can't recall the moment the premiership became official telling nine news. Barry Brain kicked that wobbly pun to win the match and it all became too much for me and I fainted. So in theory, I've never experienced the Saints when he grandfinal ever and that's why I hang out for it so much he laughed. That's why. That's why, yeah.

Starting point is 01:46:46 He's just like to see it. I'm pretty sure I remember a story of him maybe at the 65 or one of the losses he went to. He was so angry after the game. He went to kick a can. I was just like, I was so angry. I wanted to kick this can on the ground and he kicks through it and into a brick wall and broke his toe. I couldn't find it online but I'm pretty sure that's true. If not why not, Molly. Kick harder. The Saints continue to be competitive with the top teams into the 70s, playing off the Grand Final again in 71, but despite leading by 20 points at 3 quarter time, the Hawks flew home with a seven goal final term to claim the Premiership. So they moved to Defender. They moved to Defender into the four line who kicked I think he hit five goals.

Starting point is 01:47:34 Which is that was they were basically go and throwing caution of the wind. We're running out of ideas. Yeah, let's just switch the team around. You know it worked Bob Kettie Bob Kettie curse that name Alan jeans continued to coach the team to a high standard making the finals in the first four years of the 70s But unfortunately after 1973 the Saints golden era was over having made the finals nine times between 61 and 73 And that is I mean that says something about the science out golden era meant one premiership our silver era No premierships. I think silver era was that that decade of mediocrity

Starting point is 01:48:18 After this point, I guess it is yeah Alan jeans. Yavi he remained at the top job until 76 and Barry brine it is yeah Alan James Yavi he remained at the top job until 76 and Barry Brain played on him to the 80s so there was some of those premiership legends who hung around for a while Barry Brain also was the first play to play 300 games of the Saints which was a record that existed until the 2000s I think yeah I think it was birth below forget which order but it was same then Harvey did that's right and then Riva and then Riva. And then Riva. Yeah.

Starting point is 01:48:46 All of a sudden, in the first 100 years of the pub, only one player played at the 300 games, but yeah, in the last 20 there's been, or last 40, I guess there's been four. It must have been so many premierships. Hmm. Yeah, you're shown with that, that many great players in the modern era. We must have got there. Well, let's find out Anyway, the slide down the ladder was on and while they were tough times

Starting point is 01:49:09 There were still bright spots with exciting individual players particularly Trevor Barker Barker debuted in 1975 Unfortunately for him he sort of got there as it was all You know hidden the skids and he played during the toughest era, one of the toughest years of St. Kilda's victory-stuffed history. A little bit like Darryl Baudok, he was kind of that undersized kind of player who played pretty much every position on the ground. He played center half four, he played center half back, he played full back. He just, he did everything.

Starting point is 01:49:39 And he was, he was, he was, his era is cosaly. Absolutely, yeah. High flying, take speckies every week. Do you wanna talk a bit about this? Because I said to you, when we were putting this story together, I said to you, this next period is, it's like the nadir of the Saints. But it was also the Saints Disco era. The Saints Disco era, which is famous in its own right.

Starting point is 01:50:05 Yeah. Professional football club never liked to have fun. But this team that never really won anything had, you know, one of these era is this period where they were known for being the party club. They never won anything they would lose on a Saturday and then have a party Saturday night through Monday. And it was known as the Saints Disco, really lean years on the field, but incredibly fun.

Starting point is 01:50:28 And it's such a well-loved period for St. Fans, which probably says it all about, I guess, the history of the club. I think it says a lot, but it also probably just says a lot of people found the club in that period as well. And their earliest memories, you know, people of our generation and older, people younger than us wouldn't remember it, but that was, you know, that was the first games I went to where it were happened. Yeah. So, I have such fond memories of it, and it was different. It would, you'd go there, it wasn't allocated seating, like it is now in a big stadium, this is Old Man talk, but

Starting point is 01:51:00 you'd go there, it was mainly standing room at Marabin. So people would go on a, it would be a social thing, as much as anything. Yeah. Now it is, you know, a lot more corporate and whatnot. It was the animal enclosure. Yes, that's right. I'll talk about that in a minute, but you had a story that I hadn't heard of about A.N. Stewart. He came back to the club?

Starting point is 01:51:22 Yeah, so in that period, A.N. Stewart, who was the centre, the centreman for the Premiership Team in 1966, three-time Brownland medalist, he was a pointer general manager of the football department. In 1983, he was involved in a controversial clearance wrangle, when South Melbourne players, Paul Moore and Silvio Fachini crossed to the Saints

Starting point is 01:51:40 without clearance from the VFL. In round four, Moore would play in the game against Jolong without official clearance from the VFL, and the Saints end up losing by 11 points, but had they won, they would have risked forfeiting the Premiership points under League rules. When asked about the risk of forfeiting Premiership points, Stuart replied, we were beaten by 21 goals last week. What's the risk? Let me make a play anyway. The risk is not playing. So yeah, this is a grim period for the Saints on field. They added to their wooden spoon collection in 77 and 79 and 83 and 84 and 85 and 86 and 88.

Starting point is 01:52:20 Oh no. So I think by this point up to 25 wooden spoons by the end of the 80s 1985 started particularly brutally with three consecutive 100 point plus losses So this is sort of the time that you guys have started to get into the club. I actually wasn't in this this period I was living in the country and was a colon supporter. Right. And Calvin had a great decade.

Starting point is 01:52:51 I don't really realize this recently because I don't have any memories of being a colon supporter really, but I was a colon supporter when they want premierships. So I'm like, it doesn't quite, it's funny feeling that I'm like, I sort of have been a premiership supporter. I just don't have any memory of it. You just didn't like that winning feeling. Yeah, no, it was all wrong. Well, I've told you this before, but when we moved to Marabin, Dad's are the families

Starting point is 01:53:19 or saint supporters, Mum's side is all Carlton. And it was like a housewarming. I remember there wasn't even furniture in the house yet and Michael John Dad's younger brother took me into the front room and he sat me down front of the heater and he goes you go for the saints now Matt and I said okay John I've been a saint-s-boy ever since. But mum being like she is family, she's the only other diehard 40 fan in our family. There's my younger sister also is in order bit, but my brother

Starting point is 01:53:51 and sister don't really care that much. Dad, you know, sort of been not really. And yeah, mom tells me about it how she was unstitching the number four for six keranhan off my carp and jumper, and stitching it onto a saint's jumper to be plugga, and she was like, it was the saddest moment of her life. But she didn't anyway, what a great moment. I've heard you tell that story a couple of times. I can just imagine in my mind, and this obviously nothing gets jammed,

Starting point is 01:54:21 but I have this picture of this lonely lady, like sobbing, the needle and and thread like unstitching yeah so brutal yeah I don't know it's hard to know whether or not because ever since then the blues they have one premiership which they bought it's money in a brand paper bag but brand baggers the brand they've had a pretty tough time since we've now both got the two longest Premiership droughts in the league. All right, so you're damned either way then. Yeah, they haven't won since 1995.

Starting point is 01:54:53 So there's a quite as long. But how about you, Nick, is it a family thing for you? It is a family thing for me. I, a bit of a similar story, but I had to choose when I was about five. I used to go to St. Kilda games and Hawthorne games every weekend. My mum's side of the family is all Hawthorne, and dad's side was pretty much all St. Kilda. And I chose very poorly. I think of that scene in Indiana Jones, where he chooses the cup and he drinks from the

Starting point is 01:55:18 cup and his face melts off. And the night says, he chose Paul. That got you so much life. How many flags do you miss out on from the Hawks? That's what's that seven or must be it. Yeah, it must be about that in your life They want a couple in the late 80s. They want a couple in the early 90s one or two in the early 90s 91 91 yeah 89 Yeah, yeah, and then one four in the last 15 years. Yeah, they won 2008

Starting point is 01:55:47 12 13 14. Yeah, I don't want to Don't you think I just feel like you'd be a different person. I'm that you just a build resolve Yeah, one way builds resolve the other way builds like we just soft you stop it. Oh, yeah But maybe it also I've heard Charlie Claus and talk about this. There's people who have grown up being winners and they just believe that they can do things more. They'll try more things and they'll have more self-belief. They're like, oh, they're not going to get someone in there. Because it can happen.

Starting point is 01:56:19 They know it can happen. Yeah, because you just do it and then it works. You know, just do it and then it works. You know, just do it. Win. So Dave, you I thought you were bringing up before now, but you haven't the Saints and their wooden spoons. 27 wooden spoons. It's it's the is what we currently stand at. It is by far the record. You're saying that like if you'd stopped 60 years ago, you're a year. Oh my God. 27. So that's since joining the VFL in 1897, we won more in the VFA as well, but we don't count those. That doesn't count. Not official history. But of course, it should be said, I think you we've got to clarify this.

Starting point is 01:56:59 A third of those were won before 1910. We're talking about horse and cart days. Do we really count these? They're wearing long pants and leather boots. Back back when a spoon meant something. But it was probably valuable. And there were way less teams, you know? You had your chance of winning one more much higher but they're right.

Starting point is 01:57:17 And then, yeah, we've only won two in the AFL era. So in 1990, the VFL became the AFL and we started having teams in all states and coming up when Tasmania gets their team and a few years, every state in Australia will have a team. In that period of only one, two wouldn't spoon. Compared to Caluton, there's one, five. Right, and they're heavyweight.

Starting point is 01:57:39 So, may not be sounding a bit defensive there, but I just wanna say, since things have been made more equal, we haven't been as bad. True. Yeah. True. We are only the equal worst team. Yeah. But yeah, the times were very tough in the 80s, late 17 in the 80s, but that were good times, like Nick says, back to home speed. It wasn't the poor on-field performances, substantial defeats, collection of wooden spoons rapidly increasing debt or even the risk of folding that defined the club and the eyes of the said killer faithful. Instead it was defined by those who proudly represented the red one black and provided a light to cut through the seemingly endless darkness and Trevor Barker was the absolute hero who championed those values.

Starting point is 01:58:25 The idolized saint with the blonde blocks, Hollywood looks, and a penchant for a spectacular marks, gave fans a reason to cheer week after week. Barker took out the club's best and fairest award in just this second year before adding another to his collection in non-an anyone. That very metal would later be named in his order. With the Trevor Barker award to this day, one of the most revered accolades that can be bestowed upon a saint. very metal would later be named in his order. With the Trevor Barker Award to this day, one of the most revered accolades

Starting point is 01:58:46 that can be bestowed upon a saint. Oh, so for the hottest player. Yeah, yeah. Same after Hollywood Trevor. The saint's mascot's actually now Saint Trevor. Saint Trevor named after him as well. And he got the long blonde locks.

Starting point is 01:59:01 Speaking of the Trevor Barker Awards, have you been before Nick? I haven't actually. I haven't been to the Trevor Bifrelds. I'll be doing a little hump break here because I got a plus one invite when Aaron Goxy Goxy stand up comedian and science fanatic was going to be performing. Didn't end up happening but he um he took me to his plus one and it was really great. So I thought I'd message Goxy and see if he wanted to let us know what he feels about being a Saints fan.

Starting point is 01:59:29 I guess I love the Saints because, you know, there's always interesting characters and even though they're not a very successful club, you know, it's always something fun going on or something interesting. It's very, very dull or boring at saint so yeah I wish I could say it's for the greatness of the onfield part but yeah that's that's probably how I summon it all is a quirky and fun club that's awesome of goxy a quirky and fun guy. What a guy. That's great. Haggard's Goxy.

Starting point is 02:00:08 I love Goxy. I love Goxy. Yeah. Honestly, a natural treasure. Next to Molly Meltham. Yes. That's right. I think once Molly goes and heaven forbiddy for you ever does,

Starting point is 02:00:19 I think Goxy steps into that role. I think Molly's already been in barmed, hasn't he? I think Molly is still kicking. But the, hasn't he? I think what? Still kicking. But the, yeah, there's a few roles. It's probably the Hollywood role, which Eric Banner's currently in as the Hollywood science fan. Have you had one before Banner? Was there another Hollywood? Yeah, there's all this. Greg, Graham Kennedy. Graham Kennedy was there. He was a science fan. There you go. Shane Warren, of course. Hollywood, Hollywood shame.

Starting point is 02:00:47 Yeah. Peter Hitchner. Oh, the Hitchner, the Hitchner. Yeah, the Hitchner, the Hitchner. Yeah, a lot of people in New's are science supporters. Yeah. Because they did a, they, the club did a video with the ambassadors a few years ago.

Starting point is 02:00:59 Yeah. Kongsy was probably in it. Jane Bunn. It was like majority news reporters. Yeah, Jane Bunn, Alicia Locksley, Peter H in it. J.Ban. It was like majority news reporters. Yeah, Jain Bahn, Alicia Oxley, PDHNA. Yeah. There you go. That's right.

Starting point is 02:01:10 People who air their message. Tim Gossage. Tim Gossage. Tim Gossage. That's the Goss. Anyway, back to Barker. He was offered big money to play for other clubs, but he stayed loyal to the cash strap saints.

Starting point is 02:01:22 He even donated a car. He won back to the club to help with their money issues. How did he win a car? He won the even donated a car, he won back to the club to help with their money issues. How did he win a car? He won the centry? No, he won. Yeah, in a raffle. No, he won, he won down.

Starting point is 02:01:31 He wanted it for the best part of the year. I think maybe the club. Mark of the year or? Oh, yeah, it was something like that. It was something like that. Yeah. Not only did he not take more money from other clubs, he took less money from Securdom.

Starting point is 02:01:45 Yeah, he just couldn't afford to pay him. Isn't that wild? He could have been, yeah, he could have gone anywhere and got paid proper cash, but he stayed. I think in that period, players, I think it equaled out something like 13 and a half cents in the dollar. They got paid during that period. That's how bad it was. And they talk about it now, they should be getting paid that money now, right? They should. I think there is something kind of going on behind the scenes that there's some sort of acknowledgement or something, whether they actually get paid cash or there's just

Starting point is 02:02:12 some sort of acknowledgement of what those guys did. Yeah, bastard will come out and say sorry. I'm so... It's clear everything out. He's out. It's a present at the moment. Yeah, billionaire. Yeah.

Starting point is 02:02:23 Yeah, yeah. It's hard to take some, sometimes it's like, you know, really we need them members. We found it sick. Just, didn't we? Can't you just chip in yourself? We found it sick. Oh, that's your president.

Starting point is 02:02:33 Yeah. Right. So the president for people who don't know fully, the president's like, it's an unpaid role. It's an honorary title. It's normally like a business person or some sort of... Someone who's got some clout. Yeah.

Starting point is 02:02:50 Anyway, after 230 games, Barker never played in a final and only tasted Victory 29 times throughout the 80s. So, it was tough. Wow. Isn't it amazing to stick with that There's like there's no nearly no upside worst pay less success Another club sort of clearly taking him. Yeah, yeah, yeah He did go on to have a premiership success in the nonnies though as the coach of sanderham in the Victorian state league Which confusingly is now called the VFL. The VFA became the VFL when the VFL, after the VFL became the FFL. That's confusing,

Starting point is 02:03:31 but anyway. So he coached a couple of premierships with Sandroham, but sadly he died of cancer at only 39 years of age. Oh gosh. And at that time he was seen as the next in line to be the Saints coach. There was there was a somewhat of a succession plan kind of put in place that Trevor Barker was going to become the next coach of St. Kilda and the captain of St. Kilda Danny Froley was going to become his assistant coach and that was going to be the dream team kind of coaching team at St. Kilda moving forward and never happened. Yeah, sad. Another bright light for the Saints in the 80s, as well as Barker was Tony, plugger, locker.

Starting point is 02:04:09 Okay, now we're talking. Now that's on a pedal. That's the first one. Oh, that's the first one. It's Ailey. Yes, you did. You didn't know Ross Oakley? The player went on to be the president of the whole league

Starting point is 02:04:23 or the CEO of the league. You didn't know Billy Schmidt. I did no long day. Yeah. Uh, back to Hoesby. The arrival of one Tony Lockett to Marabbon took the game by storm, with the boy from Ballarat going on to become a legend of the game, making his debut at 17 years of age. Plugger fast became one of the saint's most iconic

Starting point is 02:04:45 heroes with his hulking presence, strong hands, surprising speed, and aggression making him one of the best players of all time. In tandem with the great Nikki Windmar, the duo formed one of the most dangerous partnerships up forward, despite their side's minimal success. Windmar's chemistry with Plugga inside Ford 50 was truly magical. Without him, Lockett wouldn't have kicked anywhere near as many goals he did. It's a tism, I don't know if I've mentioned this to you Dave, one of my old time-favorbans. That is song called Father and Son, and it was all about the dad taking the boy

Starting point is 02:05:19 down to watch Footy at Marabin, and the chorus was Wynmar, Wynmar, Wynmar, Lockett. That's a shot of video clip at Marabin and the chorus was Winmar Winmar Winmar, a Winmar to lock it. That's also a shot of video clip at Marabin. They did, that's right. I'm gonna mention that a bit later. Locket registered his best season in 1987, booting 117 goals to lift the Saints off the bottom of the ladder and taking out Beston Ferris, Coleman and Browndo Metal

Starting point is 02:05:40 on as a result. Wow, does anyone ever win three at once? It's very, very rare. Yeah, very, very rare. Because Browndo Metal's sort of seen as a result. Wow, does anyone ever win three at once? It's very, very rare. Yeah. Very, very rare. Because Brown though metals sort of seen as the midfielders award now, forwards never really win it. So yeah, it's probably unlikely to ever happen again.

Starting point is 02:05:55 I mean, it did that for forwards never really won it ever. No. It's very few, I think. Yeah. Plagot was also feared as a player due to his size and physicality, while only standing at 191cm tall, short by a key position player standards today. He weighed over 100 keg, he weighed over 100 keg during his playing days, and he wasn't afraid to throw his weight around. This was true off the field as well. In 1988, he was in hospital

Starting point is 02:06:22 with an ankle injury when Janos Edimaguar attempted to barge in for an interview. Eddie McGuire, who went on to become the Collingwood president. I don't really have a problem with Carlos, it's a fun thing today to be. Yeah. And it's Jess's team, and while she's not here, really lay the boots. You would have thought the powers would have been Dave's team. Anyway. I love a part. There you go. So McGuire is trying to barge in for an interview and lock it through one of his crutches at McGuire like a spear.

Starting point is 02:06:55 The footage was captured and shown on the news that night. As far as I can tell there were no repercussions for it. It was a different time. Surely not the last person to want to throw something at the show. It was like back then he was like a real doorstop kind of journalist. You know like on a car in a fairs top show. Shut up, barge in. Yeah. Going through people's rubbish and stuff. That's an appropriate. Sounds in hospital. I'll probably talk it up a little bit, but he really, I think he was just kind I think he was a junior journalist at the time. Yeah. Yeah. That's that kind of tenacity that got him to where he got there.

Starting point is 02:07:30 That's how he got the Collingwood job and the host of who wants to be a millionaire. Something that's quite well I went people talk about Marabin 40 grand there's a few things they talk about. One of them is the cold showers, Dave. It was also in the days where footy was still only semi-professional, so things were a bit loose. According to an article by Paul Daffy, the visitors rooms at Marabin were considered among the most inhospitable

Starting point is 02:07:56 in the competition. The biggest bunk bear was the cold showers. After almost every game during the 1980s and early 90s, Marabin' Curator Brett Sullivan was called to the rooms about 20 minutes after the match to try and get the hot water going. I'm matching every week. I'm sorry, something again. But the funny thing is, his first protocol was the gas tap at the back of the rooms. Just a few steps away from the stairwell that leads up to the back of Baynon in the Grandstand. This was one of the main thoroughfares on Mashedays, so I've been said. So, St supporters are walking past this wall where the gas tap is for the

Starting point is 02:08:33 opposition room hot showers. The easy access to the gas tap for anyone who wanted past enabled supporters to develop a habit of turning it off. A measure that instantly cut off the hot water. When the tap was taken off, supporters brought, so they eventually went, all right, we'll just take the tap off. Well, after years. Yeah. So once they took the tap off, supporters brought pliers and continued to turn the hot water off manually.

Starting point is 02:09:01 One of the stories is that Ian Stewart, who was the general manager of the Fuddy department at that stage, was one of the first people to kind of click to that idea that, hey, we should do the other team called Shout out. That's so funny. Because he comes up again, talk about the muddy ground at my revenues. That's right. Like, he was one of the all-time greats, no one ever won four brownlist, he was one of a few that won three. Three. And one of the all-time great players. But I see he won it was one of a few the one three. Yeah, and one of the all time great players,

Starting point is 02:09:26 but he's like after football, he's like this guy turning a hot water. I've been real. I've brought the front. Like it's an older man. That's so funny to think about. After 23 years as a curator, Sullivan believes it was the chia squad members

Starting point is 02:09:41 who discouraged the hot showers, saying the chia squad never admitted that they turned off the tap, but that was the main suspects. Bill Cobb, a member of the St. Kilder chia squad for 36 years, was horrified by the suggestion, saying chia squads get blamed for an awful lot of things. Cobbs now an administration officer at Australia Post. And he said, but I'll fight tooth and nail to protect the good name of our chia squad. Sounds like one of those who'd done it stories like, was the chia squad at the gas station at the flight? It's so funny that it's like, how dare you?

Starting point is 02:10:14 And it kind of, it doesn't convince me either way. Like that's exactly what a chia squad member who turns off the hot water would say. I'll fight tooth and nail. How dare you? Our very good name in the Cheers Squad. Like Nick was saying, the sprinklers was another one that Mirabin was famous for.

Starting point is 02:10:32 During the tough years and the 80s, to bring the visiting teams down to their level, the Saints turned the sprinklers on overnight to make sure the Santa Square was a muddy bog. This was confirmed by an 1983 coach, Tony Jewel, in a 2018 radio interview, saying that one time they used a program time to turn it on for a few hours at night before the game, but the time of fail to turn it back off.

Starting point is 02:10:54 And Joule remembered that the following day of the game against the Tigers was quote, like a fair dinkam swimming pool. When the journalist asked him after the game, why it was so wet, he told them that it was a localized shower. The famous local showers in Maraben. But again, I think it was Ian Stewart who did that. There were nights where he'd be walking on the field with hoses and turning the sprinklers on and all that stuff in the center square.

Starting point is 02:11:23 Let's just say that him and Stewart would be out there sometimes drinking a beer holding a hose Now they're on a Friday night, but the second half to obviously playing it as well. Are they better in playing in mud? No, it just brings the opposition down to that level That was a Yes, so one of the one of the stories out of that that ears from Rowan Sawers who who's a One of the professional empires in the VFL I'm part over 400 games of football and he had to say this about his unpiring debut at Mirabin in 1977 And he said my first bounce in league football didn't bounce the ball got stuck in the mud

Starting point is 02:11:58 Paul Calorie the St. Kilda Rover plucked the Sharon out of the bog and played on It didn't bounce They just got swallowed by the bog. So yeah, they basically kind of had the effect of making opposition teams dreading to go there. Like you go there, you're going to get muddy even on a nice day and it's just hard work. It's a slog. Slog in the bog. So it was was famous for.

Starting point is 02:12:27 But the Saints' play is in fans love Marraven. You know, to spot all this, we were talking about Danny Friuli before, but he said there was nothing like it. You would walk out in the middle, especially in the 80s, and you could just sense the atmosphere of the place. According to the Harold Sun, after a fire game in 1978, Essin and President Colin Stubbs described the science as animals

Starting point is 02:12:48 and the fans embraced the tag. A small area fenced in between the umpires and say killed a player's races became known as the animal enclosure and was home to the most rabid fans. It's about for all you later said, the animal enclosure was famous for all the right reasons. Ha ha ha ha.

Starting point is 02:13:04 Anyone outside of the club was like, it was feral, it was gross, it was awful. I don't think anyone has loved the St. Kilda Football Club more than Danny Frawley. No, no, yeah. He is, yeah. Like he went on to be in the media a lot after he coached other teams and stuff, but yeah, he was always flung the flag for the Saints. By the way, he gets the name Spud Dave. It's not the most interesting word to get a nickname, but he grew up and worked on a potato farm in Bungery. That's how we got the nickname. Which I guess begs the question, did you grow up in a snake pit, Dave?

Starting point is 02:13:37 That's why I, in New Year, I, need for context. I tried to rebrand as Cobra. It did not take off. Nick does not convince. I can see it. I'm trying to bring it back. Trying to bring it back now. Is he gonna call me Cobra? Oh, no, okay. No, Cobra, let me go on. One of our listeners who suggested the topic is Maddie, who in her submission wrote, I'm a massive Saints fan just like Matt. Danny Frawley was also my family friend and school coach. He was the person who introduced me to football when I was a kid and moved to Australia. He's a reason I loved this sport so much and was the

Starting point is 02:14:13 person who made me go for the Saints. But also the reason I loved them too. Danny was not only an absolute legend of the AFL but also a huge advocate for mental health. Yeah, so that's Maddie's message. Said, I hope you can consider this as a topic. And yeah, I couldn't agree more with Maddie. He was an absolute legend. I remember me and my brother. So I had number four. My brother Tom had number two, Spud's number.

Starting point is 02:14:37 And yeah, they were full forward, full back. And they're just super dependable at each end of the ground. Both grew up in or around Ballarat. We had a great period of getting players from Ballarat. Was that a zoning thing? I think it was, yeah, every club had their club zones. So we at one stage had the morning to peninsula as well. And we lost that part of the zone and that went to Hawthorne and they got a bunch of incredible play and there was also there was I think there was a story that Brad and Dini like fudge where it was from on that like you said it was from the other side of the road or something

Starting point is 02:15:13 So he went to Hawthorne instead of the Saints what a dodgy dog We're being dog forever by the system But we would have had done still and Brad and I think out of that out of that zone And I think it only changed like two years before or something. Hawthorn petitioned the VFL to get that part of the zone. Dogs. Dogs. Why more sense for it to be ours as well?

Starting point is 02:15:34 It's so much closer geographically to us. One of my favourite of her footy memories growing up was going out to Western ovals. The first time I went to the Western ovals, the your home ground Dave, the now known as Whitten Oval. And I went to see Spots Last Game. Were you there Nick? I was there. And did you run out? So after you run out?

Starting point is 02:15:54 I didn't run out, no. Normally it would be after someone kicks 100 goals. The crowd would, or it still does run out on the ground. And we all ran out when he finished. And that's the great photos of him with his arms up with just bawling his eyes out, such an emotional guy, but he bled for the club and I met him years later in a pub in Ireland and he was so nice and welcoming like Molly as soon as I told him I was a saint supporter. He's run into him? I did, yeah just bumped into him,

Starting point is 02:16:21 but he was over there as an assistant coach for Australia and the International Rules, Australia was playing Ireland. And yeah, he just kind of got a line up a room with his warmth and humour. A little personal story, you know that photo of him holding up the flowers and he's on the shoulders and stuff. The player's actually got him a copy of that photo, framed copy of that photo and my dad had a photo story in the city and a lot of the players used to go there to get their photos done and whatever and they actually got that photo developed and framed and a plaque put on to give to Spud at Dad's shop.

Starting point is 02:16:55 And so when they came in and they ordered the thing they said we'll come back on whatever day to come pick it up. Dad actually kept me out of school and took me in the work so I could be there when Robert Harvey and Stuart Low came in to pick it up. That's kept me out of school and took me in the work so I could be there with Robert Harvey and Stuart Low came in to pick it up. So yeah, that was cool. So you met Banger and buckets. Banger and buckets. Amazing. I went to the Saints training, but buckets, the week he was retiring. And I went to the training with me and my friend Arnie and I brought my little Sony cam quarter to everyone's getting photos with him.

Starting point is 02:17:29 The softening's been real patient and I soft to training. And I go, Arnie, get a video of me shaking a bucket's hand and we're standing there. And Arnie's gone, it's not working. I mean, Stewie Loa was standing there shaking hands. Look at Arnie's going, it's not working. Something's wrong. He's like, I working some of the drawing. He's like, I can't get it working.

Starting point is 02:17:48 And Stewie Loa sort of between his gritted, smiling teeth goes, you guys taking a piss? The problem was you couldn't see your hand. It's been engulfed in his mid. Yeah, that's right. There's this great photo of him during his playing days holding like 12 eggs. His hands are so big, you just hold 12 eggs and he's saying. But you were like shaking hands for about 25 seconds. Yeah, and he was just like, you know, being calm, but he's just like, alright, guess.

Starting point is 02:18:14 I think there was about three seconds of video of me shaking his hands somewhere. No, we're gonna try and dig that out, that's so good. Sadly, Spud Fruly also died young, the age of 56 in 2019, really shocked the footy world and took a memoratum the Saints now play an annual Spud's game, which I don't think we've won a single one of, the mid three of them. No, we haven't won them.

Starting point is 02:18:39 Yeah, I think we've been thumped a couple of times as well. And the Saints have also opened the Danny Frawley Center for Health and Wellbeing at Merabin at the home ground and training facility. And it's a state of the art facility. And its website says, the Center's vision is to continue Sput's legacy is both a St. Kilda Champion and Advocate for Mental Health, where everyone is welcome

Starting point is 02:19:02 and endeavoring to look after their health and well-being. This is a pretty nice tribute for a legend of the club. Have you been in there? I've been down. I haven't been inside the Danny Fully Center yet. It's a pretty impressive building though. The whole guy, the Royal Redevelopment's awesome. It is.

Starting point is 02:19:20 And I love it against the grandstand there. The footy. I kicked some great goals, somebun earlier in the year. On that note, let's go for a quick break. I think one of my favorite early memories of seeing games in Rebun was after the game to support the same guy every week. He'd climb up on one of the big advertising billboards. It was sort of on the outside of the stadium.

Starting point is 02:19:42 And he would be up there with his trumpet and he'd play when the Saints triumphantly after we won or kind of downtrodden. It's still doing the view off. You know what I felt lost and I was like you know everyone was having fun. I was like I was quite young when we were going there but I was there with I would have been there with a crew of 30 oddodd people, my uncles and aunties and friends. Every time I was, it just fell like a party and then we'd walk back to Nanor and Pop's place, either Commiserade or Celebrate the game. It was just the best. You know what I remember about that period and you were probably there. I mean,

Starting point is 02:20:19 you're a year older than I am. A very long year. Yeah, but hundreds of years. Hundreds of years. But that period following Tony Lockett from Gold Square to Gold Square, I used to run around halfway around the ground to follow him from Gold Square to Gold Square so I could see him kick goals up close. And there was a bunch of other kids that we did the same thing and nervous knew each other, but we all did it together almost every week. So we parted that.

Starting point is 02:20:40 I wasn't part of that. I was running from end-to watch Spudfroly defend So we would have been crossed the go No, I did we will stay down the down the south road end But I had I heard about that and I remember seeing kids doing yeah, it was probably cool enough It's probably a hundred maybe a couple of hundred kids that would do it almost every week So there's very defeated like Rome to run all of it. It was all essentially open. Yeah.

Starting point is 02:21:08 Because there was almost a standing room. Apart from, there was like a grand stand on the back on Linton Street. Yeah. And in front of that was just concrete steps. Yeah. So you could just run around, literally around the boundary line fence. That's that's fun. Yeah, so that was a lot of fun.

Starting point is 02:21:21 A lot of times. That was very social. Yeah, for there were a lot of kids just sort of going off and doing whatever they wanted to do. All the parents were getting pissed. Yeah, we're done cutting. No concept of at the time, but yeah, that's obviously what we're doing.

Starting point is 02:21:35 Did you stand on cans? Yeah, you can stand on big old thick cans and... Yeah, so I've divide there was just so much fun. There was also the Siren guy, which I really know from the Eddie McGuire's story which you can see on On YouTube he does a report from the final game at Mrabin and there's a clip of I think he's a Siren guy But he's just like there

Starting point is 02:22:01 But he's only his sounds like a Siren he does the Siren. Yeah, I think maybe he was just the clone. He was the siren guy. He was a siren guy. He was just a fan of the siren. Do they have a real siren as well? There was also a real siren. They ended the game whenever this guy decided to end up. I'm on board. We're in front.

Starting point is 02:22:12 Yeah, fun siren. I also has a bit of a funny heckle from the crowd when your team kicks a point to sell the game. But I have a siren. Yeah, I'm on board. I'm on board. I'm on board. I'm on board. I'm on board. I'm on board. I'm on board. I'm on board. We're in front and yeah, fun with the song. Also has a bit of a funny heckle from the crowd when your team kicks a point to start the game.

Starting point is 02:22:28 But I have a song, bit of fun. According to Andrew Slevesen writing for Sien, back in the 1980s, the St. Kielder football club was renowned for having a good time. Nick was talking about this before as well, including at the infamous Saints Disco at Marabbon. One man who recalls the fun-loving days of the Saints' form of full Ford Mark Scott, and he must have had a pretty short time, either way, he was before my time anyway, but in a game at Marabbon in 1980, Scott kicked a bag of nine goals, big bag of goals. The end result was a 49-point defeat at the hands of Carlton. Ooh!

Starting point is 02:23:04 With Scott admitting, it was a little bit tricky for the hands of Carlton. We're scotted meeting. It was a little bit tricky for him to fully acknowledge his own individual output even among the regular boisterous behavior, saying, Marabin in those days was just a quagmire. It was hard to celebrate because you came off and you'd think, I've kicked nine. I've had the best day of my life. But all the boys who got their heads down because we were beaten by eight goals.

Starting point is 02:23:23 Because no one else kicked a goal. He played 34 games, secured. 34 games, zero. 110 goals. That's a bad ratio. Yeah, that would keep you... I think of you another year contract based on that now. But like, so it wouldn't have been his choice to retire after 34. I think he played some other...

Starting point is 02:23:39 So he came to secure it from Hawthorne and then went to Fitzroy. You're averaging four or four maps and they're like, sorry, Matt. How's this though? Three games for eight goals from Hawthorne and then went to Fitzroy. I was thinking you're averaging four maps and they're like, sorry, Matt. How's this though? Three games for eight goals at Hawthorne. 34 games for 110 goals in Kielder. 41 games for 57 goals at Fitzroy. So his best period was at the Kielder

Starting point is 02:23:57 when there was no one else kicking goals. Yeah, no one hung it up. But even so, he said, it was hard to sell it right because everyone else had bummed out by the loss. But then he said But I must admit it's ain't kill during those days. They never used the gym But by G they did some heavy lifting in the night clubs. The boys celebrated anything All right, we're going out to night goes where the biggest last part. What about that? Nine goals.

Starting point is 02:24:25 Hey Scotty, let's go. There's a party club, you know? And people say that is a negative. Maybe they should have made more focused on football. But I think that's glass half empty stuff. Yeah, come on. Come on, why not party? Hey, how good is it to be alive, you know what I mean?

Starting point is 02:24:43 That should be the Latin motto for the Saints. You can only you can only play football for so long. Yeah, but you can party forever. Yeah. That's all right. And kiss said that as well. I think you're going to grandfather's attainment this year. Uh, so we had plug-a-dominating, but we also had other champion players coming up at the club. And they all had great nicknames like plug-a. But I should say plug-in dominating, but we also had other champion players coming up at the club, and they all had great nicknames like Plugger. But I should say Plugger, that's obviously where Unplugged Podcast gets its nickname. Yes, or it's Names.

Starting point is 02:25:12 Yes, it's Names, yeah, yeah. It's Names, we decided that whenever we get Plugger on the show, that episode is just going to be called Plugger, and then we hang up the microphone. That's a good one. So, and why is say called plugger for? I don't know. I was thinking about it. Yes, I don't know why it's called plugger.

Starting point is 02:25:28 That's a very good question. I don't know. Yeah, I'm not sure. Plugged the girls. Plugger, yeah, did he wear thongs? Like do you call him pluggers? I don't know. It's good.

Starting point is 02:25:39 There would be a story and a Russell Holmes be it, no it. Russell would know. Let's get Russell. I'm imagining it's not that interesting otherwise we would know it um but yeah that all the other great players coming up at this stage had great nicknames as well like Robert Banger Harvey Neil Elvis Winnmar who's nicknames Nicky his real Nick is real name Elvis is he's real middle name yeah his real name is Neil Elvis Winnmar but his nickname is Nikki. Right, I thought that was gonna, you're gonna tell me that's Nikki's older brother, Neil, Elfus. Yeah.

Starting point is 02:26:09 But that's, there you go. Then he had Stewie Bucket slow and Captain Danny Spud, for all he, so with all these great players, the doctors were coming to an end once again. Tony Lockett's nickname, Plugger, was inherited from his father Howard, who in turn had inherited from his own father, a green thumb who used to plug around in the garden. It's a pretty generation. He's plugged in the third, a gardening. There you go.

Starting point is 02:26:35 That's a great nickname. That is a great name. I can't believe I haven't heard that story before. That's fantastic. Because your whole life is believe I haven't heard that story before That's fantastic Because your whole life is like yeah it's plugger you like it yeah yeah yeah I'm like what is it even really me? No no it just feels right. It's the plugger. You know in that that brown low footage where they call him up as Anthony Lockett It always confused me when I was growing up Anthony who's that who's Anthony Lockett? You mean plugger Anthony, who's that? Anthony Locker.

Starting point is 02:27:02 You mean Plugga. Plugga, then for a while you got the wrong lesson out of it. Plugga must be short for Anthony. So with the dawn of the 1990s, where the VFL became the AFL, uh, continue it. Oh, hang on. I've already said all this. This is a problem when you go off script earlier and you come back and you're almost breaking that down.

Starting point is 02:27:24 So with the dawn of the 90s is the VFL become the AFL a new decade Saints fans started to feel hopeful once more hope of course being the curse of the Saints fan Always always sort of it's this weird mix of optimism and pessimism that I feel like I'm always Floating between as a Saints fan like other and it's like what Charlie said at the start, there'll be opposition supporters of the media who'll be talking about our list. So I'm like, it's not as bad as you're saying. Yeah.

Starting point is 02:27:52 Only other secure supporters are allowed to say how bad it is. Yeah, that's what I'm like. Shit, we are as a club. Not you. No, you can't say that. How dare you. How dare you, I would leave her.

Starting point is 02:28:01 I would leave her. The Saints started climbing up the ladder, finishing 12th and 89th and 9th and 9th and 9th and finally back into the finals for the first time in 18 years in 1991. Plugger won the Column again that year kicking 118 goals in the home and away season. He kicked 127 that year including through finals, 127 goals in 17 games. An average of nearly 7.5 per game which we'd do a bill more before. Seven and a half per game, which we do a bill more before. Seven and a half per game is double that.

Starting point is 02:28:27 That's ridiculous. Seven goals for one game this year would be most for the four best game of the year. Pretty much. But doing that on average every week is just unthinkable. Yeah. He missed the first six weeks of that season. He came back in around seven and keep 12 goals,

Starting point is 02:28:40 10 goals and 12 goals in his first three weeks. The guy was just unstoppable. You're gonna make it up for it. If you extrapolate that out to a full 22 week season, you get 164 goals. The single season record in VFL, IFL history is 150. So it's just shows one of the greatest patches of goal kicking ever. So the Saints made the finals and they met and remembering this is after these dark years where players weren't getting paid What was they getting paid 13 cents in the dollar? And they got through that somehow

Starting point is 02:29:12 Survived through to the AFL made the finals in 91 And we had probably one of the best teams in the league would have been one of the favorites for the Premiership that year Yeah, like a very formidable team And they met the Jalong cats in the elimination final at Waverly Park. And the system was weird for this to be an elimination final right now. That's right. I mean, under that old final system, there were 16s played finals, footy, first played second, third played fourth and fifth played sixth in the first week.

Starting point is 02:29:41 So under that system, you actually rewarded with a better match up if you finished fifth than fourth, because you got to play the first week. So under that system you actually rewarded with a better matchup if you finished fifth than fourth because you got to play the worst team. So fifth and sixths is an elimination so serve as a fourth just make your sense at all. That's right. So third versus fourth is also an elimination. Yeah. So if you're third and lose, you're out. You're out. Even though fifths has played a team that wasn't as good. Yeah. Yeah, this is in the AFL era. This is in 1991. It's so funny that no one's checked this over with a mathematician or someone who knows what they're doing. They changed the system the next year.

Starting point is 02:30:13 Yeah. Which is, as we know, it's what happens after noticing you're able to fail. That's throughout the whole history that's been the case. You always get shafted. But it was a cracking game. I was there. It's the first final I went to. Obviously it was the first one I was allowed for. And, uh, Saints got out to a 19 point lead at half time. But despite plugger kicking nine goals,

Starting point is 02:30:33 the dirty cats flew home to win by seven. Is that the game that Gary Abbott did? Yeah. Um, they work. Uh, Dave Greenton, David Grant and David. Yeah. So when you say, don't say they were playing a bit rough, were they? Yeah, like just dirty off the ball. One of them was Hobbit, one of them was Hawking, maybe? Oh, yeah, that's right. Maybe Hawking was Birken, Ablet was Grant. Yes, that might be it.

Starting point is 02:30:57 But yeah, stretching my memory. Just pretty filthy kind of play. And we were robbed because... What happened? You're off the waiting Well, two of our best players were taken out off the ball for stutters And yeah, they just just got over us in the end She's brutal but in the system today We would have had a double chance or would have been playing a much lower team Yep

Starting point is 02:31:24 And also, Ableton Hawking would have been rubbed out for the rest of the year. You know, like very frustrating anyway. Saints play finals again in 92, winning the elimination final against the Magpires. Their first September win in decades, before being knocked out by your boys, the dogs, and the semi-final. Sorry about that. But, we get our finals revenge on you a few times. We'll get there. Yeah. According to Holmes Beat, that 1992 season would see the Saints close the book on Marabin's

Starting point is 02:31:57 rich history of football with the red, white, and black taking residency at Wavelie Park as part of the AFL's ground rationalisation strategy. The move cleared up some of the club's debt as well as an opportunity to start a fresh with newer facilities compared to those of the aging Marabbon. St. Kiela remained at their spiritual home for training in administrative purposes with the final game being played on the Hello Turf in round 20 on the 1st of August 1992, but they had an 18-point win over the future of Lions. I was there, you there, that one, Nick? I actually don't recall, which makes me think that I wasn't.

Starting point is 02:32:29 Yeah, I feel like it's, you think I would remember that. Yeah, yeah. I remember there were kids on the ground picking up chunks of grass to take home and I'd like to think that they planted them in their lawns at home and now they've got a little bit of wind and street grass. They've got their own oval up there. Yeah, picking up pebbles. Exactly. It was emotional, but yeah, that year we went on to Winner Farnall after that. So it was interesting. The two first years at Marabbon, we played Farnall's and won a premiership in the last two years

Starting point is 02:33:01 and had a long drought of Farnall's and played Farnall's. Marabbon was a, I think that's another reason why people love Maraben. Even though there was a real tough spot in the middle. That 91 team might be the best and kill the team of all time. Really, when you look at the list and the players and all that stuff, it was just an incredible, an incredible year. Yes, but yeah, just the final system was so poorly put together that you just never know. But definitely like worthy of premiership contention that year. But yeah. Growing up nearby the ground in those years after

Starting point is 02:33:32 they moved away it was kind of fun. So we moved to Waverly which is a lot closer where you were growing up Dave. Do you have any memories of Waverly? Do you ever go to Waverly Park? Or Arctic Park as that was sort of pejoratively known? No I don't think I ever did go. Because, yeah, there was this idea that the weather was worse there. Yeah, it wasn't a valley, wasn't it? Yeah, so it just was like a that rained more there. Yeah.

Starting point is 02:33:54 That's how I got the name Arctic Park. But finally, I remember, well, my memory's there for the most part, it's just beautiful sun-shiny days. The rainbow-colored wooden seats they had there, brown and blue, big screen. We've got a big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, big, Delta car and trap rental just call one three one three four nine Delta Matt has an incredible. He's a steel trap. He's mind is for ads Unfortunately, I never remember the number correctly, which is the thing that they really wanted to get down in the jungle I have one memory from from Waveley and it is around that weather and I remember sitting in the outer one afternoon

Starting point is 02:34:47 And it was absolutely pelting down like these golf ball size The Brisbane game oh Friends place and we were watching on TV But this guy who was in the like probably two or three rows in front of us big old Brisbane Bears Jersey jumper But he was ball it looked like angry Anderson. And he was just jumping around and the house stones were bouncing off his head. And I just have this clear picture of that even now. And we flogged him.

Starting point is 02:35:13 Yeah. But you could like, the TV coverage was hard to say. It was that thing. The weather was that thick. Yeah, on the broadcast, it looks like snow. It's just white. It's amazing. Yeah. And so during that period when they'd moved to Waverly, I was still living in

Starting point is 02:35:29 Marab and so, me and mates would ride down there after school or on weekends and just be able to play around what was becoming pretty dilapidated stands. We could climb up into the scoreboard and I regret it now, although hopefully the club held on to them, but it was unlocked. You climb up the ladder into the scoreboard and all the old team names are on planks, which they put in, you know, when Columns are your way to them, they put the Collingwood slide in there and all the numbers for the scores. So I would just sit now like, oh, if they ended up in the tip, I wish I'd took some of them home with me. But it was just a real fun time.

Starting point is 02:36:03 Yeah, I've got a couple of those old wooden slats from the benches in the grandstand. Really? Yeah. I've got a couple of them in my garage. Yeah. You got your name on one of the new seats. I don't. Not yet. Not yet. Our pop, our nana pop, we got their names on there. Yeah. They're pretty exy, but luckily we've got a big family. Could all chip in to get one seat. I think that, that feels like a grand or something like that. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. For it, but it's for the Danny Fully. That's right. I think so. Yeah. Yeah. So, so fun. Anyway, enough reminishing about the olden days. That's reminist about the olden days. So the club was basically paid hundreds of thousands of dollars to move.

Starting point is 02:36:40 And I wonder what if it was possible to stay if they just went, no, we're going to fight it out and stay and they liked you long had a state of the underground now and rather it would be the club would be in an even better spot and they're doing okay now but yeah they were paid hundreds of thousands to move but yeah as we'll hear soon it didn't necessarily fix their money problems but before we get to that this great team as Nick says probably maybe the best ever Saints team wasn't able to quite get to the big dance and in the following years drop back down the ladder. But I was in the end of the Saints being involved in iconic moments and perhaps one of the most powerful and iconic moments of all came on the 7th of April, 993 when when Nikki Wimmar stood defiantly in front of opposition spectators,

Starting point is 02:37:26 would be in hurling racial abuse at him. Which spectators? Yeah. Collingwood Scum. The following comes from the National Museum of Australia. I never went to a game at Victory Park. Do you ever get out there? I went to one, I think it must have been around the time

Starting point is 02:37:44 that they stopped playing home games there and they moved to the G. Yeah. So it would have been early to mid 90s I guess. And it was pretty intimidating. Yeah. Like I went to one, I've been to a few long games and it was about the same. We just surrounded by the opposition and they're so loud and so intimidating. Yeah, it's an experience.

Starting point is 02:38:05 It's changed a lot now, right? You go, that's one of the many things that it's improved. I mean, we're reminiscing about some things, but... It wasn't particularly fun. It wasn't particularly fun. Yeah. And it should be. Yeah.

Starting point is 02:38:19 Going to the footy and watching sports should be fun, and that wasn't particularly fun. Yeah. And yeah, it was particularly grim on this day, but not to say that it hadn't been on many days before this, but this is the day that Wynne Ma and an iconic moment stood up and basically changed Australian culture in a lot of ways that day. So yeah, this comes from the National Museum of Australia. On Saturday the 17th of April 1993, St K Kilda faced Colinwood at the Magpires' home ground of Victoria Park.

Starting point is 02:38:49 The Saints had beaten the Magpires in the finals the year before, so there was animosity, but St. Kilda had not defeated Colinwood at Victoria Park since 1976. In the warm up before the game, Gilbert McCartam and Nicky Wimmar received withering racial abuse from the crowd.

Starting point is 02:39:03 McCartam and Wimmar, and it was such a fun time to watch the Saints. Oh, particularly these two players. So, so good, but both indigenous players. And they're getting all this racial abuse. And McCatum grabbed Wimmer and said, bro, we have to do something today. We have to make a statement. We'll show this mob. We'll make them quiet today.

Starting point is 02:39:24 It was a hard fought game with both teams leading at different times, the deciding factor was the performance of St. Kilda's Indigenous players with Winmar and McCatum named Best on Ground. As the siren sounded, Winmar was standing near the Colin with chia squad. Some McPire fans were not gracious into feet and continued to hurl abuse. Winmar lingered, raising his hands in a in-victory towards the hostile spectators and then, as if he had heard something specific from the crowd, he looked at them, raised his jumper, pointed at his skin and said, I'm black and I'm proud to be black. Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander players had endured racial abuse on the field from

Starting point is 02:40:00 spectators and other players. Windmar stand, which was captured in iconic photographs, opened the way to a code of conduct that was the first of its kind in Australia. Legendary Sydney Swans player Adam Goods said of Nikki Windmars' gesture in 2013. It's something that stands in history, which proves that you can call me all the things you want, you can discriminate against me, say all these things, but I'm still going to be black and I'm still going to be proud. That's exactly what the photo symbolizes to me. Even today, 20 years later, it highlights how every indigenous person should feel about

Starting point is 02:40:32 their heritage. The iconic pictures of Windmars stand taken by photographers Wayne Lubby and John Feta appeared in the Sunday age and Sunday how it's unrepectably. Both photographers had to fight with their editors to get the photos the prominence they deserved. On the day, there was not much discussion about the images, but by Tuesday everyone was talking about it. In an editorial in the age, it said, there was no place for racism in football and the AFL must do everything in its power to make sure players and if possible spectators understand this. The following weekend the Colingwood president Alan McHalister appeared on television to a shore

Starting point is 02:41:05 Victorians that the Magpies were not a racist club and this is something that's followed on the Magpies even you know Even recently that a big what do you call it investigation of the club that found that there was systemic racism within the club The do better report to do better report and then you know, I think they are now doing better, but better report? To do better report and they're you know I think they are now doing better but they're better yeah I mean football in general I'm not just throwing Colin at under the bus but a lot of the bad times have been seemingly Colin was been at the center of it and this one was pretty gross I remember even as a kid just being like hmm the hell are you saying so Alan McAlister Colin would president when on TV said we're not a racist club, but he finished by saying that Collinwood did not have an issue with indigenous Australians.

Starting point is 02:41:50 Quote, as long as they conduct themselves like white people, well off field, everyone will admire and respect them. Oh, okay. Yeah, that was him going on to say, we're not racist. Wow, I've never heard that before, that's awful. Yeah, and at the time it was a big deal. I think it ended up there was a game played with the Indigenous All-Stars, I think came out of that from my vague memories, but all these things, yeah, just showed how far

Starting point is 02:42:20 there was to go at the time, and how, like that's him out there publicly saying there's nothing to worry about. And by the way, and sections of the community was like this is normal. Like that's just normal. He didn't say anything wrong. Yes, that's normal, of course. Yeah.

Starting point is 02:42:38 But, you know, so it was all very grim, but some positive things to come out of it meant that by the end of 93, the AFL promised to establish a code of conduct for players and teams Rule 30 to combat racial and religious vilification was included and it stated that no player shall act towards or speak to any other player in a manner or engage in any other conduct which threatens disparages, filipers or insults another person on the basis of that person's race, religion, color, Philophiles or insults another person on the basis of that person's race, religion, color, descent, or national or ethnic origin. The role of Umpires in reporting incidents of racial abuse was emphasized and clubs were liable for fines of up to 50 grand.

Starting point is 02:43:17 The league also introduced strategies to encourage football development in indigenous communities and to fund AFL Aboriginal Liaison officers in each state. Windmars gesture ignited a national discussion on racism in sport. The instigation of Rural 30 was the first time that racist abuse was officially prohibited within a sport. The ruling centre message that racism would no longer be an acceptable part of the game or the culture around it. According to an Australian Human Rights Commission report in 2007, the AFL led the way in Australian

Starting point is 02:43:46 sports and trying to engage with ethnic and indigenous groups. Racism persists in the game as demonstrated in 2013 when Sydney player Adam Goods was vilified by a 13-year-old spectator, Collinwood supporter. And in 2023, Western Bordock's player, Jamara Uglhagen, lifted a shirt and a just just similar to Wynma after being racially abused by a fan of the game and on social media. And I think that fan was a saintess. That was a sync order game here. Which has just hurt so much to hear.

Starting point is 02:44:14 It does, doesn't it? That was this year. And you're like, saints have got, we've got so many indigenous stars on our list now. And you keep thinking that we're moving past it, and then you realize it was still so far to go. But you would be aware of that moment with Winmar? Yes, yeah, absolutely. No, the photo. Like that's kind of right to the mainstream.

Starting point is 02:44:42 Like, yeah, very right. There's a statue of it at the person. The person. Yeah, because he's a western show. Yes, yeah. And yeah, he was, him and Frankie Peck at my two flatt, five players going up, they're my two badges I had. Just absolutely heartbreaking.

Starting point is 02:45:03 But I love to say he's still involved in the club he designed indigenous Gerns a couple years ago. Yeah, indigenous rounds become quite a big thing. Sir Doug Nichols round? Sir Doug Nichols round. Yeah, cause I mean he, we can do a whole report on him. Probably could. Yeah. Maybe that's when you come back. I'll make you do more talking. So yeah, that's a pretty heavy part of the story. And we're going to a much lighter one now, which also happened in 93. And I think my dad was up at this match with his, some of his siblings. This is up at the SCJ in Sydney, when a swan fan smuggled in and released a pig onto the field with plugger and lock its number four painted on it. Outside it's large, or it's probably fat-shaming stuff, but commentator Sandy Roberts famously exclaimed, there's a pig at full forward! It was that ugly, it was some of the great moments in commentary.

Starting point is 02:46:05 It was that I was there with some of the great moments in commentary. I changed it to shoot with official struggling to catch it until Swan's player Darren Holmes dove on the pig tackling it to the ground. I think he was a grub on a farm or something, so he had it covered. Plagger wasn't playing, but it's amazing he wasn't even playing the game. Most people don't remember that, then he wasn't even playing in that game. I think that game and the game the following year, I think including my dad, he's merged them into one game. He's like, I was only at one of those games.

Starting point is 02:46:29 He's like, I was at the game with the pig and when plug a kick 12 goals and we, I'm like, that one two different games. It's like, it's interesting. And he wasn't sure which one he was at. I think it was at the pig one. Yeah. So plug wasn't playing, but apparently he did see the incident and he didn't find it funny and he vowed to take it out on the swans the next time they played, which he did.

Starting point is 02:46:49 Again up at Sydney's home ground, he was involved in possibly his most infamous onfield incident. In round 7994, the Saints were having a dirty day at the SCG, the swans were leading by as much as 51 points. Game over, it's a flogging. Then in an ugly incident, at full tilt, Locket ran through Swans' defender, Peter Kaven, with his elbow raised, breaking Kaven's face. Oh, just like smash.

Starting point is 02:47:16 It was like if it happened now, he'd get a laugh then. Probably. Probably, it was like a car accident. Yeah, it was. And Kaven, like, I think, you know, he was shaken by it. I don't think he played in that season. He did play again after that. He went to the crows.

Starting point is 02:47:30 He went to the crows, but I think, because Plegger ended up at Sydney, the next year, the end of the season. And I think Kaven was like, Kaven was still there when Plegger turned out. And I think he's like, I'm not, he wasn't ready to be a teammate with him. Oh, I remember one time on some sort of night time talk show,

Starting point is 02:47:49 Kevin was on and there was a, they had a dummy of plugger and they said, all right, you get to take on plugger, you get three, three chose for weapon, a baseball bat, feathered us or some other lighting and he chose the baseball bat. And we're tall the dummy apart. To pull him off the tummy. It's like, okay, there's still some, he's already dead. Yeah, it was just like that.

Starting point is 02:48:15 That's how our remember is like, okay, there's still some, there's 20 years of rollback in here. I'm really funny segment quickly but can't really scary. So yeah, I've written down here so Locker got an eight weeks suspension and but Caven missed 12 weeks. So eight weeks like he would get, if he did that now, I don't know. You get double that. You get double it.

Starting point is 02:48:39 It'd be double, it'd be the record. Probably. Of all time for being rubbed out. But yeah. it'd be the record probably of all time for being rubbed out but yeah so after doing that and the saying still getting flogged this one's a supporters a given him crap but he played by a man possessed I think still taking him out on him for the pick thing I guess at one point he kicked a goal low and hard from close range into the Sydney chia score. Like he kicked it to try to hit him.

Starting point is 02:49:08 Yeah, sort of at the time it was like, yeah, now look at back. It's like, whoa, this is what a what a weird day at work for the big man. He kicked 11 goals to reel in the 51 point deficit and science ended up winning by a point. What? Wow. It's like one of the all-time greatest comebacks. Any of the last quarter.

Starting point is 02:49:31 I think it was 51 points at the end of the third, somewhere in late in the third quarter. Yeah. Just came from the clouds. Wow. But he also broke a man's face. Yeah. Fuck. And tried to make him another.

Starting point is 02:49:43 Yeah, I know. I think this is one of those ones where you say well, it's a different time Oh my gosh, you would have just been you would have been short pants at the time day of back then Very short. You rarely wear show your legs anymore In 1995, Lockup broke many Saints fans hearts by asking to be traded to a vault team to the Sydney swans. After 183 games and 898 goals, he moved to Sydney where he continued his career at a similarly high level. Like I said before, Kaven unsurprisingly did not state the swans moving to the Adelaide

Starting point is 02:50:18 Crows. Plager would go on to become the games leading goal kicker of all time finishing his career with 1360 majors. He played the majority of his games at the Saints, goal kicker of all time finishing his career with 1360 majors. So he played the majority of his games at the Saints, kicked the majority of his goals at the Saints, one of his brown low at the Saints. People still for some reason seemed to remember him as a Swans player. But he basically went up there for his retirement play. He was actually kicked his record goal for the Swans, even though the majority of the

Starting point is 02:50:44 ones before that time. Plain Final for the Swans, even though the majority of the ones before that came to the final for the swans. Yeah, so I think that those things probably, he was a far better player at St. Kilda. Far better player at St. Kilda and probably a far better person at the swans. Maybe, maybe, maybe, why? I don't think he broke anyone's faces. Well, maybe he did. Yeah, who knows.

Starting point is 02:51:02 So things are getting rough. We've lost our star, the all-time great and Despite the move to Waverly the money troubles were only getting worse and Your colleague Nick Ed Carmine wrote a great article for your website zero hanger This is just giving me a moment like when Russell Holmes be was babysitting me Now I'm like oh my god Nick This is just giving me a moment like when Russell Holmes be was babysitting me. Now I'm like, oh my god, Nick, probably commissioned this article to be written. Wow. Actually, it was Ed's idea this one.

Starting point is 02:51:33 It's a great article. I did give it the all clear, but it talks a lot about Tism as well as the Saints, but I'm not focusing on that bit so much, but come on Rites. The day after his side fell by 17 points to the demons midway through 1995, Andrew Plimpton, the Saints president at the time, told the footballing world he could no longer keep the wolves from his boardroom door. As the president of the struggling Saints Plimpton had been working feverishly to provide off-field stability to head coach Stan Alves and is now

Starting point is 02:52:05 Tony Lockettless lineup. Yet by the close of business on Monday, June 26, 1995, the administrator was finally forced to send for help. Plypton's call to create the Save Our Saints Fund was made to draw the club's latent fanbase back to their bleachers at Waveli Park and to make sure their wallets came with them. The move of doing the SOS enabled myself as president to say to our members in a very open and honest manner that I couldn't guarantee our future plimped and told Zerohanger. Behind closed doors, this was a time when the AFL was very much suggesting that there were

Starting point is 02:52:40 too many teams in the competition. This was also a time when all clubs were talking to each other in regards to mergers and relocations. There was a high level of uncertainty in the marketplace and we were all somewhat unsure where we were all headed. The bottom line was that we were vulnerable. Throughout the remainder of the 1995 season, the importance of the scoreboard

Starting point is 02:53:00 had taken a backseat to the St. St. St. St. St. for survival. Loose change was collected in the grandstands and greater donations came in from those with deeper pockets. But it was the maneuvers of Plumpton and his board that set the wheels in motion. We had this company called the St. Kilda St. Ltd, which was a non-listed public company said. We managed to go and speak to all the shareholders of the company to persuade them to donate all of their capital back to the club and all of them agreed.

Starting point is 02:53:25 That gave us a $260,000 head start to get the process of save our saints underway. So it was a big thing. I remember in all the games that were Tin Ratlers, and I think your co-host Darren Park and said he was outside the games rattling and tingling. I remember volunteers walking around the boundary line at quarter breaks before game after game with blankets and people with Throwing coins. Yes, onto the blankets, which I was looking back now as an adult. You know, it was 10. Yeah, looking back now with a kid of my arms Thinking he threw coins at children. Yeah, yeah, that hurts This was pretty intense before

Starting point is 02:54:01 There was a wonderful was inspired by this little bit. I wanted to see one of Tism's last gigs before they broke up or went on hiatus. And it was called the Save Our Tism radio thong or telephone, and it was like this fake, that this fake telephone set up at the back of the stage, people were taking calls and stuff, and they had a host in a tuxedo coming out and giving updates on how much money was raised,

Starting point is 02:54:24 and they needed a raise of million tuxedo coming out and giving updates on how much money was raised and they needed a raise of a million dollars to save our tism. Well, tism played it all to save our saints' events. It's more through that video too. That's right. That's right. Yeah. So, yeah, maybe they did get some inspiration from it. Yeah. But at the end, after their last song, they said, we only need one more or before their last song.

Starting point is 02:54:41 We only need one more dollar. One more dollar and a few people threw coins at the stage. They played a song and they came back and said, let's go to the tally, let's see if they made it. And they still needed a dollar. It's like, unfortunately, that is the end of jizz. And then the crowd just started piffing coins. And the host was wearing glasses.

Starting point is 02:55:03 He's a comedy writer. No, I mean comedy writer. His name's just going to be now, but he copped one to the glasses. I think maybe even chipped his glasses. Hopefully, that's so dangerous. So dangerous, so dodgy. But anyway, the kids, hopefully they weren't wearing glasses. And they were just copying him straight into their eyeballs and had the footy.

Starting point is 02:55:23 Pluked in, said his memory's a bit clouded, but he reckons they raised about 600 grand overall. And because of that, the club was saved as part of the campaign. This is still from Ed Carmine's article. As part of the campaign sports journalist and Saints fan Francis Leach organized a fundraiser gig at the old palace in St. Kilda, which is where bands like Nirvana played. I saw Queen's The Stone Age there, it's great venue. So Tomahawk and Melvin's play with Phantomars. Is that where you saw a kiss up close in personal?

Starting point is 02:55:55 No, a kiss I saw at the Palais. Oh, a Palais. Near by, but not quite so. The memory, Dave. The very up close and very personal. Yes. Only 3,000 other people. Yeah, exactly.

Starting point is 02:56:05 So Leach put together this gig there at the Palace on the 6th of September, 95. And the lineup was huge. Bands like Cosmic Psychos were there, but the headliners were Tism. And that night in itself raised over 40 grand for the club. And then a few days later, the club put on a save our Saints fundraiser game.

Starting point is 02:56:27 I think it was called Saints vs Sinners. And it was maybe like, X Saints plays versus... Couple of celebrities. Yeah, the journalists. I think Francis Leach himself played. I went to that as well. I remember getting Wow Jones' signature.

Starting point is 02:56:39 Wow Jones. Yeah, you know how Wow Jones is gonna get asked if we could do it. Actually, now this ring is a bell, but I'd love me to share this well The story is that he's got a W tattooed on each cheek. So any if you ever does a drops the strides Wow That's same year in 95 Tism also filmed the film clip for their hit single Greg the Stop-Sign, which featured my all-time favorite, Santa Frankie packet, as well as one of the Wakelands

Starting point is 02:57:12 and Joshua Kitchen. And that's one other there. And that's one on. And then all these shots of the band singing and playing on the ground, but also in the club rooms. And there's one famous shot where it's got a spelt. There's all these inspirational messages on the walls for the players in the rooms. And one of them's got like a real bad spelling mistake. All of the apostrophes of the wrong spot are some of that. Very fun.

Starting point is 02:57:38 Anyway, speaking of Tism, I reached out to Damien Cowell, who may have been one of the guys in Tism, and asked him if he was up for speaking about why he loves the Saints, and he's sent in the following clip. I will say if anyone's in Melbourne, or Sydney or Brisbane, he's doing a tour of his bit of a greatest hits to it coming up this month, I think. So I'll be there at the corner hotel. You should come, Nick. Yeah, I'll come.

Starting point is 02:58:04 And yeah, everyone should come. And we'll see you all there. Corners, good of any two. Ah, so good. Great. His Damien Cow. Oh, hi everyone. My name's Damien Cowell,

Starting point is 02:58:14 and I'd like to start with two apologies. First of all, I'd like to apologize for the fact that I'm about to start reading a passage of my own writing from a book, like on some fucker in a tweed jacket, smoking a shirute. The second apology is that this article was written in 1998 and is full of people and places that you undoubtedly will never have heard of, especially if you're you know living in Saskatchewan, you know something like that. Anyway, so I'm doubly sorry about that, but here we go. This is an article called Sinkilda Football Club Must Merge. It's a tough decision, but there is no longer any running away from it. The only possible future for the Sinkilda Football Club is merger. Sinkilda FC must surrender its independence, lock up the club rooms one final and irrevocable

Starting point is 02:59:16 time and seek a new identity. Sinkilda FC must assist to exist. Because then I can lead a happy and normal life. If you're unlucky enough to be wandering the windblown terraces of Waverley Park on a sinkilda matchday, you might have to look carefully to find me. You won't find me mugging for the TV cameras with red, white and black paint on my face. You won't find me holding up some witless banner like Sen-Saint-Shinnell. You won't find me yelling Aussie Aussie Aussie oi oi oi oi or entertaining the crowd with selected jewels of every man wit or joining

Starting point is 02:59:58 in the Mexican wave or even wasting precious match-fueling time by queuing up for beer. Nope. I am the hooded, inconspicuous figure, quietly hunched on my gloomy expansive bench, wired with Walkman, permanently affixed binoculars obscuring a frown of deeply chiseled tension. Football isn't fun for me. I marvel at couples who go to a match wearing the opposing team's colors, sharing a laugh or horror of horror's chanting during a match. What do they think they're doing? What kind of liberated, permissive society love child goes to a football match with somebody you barracks for the opposition. If you lose, the object of your blind, inconsolable hatred has palpable human form right there next year.

Starting point is 03:00:47 If you win, your awful, vengeful gloating is watered down by remorse. No, no, no, no, no, far better to sit there, welling up with fantasies about Glen Jackovich's bowels involuntarily evacuating whenever he goes near the ball. Or Wayne Carey going on a two ritz syndrome rampage, nutting the umpires and exposing himself to the great southern stand. Now we're talking I'd like to see that. If it's a close game, Bruce McAvaney's hyperbole may well run it over, but I'm not enjoying it one bit. You know that 10 minute pre-vomit or

Starting point is 03:01:25 deal where you feel that all the components of your digestive system were bought at the not quite right store? Imagine that stretching out to last 100 minutes and you're in the right part of town. This weekly dose of tooth pulling comes from experience. As a supporter of the Sinkilda Football Club, I have learnt to accept the following. Losing. Being viewed with smug conversation with the supporters of other teams. Losing. Expecting defeat even when leading by six goals with three minutes to play.

Starting point is 03:02:02 Losing. Merger and Insolvency play. Losing. Merger and Insolvency threats. Losing. Rumors of bottle blonde pests and killed a player's assaulting team officials at the social club. Losing. And, well, you know, you get the drift. Of course, lately success has been flirting

Starting point is 03:02:20 with poor olds and killed alike some kind of Anna Nicole Smith, which is even more reason why we should follow the lead of a late liberal party leader and quit while we're having fun. Okay, so do we resign from the AFL? Maybe not. It's all very well to just say no, but I don't think I could handle it cold turkey. That's why the AFL have their own methodadone program, the merger. Yep, that'll do the trick. Bit by bit, I'll lose the reasons why I barricked for St. Kilda in the first place. The jumper, with its strong distinctive red-white and black, will die grisly deaf at the hands of some marketing genius who thinks the World Series

Starting point is 03:03:02 cricket uniforms are plausible. Then the club's name will change. Change one letter of Sinkilda FC and for me it's all over. The Sinkilda Saints isn't the team I support. So when the AFL comes along and replaces the Sinkilda bit of that phrase with, say, Doclands or Homebush, it won't be the same team. Actually, while they're getting rid of that inconvenience and killed a word, they might as well lose the saints bit too, don't you reckon? I mean, how are kids going to relate to saints as a marketing concept? Much better to call them belakers or, hey, let's cut to the chase and go for the Yankees.

Starting point is 03:03:46 Then again to make the merger completely non-addictive, why not just merge some together with Arden F.C.? A new composite team would be called Carlton F.C. They'd wear Carlton jumpers and play at the only suburban ground in Australia that the AFL hasn't condemned, which just happens to be in Carlton. I'd be clean and sober within minutes. And just imagine my post-merger life. Wanna go to the footy with some friends? Sure, also. Let's have a few beers, make a day of it. Only I hope the weather's good and it's a close game. Wow! Imagine being able to say that.

Starting point is 03:04:27 I could contemplate holidays during winter. I could appreciate the promise of a sunny winter's Saturday. I could stop reading books about migraine prevention. I could give a crap about the Olympics. It's certainly a beautiful idea. Bill Shankley, manager of Liverpool, once said, football is much more important than a matter of life and death. So if they played that speech over the loudspeakers during

Starting point is 03:04:54 the Hillsborough disaster, I guess everyone would have felt guilty about complaining. But not me. Football for me is a matter of not having a life. So come on, St. Kilda, rise to the challenge, raise the bar, dare to dream, take the ball by the horns and give up. That is brilliant. Thanks so much to Dominic Kalf, sending that in. He got into the Saints, because I think he's a great uncle, played for the Saints, a few games in somewhere in the middle of the 20th century, and yeah, as you can hear. And he's not really muckin' around, he bleeds the team, and it's like, almost the point where it's not that much fun. It's like, it's actually a curse.

Starting point is 03:05:40 He's burdened to bear. That's right. He wrote that by the sound of it 25 years ago, but he read it this week and it sounds like he still means every way. Yeah, there was a lot of belief in that. Yeah, amazing. So the Save Our Saints happens, again a bunch of money back into the club, but also a lot more buy in, you know, because now everyone's in it.

Starting point is 03:06:02 We're all, and the club now is owned by the club again. It sounds like it was owned by shareholders before this Nick, which I didn't realize until I'm reading that article. Not sure. I'm not sure. But now it's a member-owned club again. Now I feel, yeah, anyway.

Starting point is 03:06:18 And then in 96 things started to turn around again. This has come up to maybe what I would call the silver age. The following 20 years are pretty good. Right, we turn around again. This has come up to maybe what I would call the silver age. The following 20 years are pretty good. We turn around so much I don't know which direction you're facing. This is good. Yeah, we turn around a lot. So 96 the sides are on the up and I won the pre-season premiership. Their first pre-season premiers, then known as the Anset Cup, which dates it, that's the now-to-fun pair one. That's so great. Couldn't have been anything better.

Starting point is 03:06:52 My family rocked up so I don't know if you're that one Nick, but we got there and we weren't allowed in. It was a lockout. It was packed. We were there. It was the biggest crowd I'd seen at that stage. Yeah. So great. It was amazing. It was that night, probably for another decade, was the biggest event that I'd been to really. It was just an insane atmosphere. And St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. St. of, but yeah, they won. The rest of the season didn't go quite as well. It was an improvement on the season's prior, but didn't quite make the finals, but blooded a bunch of young players, Aussie Jones, Joel Smith, Tony Brown, all these guys. Maddie Lapin. Maddie Lapin, you've interviewed most of them on Unplugged. Jason these. Oh, the goal in the answer cup. Yeah, we're going. Number 32. 32.

Starting point is 03:07:49 It's funny how the players, most of the numbers are still somehow stuck in my head, especially from back then. Back in those wavly days, remember my auntie one time asked me a question about one of the young players? And I looked taller than last year. And I said, I, yeah, I reckon he might be. I went home and before the next week she forgot about the comment but I got out records from previous years and that year and I wrote a comparison of every player's height from

Starting point is 03:08:15 the year before and their height that year and their differential and I gave it to the next week. She clearly had no memory. Thank you. Who was the player and how they grown? I can't remember who the player was, but they had grown by a few centurators, so she was on the money, but it was just, it was sort of half-heart breaks. She's like, oh, thank you. Now you can keep that. One game that season that still gets talked about was the game against the bombers at Waverley Park. It was a night game and late in the third quarter the lights went out.

Starting point is 03:08:50 Russell Holmes B, the great man, was there that night covering the game and later wrote, suddenly Waverley was plunged into darkness as the lights failed. Television viewers were left baffled as the power outage cut off Channel 7's cameras. What the hell happened? At first people said that a card running to a nearby power station, it turned out there was no car accident, it had just been a fault within a United Energy substation which caused the problem and blacked out an area from Glen Waveley to Cranburn, a huge area of Melbourne. On the field, the two teams formed Huttles, Saints Coach San Alves was addressing his players over the boundary fence, fans

Starting point is 03:09:28 had let cigarette light us to see what was going on around him. It was soon obvious that things weren't going to be fixed quickly and the clubs took their players into the room so they wouldn't get cold and be unprepared for a resumption. Many years later, then Essin and Captain Garry O'Donnell reflected on the game and said that the aftermath on that night reminded him of the book, Lord of the Flies. And that was a fair enough analogy of a situation where the wheels fell off and normal civilized behaviour went out the door.

Starting point is 03:09:56 There was anarchy as far as were led on the ground and in the seating areas, hundreds of fans jumped the fence and ran under the oval, the point posts were ripped out of the ground and paraded in a lap of dissonar around the ground. But they were already ripped out. Literally, like, on shoulders of people walking around the ground. That's very footage of that. That's got climbing up.

Starting point is 03:10:13 Yeah. Big mother demand climbing up there. One of the point posts. Yeah. I was there. The people literally lighting bonfires on the ground, like it was just insane. Yeah, just, and it just amazing how quickly things fell apart from civil society to fires on 18 minutes of darkness.

Starting point is 03:10:32 Yeah, just a lot's going on. It's a lot, well there's no rules. No, no rules, that's what they say. I could do what I like. Much like your game when you were there for the hailstones, I remember I was on a dairy farm outside of Collac and I was the the game on the radio Which was even more confusing because it just stopped all of a sudden. I'm like what's going on?

Starting point is 03:10:49 I don't understand what's happening. Yeah Police reinforcements were called to help bring the situation under control I can help police cars with flashing lights ringed around the ground and when the announcement was made that the game had been abandoned Police urge people to leave the oval for their safety as officers occupied both ends of the ground to stop further vandalism. The lights failed at 9.25, 4 minutes, and 48 seconds before 3.25 with the acidity leading by 20 points. Both clubs agreed that it was impossible to play once the delay went beyond half an hour.

Starting point is 03:11:21 Newspaper reports told of the eerie and uncomfortable feeling in the crowd. One young fan said, it was a bit scary at first, then people started getting bored. You know what happens when people get bored. They like fires. The NFL decided that the match would be completed on the following Tuesday night, over two 12-minute halves, with time on and teams changing ends at half time. Clubs could change their lineups for the Saturday teams. The most dramatic inclusion was Bomberstar James Hurd who would miss the Saturday game due to a broken

Starting point is 03:11:52 finger. The refreshed herd would pick up 10 possessions in the Tuesday part of the match, copying cheers from Saints fans who are aggrieved by his late inclusion. So they wouldn't do this again. I think they've changed the rules now that they would just call a winner if it happened in the second half of the game. But on the Tuesday night, 17,500 and 90 diehard fans attended and St. Kilda started the game well. Tony Brown scored the first goal of the night. However, Essin and Maintain the upper hand and run out winners by 22 points. So they went back and all that extra effort led to two extra points margin to Essinon. Yeah, so it's a strange thing and the Saints then got flogged the next week so you go from every other team, the team they're playing, they had a week off, they basically played two games and

Starting point is 03:12:36 have a four day break. I was a crowd expected to just sit down up to this one 24 minute match. Yeah, pretty much. Yeah, I remember that not making that effort is pretty all right watch it It was bitterly cold the night that the lights went out. It was so cold That's what I did the fires Yeah, just for warmth. I got I got really sick that night. I was like 12 or something I got really sick that night and I think I missed like two or three weeks of school after that because I was just I'm in bed. Yeah. Obviously. Yeah. You survived the just it was all sadness.

Starting point is 03:13:08 So that was that was 96 and 97. The promise of the preseason premiership the answer cup that famous answer cup. And I think that's part of the preseason cup premiership hats on. And pretty they really celebrate the win. But in 97 things went better in the season proper. The Saints stormed home to finish on top of the ladder claiming just their second minor premiership since the start of the VFL and they won the final seven games of the season. And I remember we, I think we beat Port Adelaide in the last round. I remember watching it at home. We had to win to finish top.

Starting point is 03:13:46 And I remember this right, that was the day Princess Diana died. I think it was. Maybe. No, maybe. Yeah, I'm pretty sure that's right. Well, he give it to me, take it away. Yeah.

Starting point is 03:13:59 You know, we're meant to be celebrating a beautiful day. And you take it, you take the people's princess away from us. They also, not only took the people's princess, but also took our two rockmen. In half an hour of football, with both being big cult figures, laser Vidervik was injured at the end of the final home and away game, then Peter Spider Everett was injured in the qualifying final while the Saints were comfortably beating the Brisbane Lions at Waverly. The Saints then beat the Kangaroos to make it back to the Grand Final on a non-game winning streak when it was hot favorites. But where our Rockman was really a third string up. Third stringer.

Starting point is 03:14:45 Yeah, Brett Cook. Brett Cook. And Stuart Low pinch hit a little bit in the rock. That's right. Stuart Low had a real family tragedy. Family tragedy that week. That week, Nicky Wimmer. His dad died.

Starting point is 03:14:55 Yeah, so it was just a real cursed final series finishing on top, but everything went wrong. A lot of our stars were either injured or the heads were probably thinking about more important things in football. Anyway, according to Holmes, we have the red one black. Now we're wearing a remodeled Gernzy, which featured a large-scale version of the Crest, that famous Black Cross Crest, became the whole Jersey, which is now our version of that Sarah Wastroop. So they made it to the ground final for the first time since 1971. I remember that when 1966 premiership players talking the media gone we can't wait. We really were carrying the club on our shoulders for all this time we can't wait to welcome some new premiership players into the club. The whole of the city, the whole of Melbourne became

Starting point is 03:15:40 secure to support us that week. It was it was quite incredible to to what even Colleen would fans, Cardinals fans, everybody was just ready for singing. Very different to I think to the Ross line, grand finals, where it sort of became a, which we'll get to soon, but yeah, so first time in what seemed like a long time to fans at the time, was our first chance to win a premiership in 26 years, obviously, but with a fit and firing side, complete with Raining, Brownlow, Meta's, Robert Harvey,

Starting point is 03:16:10 who would take out the honor again the following year. And the crows didn't have their goal-kicking powerhouse, Tony Godra, Modra. The same set of the games, heavy favourites. Despite holding a two-go lead at the main change, remember when Barry Hall kicked Strener in a row? He had a burst of go anyway. In the second quarter? Yeah. And we're just like it's happening. Oh my god, it's happening. I was up in the Southern Stant. We remember where you were sitting? I wasn't there. I was there. Probably lucky. I remember it.

Starting point is 03:16:37 It was just like watching a slow motion car crash. 100,000 people there. And I just remember sitting on my hands in the last quarter and a half as we just slowly got further and further behind, I believe about six goals. And especially because of Darryl Jarm and just went off choppy. Do you want to kick six in the second half or something? There was a five in the last quarter or something. Yeah, I know it was just like, do you have who else kicked the goal that day for Adelaide in the third quarter?

Starting point is 03:17:08 Someone who had his face caved in. Oh, I did it really. Yeah. Well, good on him. Bit of revenge. I didn't realize that. Yep. I love that he ended up being a premiership player.

Starting point is 03:17:19 He got that overplugger. Yeah. I get stustered. Yeah, no. Which I'm like, stop taking it out on us. Pog is not here anymore Please Yeah Anyway, so that was another another chance we made the finals again in 98

Starting point is 03:17:35 But went out and straight sets I think we lost the swans and then the demons demons here swans in Sydney But we there was a weird top 8 system at at the time then. It was about the, they ranked the losers after. They're really, they're made so much more simple now. They're a lot over the years. We started that season pretty well for memory and then kind of fell away late. We lost a couple of games leading into the finals and then kind of took that form. We almost bit the swans in that first final. Nikki, were you able to kick the goal or maybe put us up late? Again, I was listening on a radio. So the memories, I think I was at a house

Starting point is 03:18:09 party in a garage. God, come on, I'll come back drink some more gin, beaming a second, just gotta go listen to somebody buy myself in the corner. Nothing weird. So yeah, another era was over. Stan L's ended up getting sacked soon after that and we had a few new coaches. The turn of the millennium, the Saints were once again languishing at the wrong end of the ladder. But as always, there was hope. Corner Holmes B. The Tames were surgeons, seemed like wishful thinking at the start of

Starting point is 03:18:36 the decade with a disastrous 2000 season, which included 10 consecutive losses to open the new millennium, marking yet another wooden spoon, number 26. St. Kielder moved home grounds once again to the AFL's own Dockland stadium, now known as Marvel Stadium, which the AFL built themselves, notching up just two wins for the year of their new home. But things were looking better with the club trading in gun players like Aaron Hamill and Fraser, the G train Gary. That's for Laura.

Starting point is 03:19:07 That's for Laura. Laura asked for G train. That's right. There's our G train man. So G train ends up being this guy. He wins two column medals himself. He came over. He sort of came over as like a wingman.

Starting point is 03:19:17 He was a fender. He came from West Coast. He was a running corner wingman type guy. And I remember one of the really weird, interesting stories about Fraser Gary is that, at one stage at West Coast, he held the record. I think it was for the fastest 400 meter sprint, and also the heaviest bench press. Yes.

Starting point is 03:19:35 And I think he still has the league record. Same thing like that. Yeah. He was huge. Humongous. Yeah. The cold in on Triblem radio though, his nickname was the carpet snake. Yeah, because of the mulletlem radio though his nickname was the carpet snake

Starting point is 03:19:45 Yeah, because of the mullet around the mullet of the back He's like always snuffling another big egg not a gold there the carpets You've kind of like skulk around He was just a real inigmatic character. He opened up a restaurant in Caram down and Italian restaurant called Michelangelo's And I'd done there a few times Oh, you got the fighter season of Fulback as well. He played a season on to it fullback I think because yeah, I did yeah Yeah, and since you don't know that it's because he was owned by him. Yeah, definitely and but he was he was Like a kind of a plug a rank on added huge man

Starting point is 03:20:21 Khan very reclusive. Yes, I didn'tlusive. Yes. Didn't like talking to the media. Did you like talking to the media? But I did do that weird delivery. I tried to get him to translate that. I think that was funny. But he just said it for the club. He's like, he loves the club. And the club needed him.

Starting point is 03:20:39 He's like, I'm just raising money for the club. I'll do it. But he did a few, he did a few weird spots there. Just found Michelangelo's on wordofmouth.com.de where people review things and says, Michael Angelos, and it's got a tagline is, where every dish is a masterpiece. Oh.

Starting point is 03:20:55 And masterpiece has a capital M. I can phrase a motto with no one. It's so good. What can he do? It says, restaurant dining with warm decor and tasteful displays of Michael Angelos in brackets to the artists artwork. I do, I found that helpful when I was there.

Starting point is 03:21:15 They were, and said that underrated in brackets at the artist. It was like a fake sculpture of David. Is that so it's still going, is it? Well, it hasn't been reviewed on this website since January 2010, so I'm not sure. But it was on Springvale Road, Aspendale Garden. That's right, I was right across the road from the big pub tab, Bedcarhamdance, what is it called? Not my area.

Starting point is 03:21:37 Not your area. That's right. That's my area. That's my area. You know, I'm sorry to report that I caught him to Google maps that is permanently closed. Okay, you're from South of Europe, but you really go south of the Mordiala Creek. Correct. Well, yeah.

Starting point is 03:21:52 On my made suite, you know, we all got prised out of Morabin, which is that kind of fancy where you obviously you've still been able to make it work. Or where, where a few suburbs still further further from from Arabin, but it's south or north. South. Yeah, right. Everyone got pushed out further. Oh my God, I just skipped to the north side. Oh my God, you're never going to believe it.

Starting point is 03:22:15 Only last month at the end of August, did they have their closing down sale where they started selling like everything inside. The restaurant's now closed, everything's at throwaway prices and then at the end August 21 everything in the picture is free Please come in and take whatever you like and there's like a cysteine chapel like paintings By copy of you know, that's so fun. Oh man. I wish I'd continue to follow them online Oh my gosh, we missed out on the bargain. There you go, Laura Baker.

Starting point is 03:22:45 We talked about the G-Train way more than I think. We're anticipating, but I love him. Like an assistant all-time favorite player. He much like Plugga, he also retired and then came back. Yes. And didn't quite get the hearts of both of them with the same. But yeah, I love the story. It was like he retired.

Starting point is 03:23:04 And he had this great Game it was a dead rubble at the end of the season. Maybe it's the Tigers. I think I was there and I kicked a bunch of goals And I was feed he took his shirt. He the games he offered the end of the game It was like the perfect finale without being a premiership, of course And then I think he was away from again might be misremembering, but I feel like he was on a treadmill in Europe somewhere, maybe looking out over the Alps and he was thinking, I wish I was at the club. And he decided to make his comeback like before the offseason and even started basically.

Starting point is 03:23:39 I'm not sure Fraser Gary ever went on a treadmill at the club. Yeah, someone uploaded you a very possibly just absolutely making up that story. Still good story though. Good story great story. And now that I've said it on record, maybe it'll become true. Please do go on. Please do go on. I'm going to report on it.

Starting point is 03:23:59 Thank you. So unlike with the Saints first 20-odd wooden spoons, in the modern era, even probably 23, 24 first wooden spoons, there was no real prize apart from the spoon itself, but in the AFL era, you win the wooden spoon, you also get the number one draft pick. Oh, right. Has that ever been abused?

Starting point is 03:24:19 And people... Thanking has definitely been a thing. And there's been teams that have found... They've looked into it. I don't know if anyone's been officially done for it, but it's Melbourne Melbourne got done for bringing the game into Disrepute or something, but they weren't actually charged with tanking right, but it was something. Yeah, I think I was up without saying it Definitely, yeah, I can't what they're doing. So yeah, it can be manipulated a bit like that But losing on purpose. That's it.

Starting point is 03:24:45 Yeah, it was very different from that. The two bottom teams and the number one pick seems to be clear cut, but the two bottom teams had wins in their final two rounds. So the Eagles won to go off bottom place and put North on bottom and then North in the last round won. So people are like, oh, the Eagles, they mucked up there should have lost that game. And everyone's like, North, you've been handed it. They should just be making sure they don't win. And then they comfortably won the last round and saying, winning is more important setting standards than some kid who's never played

Starting point is 03:25:18 before. We don't know what they're going to turn into. Right. So West Coast could agree with this. End up being on the bottom. So yeah, eagles go back to the bottom. And yet, the science when we got that wooden which I've ended up being on the bottom. So yeah, English go back to the bottom. And yet, the science when we got that wooden spoon, we ended up with the number one pick, which turned out to be future grade of the competition, Nick Revo. Oh, OK. Finally, enough, we actually got the number one pick

Starting point is 03:25:39 the next year as well, not because we finished last, because Carlton finished last. But what did they get done for? Bram paper bags. The brand bag is, that's what I got. They lost the cheating the salary cap so they lost them on one pick and we were supposed to. I was going to have the photos too, remember? Because I was even a priority pick as well. I got us a blue supporter, I think, and he was, but when it up getting him and he became, you know, one of the, and he's an assistant coach now, St. Cyril and through.

Starting point is 03:26:02 Yeah, and a big moment that we'll probably talk about. Yes, almost one of the old time great an assistant coach now, St. Cyril and through. Yeah, and a big moment that we'll believe in for that. Yes, almost one of the all-time great moments in football history, but and I mean, it was, but the result, when the other one would have been. But anyway, we also brought in Adelaide Premiership Coach Malcolm Blight. Just a few years ago, he broke our hearts as the coach of the 97 Premiership Crows and 98 Premiership Crows. We brought him out of retirement with a huge money deal at the time I think it was a million bucks a year. Which of the time was like Ridiculous money written written on an napkin at the flower drum love that

Starting point is 03:26:35 That's like similar to the deal the chip and dials owner made with his partner the male strip club from LA we talked about that story a few months ago on the show. But they wrote this deal and he saw in this napkin and he's like, yeah, anyway. We talked about that weeks ago. Don't need to talk about it again. Back to Hoseby. So we're good in Blight.

Starting point is 03:26:56 But unfortunately, the same success was nowhere near close to being replicated at St. Kierwater that he had at LA. The Saints languished down the bottom of the ladder with a lackluster four wins while the relationship between Blight and the players was stretched to its limits. Blight forced the playing group to sit in the middle of colonial stadium, now Marvel Stadium, twice after humiliating defeats, receiving widespread media attention and culminating in his sacking midway through the season. So like, go out there and think about what you've done,'ve done. Basically, you're just real weird old school. Yeah. It's like running a dog's face in their piss or whatever.

Starting point is 03:27:28 And the crowd's still in there, sort of watching I'm going. It's a bit weird. I think so. Yeah. Yeah. It's very odd. Very odd. And he also is in a circle. Didn't he coach from like he sort of, he lived in the gold coaster? He still lived in the state. Yeah. He just flew in for a certain amount of trips. He's like that. He's a week in that. He can be in Melbourne like Thursday to Sunday or something. He'll live in the Gold Coast. He still lived in to stay. Maybe just flew in for a certain amount of trade sessions a week and that. He could be in Melbourne like Thursday to Sunday or something and he would live in the Gold Coast and- But this is the deal we made with him.

Starting point is 03:27:50 He had a real strong hands like I'm retarded, I don't want to coach anymore. Please don't. So they made him do it and it's actually the only thing I can refuse. He's like, I'll do it but I'll come, I'm only coming half the week. I'm when I need to be paid more than

Starting point is 03:28:03 a coach has ever been paid. And yeah, he ended up getting sacked. And I guess we had to pay him out. Yeah, I think he lasted 15 weeks or something like that. Amazing. He says he was hard. His version of the story is very different. But people from inside the club have said since,

Starting point is 03:28:18 and I've heard on your podcast, people say that his heart did not seem to be in it. Yep. Grant Thomas stepped in as senior coach. Grant Thomas, of course, was on the selection committee for that job, the time, am I remembering that right? Yeah, I think he might have been,

Starting point is 03:28:31 so he's basically, all right, well, let's cast a wide net. I think my favorite one maybe is me. I'm gonna use a major job. He says that he didn't want it. He says that he tried to get out of it. Like, he got a call from one of the other directors or something and said, we've decided on you

Starting point is 03:28:48 for the next three years. Probably Rod Budders maybe, because I was great mates at the time, were we? They were, they were best mates at the time. Not anymore. But he said he got a call, I think it was on the Tuesday or the Wednesday after or whatever and they said, you've got the job

Starting point is 03:29:02 and he went, I don't want it. What job? It's not my job, we need a coach. Right. So that's what he told us. Look at all that you see. You never know. Yeah.

Starting point is 03:29:11 He had one for country prep ships in Warnable. So it was like quite an odd. Like he hadn't been an assistant AFL coach, which the 99% of senior coaches that job the year before would be an assistant coach. Anyway, so he got the job and he did have things that would be differently, started rotating captains. And I've, you know, had a few other quirky things like... It was all around accountability and... Yeah, that's the stuff.

Starting point is 03:29:40 Personal responsibility. He'd have a lot of, you know, he'd have players over to the house for big dinners and stuff like that Just a different vibe. Hamel and Gary were huge Instigators in the clubs turn around over the next few years continually driving the lowly club to reverse its external perception This is still homesby along with the likes of Revo and other top draft picks like Justin cuz it's key Brennan got out in Luke Ball They all began to build as elite players. The Saints began their gradual evolution from a bottom tier club to a powerhouse of the

Starting point is 03:30:10 competition. Even with retirements of Stuart Low and Nathan Burke, the Saints forced their premiership window open after a stunning 2004 season. So that was zero when I'm awkwardly shaking, Shulow's hand at the end of the video. At his last training session. I also, did you ever go to his bar, Flaming Mose? I never went to Flaming Mose. I've seen him around.

Starting point is 03:30:32 I think he still lives in Brighton. I've seen him at the new bay, Affair Bit. Oh, cool. Down the corner of New Street and Basetree. As far as I've seen, he's still like, looks ready to play. He could still play. Yeah, yeah. I think there are answers Flaminges to around no it became it's went through a few when I was in my you know 18 to early 20s

Starting point is 03:30:53 I went from flaming moes to and it changed its name a bunch of times it was called I think it was called seduce but spelled in a funny way like juice j u i c a and yeah but yeah it was like in a block of shops that you would normally expect it to be you know a news agency or something. It's that kind of location near a train station but somehow it was successful he sold it as a successful business and then I think it was one failing owner passing it on to another failing owner for years to come. And a lot of brawls between Bentley and other local football clubs, but they play each other on the Saturday then they'd both go there and get in with braw.

Starting point is 03:31:36 But a fun. So even before the season started, 2004, the Saints won Silverware with their second pre-season pre-machew. Then known as the Wizard Cup. So I'd be going from Ancest Cup. I think it was Fosters Cup before Ancest. Now it was the Wizard Cup. The Wizard Home Loans Cup.

Starting point is 03:31:51 The Wizard Home Loans Cup. And this one has some iconic images attached to it as the coach, Grant Thomas, didn't let him or Captain Lanny Hayes smile in the photo of them holding up the cup. So there's, they're on the dice holding up the cup but looking real sad. Who didn't allow them to up the cup. So there's there on the dice holding up the cup but looking real sad. Who didn't allow them to? The coach. She's like this is just pre-season. We've got bigger things to do.

Starting point is 03:32:11 Let him enjoy it, mate. Come on. It's made for a pretty funny photo, but Dave, you know what was about to happen? Something iconic that I've talked about on the podcast before when the season proper began It featured a then record of 10 consecutive wins. Oh, that's right. Okay. A the streak the streak DVD Box set special we'd love to release a DVD when we win the last ten But at this point ten and a row was ten and a row. I've still row I've still got it. Yeah, the box said is in my bookshelf 10 games oh like to win the whole thing So As Holmes be said 2004 was simply a slice of St. Kilda magic And as Holmes be said, 2004 was simply a slice of St. Kilda magic. It was the year that Revolt truly broke onto the scene and took the next steps into becoming

Starting point is 03:33:10 a legend of the game. He finished in the top 10 of the Coleman and Bramow medal, and like we're saying before it's hard for forwards to pole high in the Bramow. He also took out his second Trevor Barker award and reeled in a league high 256 marks. He went on to, he retired as the greatest, he had the most martial time. I think it maybe has been overtaken since but, um, any games changed. That's changed. It's just a half back flanker probably right.

Starting point is 03:33:36 Yeah. He also took one of the most iconic marks of all time that year, a courageous grab running back with the fly to the ball against Sydney, which is still put up there with, you know, whenever you see a compilation of the greatest marks of all time, that's right up there. Revolk went on to become a modern day grade of the club, winning a record six Trevor Barker Awards. He also overtook Spud as the club's longest serving captain, 11 seasons, and became only the fifth saint to play 300 games. He also earned five Australian nominations, and yeah, like I said, it took the most marks all time. You want to league MVP? That's right. Yeah, the

Starting point is 03:34:16 lemat is awards. Yeah, he was, you know, and I still, I mean, it's hard to make the argument anymore, but I still think he's the better rival. Oh, I think, I think most people agree that he was the better individual player, but Jack had to be career. Yeah. Yeah. More goals. There are things. I think a lot of people would say that means at the better career. Yeah. The better career. Yeah. But yeah, Riva was a bit more, Nick was a bit more dynamic than Jack perhaps, but then another two Tasmanis who I was talking about before, Dave, how a lot of our great players, Darrell Bordock, so, and was they in Stuart, Tazzy? No. Furned how it was. Yes. A lot of our legends. Some reason have come from Tazzy. Coleman, metal winning season for the G-Train, Fraser Garrig.

Starting point is 03:35:05 I think it was around the time it was setting up his famous restaurant and caramel dance as well. So yeah, a lot going on. That also played a big hand in guiding the Saints to September, making the top four with a preliminary final against Port Adelaide resulting in the cult heroes, hundredth goal of the year. And you remember this? you go to this game? I didn't go to this game. I didn't go to this game. I was watching with Arnie the guy who couldn't quite

Starting point is 03:35:29 get my camera to work when I was shaking his shirt. But he, we're watching his place and it was so close. Brent Gwaire couldn't quite get his toe to the ball, which would have leveled the scores, deep in the last quarter. But we were flogging him at the start of the game. And then G-Train kicked his 100th goal and the crowd flooded onto the ground, placed up for 10 minutes or whatever, and killed our momentum.

Starting point is 03:35:53 Oh no! Yeah, just unfortunate. And people said before they gave him like, St. Fortes don't do it. I think it was Steven Baker's dad, I think, let everybody add into the... Yeah, should have known better players. Yeah But yeah, we we just got done by a goal against the eventual premiere Port Adelaide. This must have happened quite a few seasons

Starting point is 03:36:14 Where it in coming up that we get knocked out by the time it goes on to win it The customary ground evasion following the goal is what killed the Saints momentum It was close to an exact repeat in 2005. Garrett took out the Coleman again. St. Kilda finished in the top four and were again knocked out of the finals race by Sydney who would go on to claim their first premiership as Sydney and the first for the club in. I think it was like it was 70-something years ago. Yeah, it might have even been mid 80.

Starting point is 03:36:44 They beat West Coast. That was the longest drought in the AFL at that stage. Right, that's right. And yeah, they've all been knocked off and racing these Melbourne's, the Bulldogs. Rich Hargers. Yeah. As the only one remaining.

Starting point is 03:36:56 Too long? Yes, too long that's right. Now only, like Carlton being the second longest is so bizarre. It's only 20 years or something. Well, not five, yeah. So it's 30. Yeah, it's 20 eight years. But let's round it at a 50. It's only 20 years or something. Well, not five, yeah. So it's 30. Yeah, it's 28 years.

Starting point is 03:37:06 Let's round it at a 50. That's not a draft. Call that a draft. That's not a draft. So I'm gonna make that a meme. Yeah, and that was, I went over for the first final that year we played in Adelaide. I was there for that one.

Starting point is 03:37:22 One of the great football memories in my life went over, called the bus over with my cousin Rano and we just took Adelaide by storm. Me and him, and the Saints. Frankie Packett played a great game. The dooner, Jason Guil. Robert Harvey, Jason Guil. Yeah, James Guil.

Starting point is 03:37:37 James Guil. James Guil was a big afro. Awesome. He called the dooner because his name sounds like Quilt. Yeah, so that is incredible name. There's also a defender So you know we cover the players, but it kicked two goals in that game. Yeah, it was awesome. Yeah, it was a big fan of the doiner and you James Blake James Blake Jason Blake. Oh my god James Blake's the tennis player and the singer

Starting point is 03:38:01 I'm becoming an old man before you're very eyes So yeah, that was a great game and I remember it was yesterday and everyone's next I'm becoming an old man before you're very asked. So yeah, that was a great game, and I remember it. It was just that, and everyone's next. And the after party, after the game. The after party. That's right, and we were talking about this on a wheel, but we were both the same pub,

Starting point is 03:38:15 celebrating the win afterwards, because we both had a friend who was involved in the club. He said, come catch up for a drink and then end it up. Yeah, I was drinking with Aussie Jones and Luke Penny. Yeah. Throw the Harvey was there. He ended up going upstairs. Yeah, I remember he told me in the ground floor. And I remember Frankie Peckett came in and cousin Rano was, we were a couple beers deep and he knew how much I love Frankie. And he, so Frank Peckett walks in and him and Harvey, two of the old, you know, that would

Starting point is 03:38:44 have been 30 years old at the time So they were the older more mature plays at the time and everyone else is sort of partying and packet comes in and my cousin goes Frick and you sort of seem to a you turn and go straight out the other door Be cool run it be cool So yeah, we once again knocked out by the eventual premiers Sydney and then 2006 we made the finals again but I think we're gonna have maybe in straight sets or even the first one we went out to Melbourne and they didn't go on in the field. No, that's right. The Eagles won that foing. I was I was over in Europe backpacking and I remember watching the score of the Melbourne game on a computer in the hostel

Starting point is 03:39:36 Computer area and it was just like a line, you know, I wasn't like watching a school worm. It was a score worm. I'm watching Silly Tick over. It was a brutal way to watch it. I think we lost I think we lost about four players injured that game as well. Right. Aaron Hamilton. Yeah. I think that day, well, that week Steve Irwin died. Oh, I was staying at that hostel when he died and I peter Brock died around that time as well. I remember after that game, actually, there was a room going around the ground that Robert Harvey had retired in the rooms. I don't know where it came from, whether someone on Twitter said it or is on the right. I don't remember, but someone said Robert Harvey's just retired in the rooms because obviously our season's over. Yeah. Grant Thomas got sacked after that game as well.

Starting point is 03:40:11 That's right. But someone had started this room with that Robert Harvey retired and a bunch of us just sat down in the stands and like, it's boiling. Look, just crying. Crying better. Look at the season was over. Yeah. But because Robert Harvey tried, and then of course it turned out that he hadn't. And he played on for another few years. Did you go to his testimonial, which would have been around that time? Was that Doc Lans?

Starting point is 03:40:33 I've still got the little, the invite, which came in like this sort of weird puzzle, box puzzle. Yes, I've got the puzzle. Yeah, I've got a couple of those puzzles for some reason. Yeah, was it the Harvey, it was Harvey Testimony, wasn't it? Harvey 350? Yeah, something like that. I've got a T-shirt, I think, as well.

Starting point is 03:40:49 So we've been in the same room multiple times. So yeah, Thomas gets sacked after that final series, which is pretty wild. Normally, three final series in a row is in what gets you sacked, but his best mate, who was the president, they became frenemies and then basically just enemies, I guess, around the summer. Is that part of the reason why we were sad? Pretty much, yeah. I think there was a lot of stuff happening behind the scenes here,

Starting point is 03:41:10 but I think there was money involved and there was business deals and whatever and they became hardcore enemies. Yeah, which isn't something I'd deal for a president in your head coach. Yeah, so I remember I was I was at October Fest when I heard that Ross Lang got the job. So I had to sort of place yourself around the world, wasn't that sort of stuff, I mean. A quirky game involving the Saints of 2006 is now known as the Sarengate match. Do you know anything about this one, Dave? Sarengate. Sarengate, just that very lazy naming convention, putting gate at the end of...

Starting point is 03:41:44 Ah, no, that's not ringing any bells any bells just off the top of my head. So I was playing it in Launceston in Tasmania. You would remember this, it's the place long day of... I set the world record. Yeah, of course. He booted a beauty that day. He booted a beauty right up the gates. So basically the siren sounded when free-mountain

Starting point is 03:42:01 were leading by a point, but the onfield on point didn't hear it, and the match continued until Saints Player Steven Baker scored a point to level the scores. Then all hell was sort of breaking loose, and then the umpire gave him another kick-it goal for some reason. He got pushed over as he kicked it,

Starting point is 03:42:17 as he kicked the bike. And so that leveled the score, and then he got another shot at it. He got another shot, which he missed as well. Which was directly in front Yeah, 35 minutes out I should have played should kick that goal, but he missed that missed it again Got a point but leveled the scores, but this was like 30 seconds after the siren went but the on field

Starting point is 03:42:35 I'm just didn't hear it to everyone else here like it sounds like a Some people even not many the set the siren was pretty low right because I'm like the free mantle coach Walked out on the field and there was a bunch of people that had to walk around and yeah but the rule technically is not when the siren goes when the umpire hears the siren and blows the whistle puts his arm in the air or her arm and but it ended in a draw and it wasn't until the AFFL commission had a hearing during the week that the result was overturned And the docus were given the win. I think freemantle appealed. I think on the Monday or something which is fair enough Yeah, in other scenarios. Yeah, in other scenarios

Starting point is 03:43:17 You know you can set like on the other way if like this year there was a bad one where a goal was awarded a point Which man? Oh, yes all that one. That the crows lost in the Swans won and that really affected the finals. Crows would have ended up playing finals but they missed out because of it. But they lost the last week anyway which meant that they would not be in their Eagles. They... Oh that's right. Yeah they never been.

Starting point is 03:43:40 So they would have, if that result changed, they would have made finals and the swans would have dropped out. But there was like a minute to go in the game. So you can't say that the swans were going to kick another goal off that, but whereas in this game was the very end of the game. So that's where I mean, I'm like, it's hard to take when it's against you, but it made sense. But for some reason, Dave, the Saints and Dockers have a history of sharing quirky moments together. Another one happened

Starting point is 03:44:08 during the first quarter of the team's round 15 match, 1990-99 at Subiako Oval, when Phil Numpuyah Peter Carey took a chessmark in general play. So the the ball was... So the Numpuyah? The Numpuyah. So the ball was kicked and it was going past him and instant kicked in and he just marked it on his chest. It just came straight out of his. Right. And he just, he sort of looked a bit shocked and he just blew the whistle. It gave him something you'd risked.

Starting point is 03:44:38 I don't even know what sport he's playing. So he just ended up bouncing the ball. That was a bit of a funny moment. And then another one has become known as the whispers in the sky controversy. It's very dramatic. Yeah, I think that's a way about a name and saw and gate, though. The whispers in the sky. So in 2005, the week prior to the St. Stockers match, St. Coach Grant Thomas made disparaging

Starting point is 03:45:03 remarks about the quality of umpiring and gave some advice on how to improve saying they should quote, leave their ego in the locker when they start their career. Thomas ended up being fined 20 grand by the AFL for the comments. So this is the week before the game. Then before the game, Thomas and assistant coach Matt Rendell, who you've also had on your show, I believe Matt Rendell? No. No, we didn't have Matt Rendell. We had've also had on your show, I believe, Matt Rendell? No. No, we didn't have Matt Rendell. We've had Tom on a couple of times.

Starting point is 03:45:28 Yeah, but Tom on the, yeah. But so both of the coaches noticed that when the umpires came through the room, so that's before the games, the umpires would come through the rooms when we shake coaches hands. It's just this weird old tradition, I guess. And they noticed that the umpires were very cold that day. They didn't shake hands, they didn't say good day like they normally would, they didn't chat and this is what Thomas later told S.E. Ernie said. I was leaning up against a wall with a system coach Maddy Rendell just talking about some matchups and some particular strategy and the umpires walked in in single file, regimented, like they do

Starting point is 03:46:05 when they walk out on the ground. They walked up to the end of the change rooms, didn't about face, turned around and walked out without shaking anyone's hand, or recognising anyone. It was just basically a token gesture to say, yeah we're here, we've been in the rooms, but that's it. Maddie Rendell dug me in the ribs and said, I think we're in for a tough one, Tomo, which proved to be the case. The cameras during the start of the match caught Randell and Thomas laughing in the coach's box at the start of the game. If it wasn't so serious it'd be funny, but we were caught on camera in the first five

Starting point is 03:46:34 or ten minutes of the game laughing our heads off. Which I think a lot of people thought, what are they laughing for? Well laughing because of the decision making, we just thought, what is going on here? It's just not right, Tomo said. Just the umpires were making strange decisions. They were all going against the saints. He said, something was really off that day, really off. The players felt it, everyone felt it.

Starting point is 03:46:53 In a lot of ways, you can say it's my fault because I tried to give that advice and they weren't happy. So basically, it sounds like it was just the umpires taking revenge, which is very unprofessional, obviously, and quite odd in a professional sport. The game ended up being a thriller with the docker's just winning in a nail barter, but there were quite a few contentious decisions that went against the Saints on the night. The following day, Channel 9's Tony Jones reported that umpire Matthew Head

Starting point is 03:47:19 had said to him while boarding the post-game back to Melbourne quote, now I know what a victory feels like. So the Empire supposedly said to the journalist. Right. That's a stupid person to say that comment too. Yeah. The same fan Mitch Renty says was also on the flight and heard the conversation. He said he couldn't be certain at the time who said what comment or who had was, but was adamant he saw and heard the conversation take place so much so that he wrote the quote down on his boarding pass and there's photo in media reports at the time of him with the quote

Starting point is 03:47:53 written down on his pass. He said, Tony Jones, who was a row behind me and putting his gear away and settling himself in, made a comment to the umpires along the lines of, you boys at a good night tonight? Or where's that effect? And I heard the famous words, yep, it's nice to have a win or now I know what it's like to have a win, Rentex has said. I did a double take and I had a look and I thought, I got a right, it's down, I could just go to remember this.

Starting point is 03:48:18 So I did. Another Saints assistant. You wrote it down with an EOS, I said two different things. No, it's like, can you just read the quote? You've got rid of it. Another Saints assistant, Mark Parker, was also in the vicinity of the playing conversation saying, the Empire had got on and he'd said something to the effect of, that'll teach them four points and 20 grand or something like that.

Starting point is 03:48:39 Everyone's got a slightly different version of it. I wrote it down in my book. I heard this conversation. Then I saw Tony down to my point. I had this conversation, then I saw Tony Jones stand up face to face with the umpire Matthew head and say, you can't say that. And he sort of mumbled something and then went back. Head wasn't sitting in business. They were down in economy. So Jones looked at me and looked at a couple of others and asked, gee, what he said? Umpire had admitted it wasn't his best umpiring performance, but denied that he was cold in the

Starting point is 03:49:05 change rooms. In fact, he said the Saints went in there at all when he walked through. He also denied saying anything like what Jones went to the park, so it's funny, his grand Thomas is like, he came through just ignored us all and he's like, they weren't even in there. So I'm wondering, well maybe the Saints invisible. Like it feels like there's like some sort of glitch in the matrix or something? He's walking through it and they're like, it's mean so cold, it's just because he didn't see it. There's only logical explanation. Were they ghosts all along? An AFL investigation was launched, but ultimately cleared head of any wrongdoing, which is weird.

Starting point is 03:49:39 The AFL don't normally cover up sausage like this. There's so many witnesses saying that something like that was said. It is, yeah. That's a few heads down a bit of a media tour in the last couple of years as well. He's finally started talking to media outlets about it and he's adamant that it never happened. Right. Adamant that it never happened. Yeah, it's one of those ones where both Tony Jones or Swayres that had definitely did happen. They interviewed each other. They did. They had to sit down and they both agreed to disagree, I think at the end.

Starting point is 03:50:10 It's just like, it's not the kind of thing where people are just slightly remembering a thing different. It's like one of them is like complete opposites. Yeah. And Grant Thomas says that I don't know if it was Mark Park or one of the other assistants or someone that was nearby called him when they got off the plane and kind of reported this thing to him and GT was like that kind of happened. Right. That couldn't have happened. Yeah, right. Doesn't that. Now let's go back to Holmes B. So Ross line comes into the fold of San E coach.

Starting point is 03:50:37 Ray Valt is now fully handed the reins as captain in 2008 and the South continue to impress with their dominance winning another preseason premiership. What was this one called? We bet the cat's kind of remember what it was called at you. But you know, more silverware and cut remember all these preseason apprentices. Some new, some other defunct business there. Like the Bilo. Yeah. Yeah. And then, yeah, they went into the season going really well. They finished in the top four after a stunning 108 point victory. NABCUP, by the NABCUP. Of course it was. Whenever it happened to NABCUP.

Starting point is 03:51:12 Speaking of the big four, they finished in the top four, winning by 108 points over the bombers in the final round, which brought them from seventh to fourth and gave them the double chance. But although a different year yielded an all-too-familiar result as Hawthorn ousted the Saints and went on to win the flag, that Hawthorn game was Harvey's last game. It was. Yep. Which was announced before the Rooms. Yes. But I remember spying up in the sand on such a hollow feeling. Yeah. We bet the pies the week before I think maybe Frankie Packett retired that day too Maybe I think that might have been his last game as well. Yeah, so Harvey retired after 383 games Still a club record and pick it after 252 games even with the legends time at an end the red white and black would piece together

Starting point is 03:52:01 It's best season to date in 2009 Red, White and Black would piece together, it's best season to date in 2009. That's of all time, home and away, best season. Saint-119 straight games to start the season. They lost two games late in the year, but only just, and basically, with multiple games to spare from second place. The famous game in the middle of the year,

Starting point is 03:52:23 is now known as the Battle of the Unbeaten, which went down as one of their clubs most enthralling matches against Jolong in front of record crowd at Dockland Stadium of 5444. Wydley accepted as the best home in a way seasoned game of all time. It's such a great game. The big Gardner mark. Had all the iconic moments. So with the two unbeaten juggernauts level would just over a minute on the clock. Gardner rising like a colossus

Starting point is 03:52:51 another great bitter commentary, realty and an unbelievable pack mark put the Saints up to carry there on their incredible winning streak. Unfortunately the cats had the last laugh though. We played them in the grand final and we won every stat on the day, apart from goals kicked, which can never be more important. They ended up being decisive, didn't they? Yeah, and so we had the I, in 66 as the iconic wobbly punt from Barry Brine, but unfortunately, the iconic moments in this one went the other way. Like Matthew Scull, it's Taupoke, the famous Taupoke people still talk about. If it just got past his toe, we were out. And probably the door's and just got a hand on it. Yeah.

Starting point is 03:53:34 And then Paul Chapman sealed the game in the final minutes after that. And yeah, it was the we should have won. We were easily the best same of the year. Yeah, but just couldn't quite get it done on that big day. We're better in the first half as always. I think as well. We should be pointed. We should. Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. Another moment in the game included included Jolong's Tom Hawkins being paid a gold as part of clearly hitting the post. because of that goal, goal reviews were later introduced. Again, the rule changes soon after, if it was reviewed then, you know, that wouldn't have been a goal. Like, I was sitting behind that end as well, and it just ricocheted. It was so clearly hit the post. Now, also, the Norm Smith metal winner for the best player on the field was Chapman and he'd been receiving a

Starting point is 03:54:25 controversial blood injection therapy to help him get over a hamstring injury. He ended up kicking three goals being best on ground. It was the difference. He kicked that the winning goal. The following season this type of therapy was banned by the world anti-doping body. Right because like he they're turning into some sort of mutant X-man. Yeah, that's right. He's out there shooting webs from his arms. And this is not fair. Yeah. In 2009, that was a layout. 2010. No longer a layout. Oh, yeah. It was having some sort of super soldiers serum. So we were desperately unlucky. But in the end, should have won the game anyway. Our played the cats. but yeah, all those little

Starting point is 03:55:05 things, any of those little things don't happen. We probably win that game. Two of you guys there that day? Yeah. Was it a devastating, is it sounds? Yeah. Oh gosh. And it should have been probably a comfortable, like it was a kind of game at half time, we should have had a pretty good lead. We had a small lead, but it should have been like a maximum. Nine points up at three quarter time. I think we'd miss probably four or five shots of gold that normally they'd kick you know whether it was just wet And it didn't quite yeah through a meal trying to dribble it through. Yeah, I think I've had a

Starting point is 03:55:32 thing wrong. I remember there I was it when Gilbert went forward or was that the next year? That was the next year. Yeah The disappointing games blew together a little next year. That's the next year. Yeah. The disappointing games blew together a little. Although people are like hate losing ground finals, I've never, I take losing ground finals over being finishing 12th on the latter. For sure. Because you can't take away the prelim wins, some of the best not to my life were. Absolutely. Celebrating those premierships. And then having that whole week as a grand finals team. you ever dreamer who we beat in the oh nine prely? Yes, and the 10 prely. I was Dave's bulldogs Still hurts guys

Starting point is 03:56:14 right And then 97 when we played it you were ripped off but the other crow's beat you and you should have won they Called a point a goal. It's They called a point a goal strike called a point liberator a kicked and yeah it should have been a saint's bulldog 97 gram final but brutal. Anyway, home speed continues. We're getting close to the end here if anyone is still listening. Send us a tweet. Just be generous and see if anyone got through this book. I'm not interested to see if anyone got through this book. Um, homesby continues. It wouldn't be the last Grand Final birth from the Red One Black.

Starting point is 03:56:48 But even with all the agony, heart wrenching sorrow and longstanding suffering across the club's history, few rivaled the pain that was to come in 2010. Desperate not to let their shot at Grand Final glory slip through their fingers, the saints returned with a vengeance in 2010. Another strong season saw the Red-white and black finish third, advancing to an identical preliminary final against the dogs again, which they won. This one, slightly less convincingly? This one was more convincing.

Starting point is 03:57:15 This one was more convincing. Oh, no, we were, we just got over it. St. Kielder seemed destined for their long-awaited triumph with the 2010 Grand Final mirroring so many facets of the fabled 1966 victory. So here are some of the things that were mirrored 66. There was Premiership Heartbreak the year before, off the back of a final quarter fade out. It's another chance at the ultimate glory against Collingwood. One kick, spelling the difference between Agony and Ecstasy.

Starting point is 03:57:40 The script was perfect. After going into halftime 24 points down, the Saints began to turn the tide. Branded Goddard's iconic screema, which would still be seen as I think one of the all-time great-grandfinal moments. And also Lenny Hayes' roost from Long Range outside 50, had the red one black just one straight kick from their second premiership, and could have joined Barry Brenn's match-winning point as part of the Immortal Club history. I mean, God, I took the one of the all-time great pack marks when back kicked the goal,

Starting point is 03:58:10 which put us in front with a handful of minutes to spare. But unfortunately, we went defensive. I'd love to, that's a sliding doors moment where we stayed on the attack. Yeah. I put the foot down. Yeah. I think that would have changed. Anyway, what ifs, huh? We're two minutes on the clock. The Saints found themselves a point down. So we went defensive and cloak kicked a goal from long range, which gave them an narrow lead again. One point

Starting point is 03:58:40 down. And then in a final moment of desperation, a tumbling punt from Lanyhaze went inside 50-year, bounced over the Collingwood defence, and a vacant Stephen Mearn was lying away just outside the goal square. Mearn was centimeters away from putting the Saints one step closer to a stunning triumph before that bounce. In a cruel twist, the ever unpredictable Sharon, which is the brand of the football, bouncing at right angles, darted past the St. Kielder-Golznik and scurried through for a behind levelling the schools. The siren rang to the sound of pure disbelief from the Collingwood and St. Kielder armies, gameted in a draw. Most commentators have since said, and at the time said,

Starting point is 03:59:18 the Saints were finishing on top, if the game went into overtime, they surely would have won. But unfortunately, the rule was drawing grand finals must be replayed the following week. The depleted Saints couldn't muster enough strength to challenge the following week and ended up getting flogged by nearly 10 goals even though Llan and Richie played a fantastic set before the game. So was there two half-time shows then? Two pre-game shows, yeah. So who dropped farm in the first week? I think they get Llan or with only one-game shows. Yeah, so who, John Farnham in the first week? I think they get Lionel with only one week's notice. Yeah, I think he was just on tour.

Starting point is 03:59:48 Oh, that's great. Yeah, so it was pretty handy. That's a win. Oh, no, Farns, he was, oh, no. I mixed, I get a lot of details from those two years. When was, which was Meatloaf? Meatloaf was there 11, 11 with pies and cats. Which is infamous for all sorts of reasons. Absolutely worth a look online. Have you haven't seen his performance? Yeah, he incredible. There's some audio issues,

Starting point is 04:00:13 and his voice is not cut by any back. There's some live issues. There's some live issues. Yeah, there's some live issues. His voice isn't quite what it used to be. But yeah, Richie was good though. Live Richie was really good. I was definitely the peak of the day.

Starting point is 04:00:25 I reckon that game, and I haven't had the guts to go back and watch it, but I remember that game going quite similarly to the first week, where they started well, didn't quite get put it all on the scoreboard, and then we started working our way back into the game, and then like a thief in the night. He sure he sure Nick Riveau was running into the open goal Didn't realize that he's sure it was closing you know him and he smothered him and that was that was the end of the game Which it just felt like we would work our way back into the game at that point but that broke our hearts anyway It's hard to argue any moment leads to a 10 goal loss. I still want to follow.

Starting point is 04:01:05 I still maintain that had we won that first one after God I took the mark and kicked the goal. It would have been the greatest A.F. moment of all time. You break the drought with a mark like that and a goal to win the Grand Final. That becomes the greatest moment. Yeah, it was a better mark than Leo Barry's famous mark, Jez Lenko's mark.

Starting point is 04:01:24 I think it would have been the great Grand Final Mark. And it should be, but that don't remember the loses of what's the... So yeah, the AFL changed the rule the next season. Again. So Grand Final's now go to extra time. So... Even Colin would fan say that if they played five more minutes

Starting point is 04:01:42 it's gonna win probably by a couple of goals, like not just by a couple of points, like not just by a couple points, but yeah, it's had dominantly within the last quarter. Yeah. So yeah, pretty brutal. But yeah, it's just a long history of rules that went against the spin-changed rocks, right after that. That's so st. Kilda. That's like I say, every other supporter would have a list of these things about their club as well. I'm sure. Sorry to the Collin, which supporters listening, I don't think you would have made it this far, but it's having a bit of fun with you here, although you are all cowardly racist dogs. The following decade was rough, so Ross Lian and another link to Friro, he left.

Starting point is 04:02:26 It seems like the Saints weren't really paying in that much respect as a pretty handy coach. Well, he was, when he signed, when he became the coach at security, he was just a rookie, he was the first time senior coach, he was on essentially minimum wage. For I think he had a four year contract, made the finals again in 2011,

Starting point is 04:02:43 she lost to Sydney. Yes, at Doclands. I had a ticket to see the DC-3 Domingale's band that night, which I booked in advance, not knowing the Saints would be playing that night, and I had to make the decision and I'd go under the gig, which was the right call, because... Was Domingale there? What'd you go to the game? Domingale was there. I think he was also glad. But I'm for a while because that was our last final for nine years. I thought I'd cursed this by not going. Not going to the footy. So the story goes that Ross, Ross had had some investments fails, the global financial

Starting point is 04:03:18 crisis a couple of years earlier and his prettyatch entire investment portfolio had plummeted or whatever. He lost a lot of money, his family was struggling and he asked the club for a rate. He'd taken them to three grand finals in two years, three final series, four final series, eight, nine, ten, nine, ten, nine, ten. And was essentially outside of the 66th Premiership, the most successful, secure to coachable. Of course it is, yeah. Yeah. But the club just said we'll deal with it later. And, you know, we're not going to talk about it, we're not going to make you an offer.

Starting point is 04:03:54 And he's stressing probably like, I didn't realize the money issue. But I just, yeah, they dragged him out, and he's like, eventually. And so a lot of Saints fans have never forgiven him for it. Even though he's now come back to coaches again, there's other things reasons not to forgive him, but that one I think fair enough, you know,

Starting point is 04:04:11 if it's your job and your boss isn't coming to the party then, you get another offer that is securing your family and whatnot. And people forget about the other coach that got shafted in that case as well, because Mark Harvie was under contract contract I think that's right. Yeah, and behind closed doors I think was it Ross's manager and Mark Harvey's manager were the same person and he gets like withdraw because he was yeah The story is yeah, so I knew I he leaves and yeah, that was the beginning of a rough decade.

Starting point is 04:04:46 And I'm not gonna go on it to it too much, but rather than the bottom of the 80s, we only won one wooden spoon that year, but obviously winning lots of them would have meant we would have had a bunch of number one draft picks. But so we won one wooden spoon, and the number one draft pick we picked up ended up having a retire

Starting point is 04:05:07 just retired this year again for the second time because of concussions. Oh yes. So yeah it was an unlucky pick whereas who's that sorry? Paddy McCartan whereas probably the guy that everyone else would have picked at number one, Petracker. Petracker, sorry, I said his name, but he's gone on to be a modern day great. He's a pressure player at the demons. Yeah, that was a in hindsight. Who knows?

Starting point is 04:05:39 Paddy McCartan was going to be a really great player as well, I think. So there's bad luck, and this was just a bad luck thing. But it is funny because everyone said everyone like all the experts were saying for track is number one. Whereas the other one that people talk about a lot is we picked Billings before Bonton Pelley, but no, I'm saying Bonton Pelley was, that was the choice. No, it's only inside everyone's. Even the Bulldogs, I've spoken to a few people inside the Bulldogs and they've said to a few people inside the bulldogs and they've said that if Billings had been there at four, they would have taken Billings over on to Pellys. It was a consensus pick. Yeah, that's right. So I think people go on about that

Starting point is 04:06:13 is silly. The Petraka one's different, but anyway, it was a tough decade, the teens. Yeah, but instead of bottoming out, we're doing a lot of middling, finishing just out of the eight down and sort of from 9 to 12ish a lot. And at one point, Alan Richardson, another Alan coach was the second longest ever coach of the Saints, and he never coached a final. We just kept. Yeah. We had a couple of years in a row where I think we had winning seasons like 12 and 10 and just standing. Yeah. But our drafting and play development

Starting point is 04:06:51 through that decade wasn't too good. Yeah. But he also left and won a premiership with Melbourne as an assistant coach with Betracker. Anyway, he would have had something to say about. He wanted to draft Petraca. Did he? He got overruled by the little girl.

Starting point is 04:07:10 That would have been frustrating as the head coach. Anyway, so it was a pretty tough decade day. We don't need to go on it with too much. Maybe there's another hour of details about it. Probably the most positive thing that happened that decade was the formation of our women's team So the AFL W was announced in 2017 and 13 clubs including St. Kilda applied for a license And knowingly the Saints run successful in the bid as it felt

Starting point is 04:07:36 Externally at least or to me that the Saints were one of the most proactive clubs and pushing for women's football at the top level Obviously the Bulldogs and the demons were right up there, but I felt like the Saints were really doing a lot of good things. I think we thought we were a pretty good chance, but... They'd done a lot in the community around inclusivity and bringing people together. I think they thought that a really good shot at getting one of those initial licenses. Yeah, and who knows? Again, it feels like we missed the jump on that and it's probably

Starting point is 04:08:06 hurt us a bit. We ended up getting in on the third intake of clubs in 2020. But unfortunately, the women's team thus far has started off in the traditional St. Style without a lot of on-field success, having played a final. But the team is really well supported with some of the highest membership numbers in the league, which is quite different from the men's team, which is traditionally in the lower third of the league for members. Though the club this year hit a new, does this include women's and men's?

Starting point is 04:08:35 But it's a week since we hit a new record this year over 60,000 for our biggest amount of members ever. Still has in the bottom half of the membership ladder anyway. Colin would broke the new record with over 100,000. 106. Yeah, 106. 7th world. Good luck getting finals tickets if you go for the pause.

Starting point is 04:08:55 Other landmark moments for the club happened when the men's team played the first match for a premiership points outside of Australia in Wellington, New Zealand on April 25, 2013. I was there, it was great fun, apart from losing. We played there again in 2014, 2015, lost both of those games. We seemed to lose, like the Spuds matches we always lose, those outweighed matches. Did you go to any of those Kiwi games? No, no. I had a great trip over there, but the footy was unfortunate. A message, Cal Wilson, another great saint supporter who's a Kiwi to see if she'd be up for telling a saint story, but unfortunately she's in the middle of shooting the Great Australian bake off, but she said I could tell her story anyway.

Starting point is 04:09:36 That's just a bit of a nice story, so she was a new to Australia as a Kiwi, and she went to a game with some friends who were barking hard for the Saints God the Sin is God the Sin is up and As the game went along she started getting into it as well God the Sin is God the Sin But she wasn't saying Sin is like Dostograd. She thought everyone was saying Silas So she's screaming God the Silas God the Silas Kind of wasn't to let her the guy she realized that

Starting point is 04:10:04 Yeah, she got it wrong, but it was a bit of a fun story. I mean, it makes me just killed a sailor. Yeah, I quite like it. The sailors as a, yeah. I like team names that are unique as well. Like, that's what I thought, John's was a bit disappointing when the newest AFL club came in.

Starting point is 04:10:20 Well, why not be the one bats or something, you know? Like something that, there's no world team with that. Why are we going for these? Yeah, still. Existing American franchise names. We also played in Shanghai and China. We were the third team to play a game over there in 2019.

Starting point is 04:10:36 So the real curse trip though, the whole team or half the team got food poisoning before the game, still played anyway, but got flogged by Port Adelaide. Well, clearly the team was not at full health. And then the following year, we went to play them again, but that was also a little cursed because there was a little thing called COVID. So the game got cancelled.

Starting point is 04:11:00 And I don't think there's no real plans to play in China again. I think so. I think Jaren Geary also, you have one of the, yeah, this weird thigh. That's right. There's this iconic photo of Geary with the stitches all the way up his leg. Hitler compartment syndrome or something. Yeah. Yeah, I don't know. It's crazy.

Starting point is 04:11:20 Yeah, the China curse. But yeah, so in some ways, I wouldn't be surprised if the Saints brought on COVID Some people's talk about pangolans and bats and so on, but I don't know made the stop in Wuhan Yeah, the Saints were what they did a captains round it. We're on that week But I loved the the idea of The Saints trying to build an international following. And I also love the idea that in our own small way, this podcast has started doing that a little bit.

Starting point is 04:11:51 Oh man, if you are this far in and you don't have a team yet, come on. Yes, get a vote. Get a Saints fan. And I know there are already a bunch of do-go-on listeners around the world who are Saints fans because of this podcast, including Paul Mella, who's one of our great patron supporters. He lives in England and he's become a saints member, which I love, and I message him to see if he would had anything to say about that and he sent in this clip. Good morning guys's Paul Mella here. And that touched me to make a few words about my interest in the saints.

Starting point is 04:12:28 So I thought I'd record your little voicemail on my walk with Mandol Prozi and the wild at all. Yeah, so I think listening back to the podcast on in, I think when I got into it, probably second or third episode I listened to was Matt's podcast on the AFL. So, and I've never really been into that sport, I've not even really heard too much about it. And yeah, kind of intrigued by Matt'sination with the Saints and the only one for like a 1966 kind of thing as a Greenblum Senior Men's Team, but well team I don't support people's reasons, it's kind of weird. And then, yeah, kept my own scores, but really, too many things are bad, until the pandemic

Starting point is 04:13:29 hit, and then, I guess, pandemic, yeah, I didn't really get a year off. I was in work constantly, because of what I do as an engineer, I keep the factories running. So, I left for, you know, it wasn't been a year off for me, it was just a weird year, but that weird year, most people took up languages and knitting and strange hobbies and eye-took up a new sport, which was watching AFL and a poll in the Saints. I think that we're doing quite well that season, so I thought, I'll get on board with this and watch it and

Starting point is 04:14:05 it's kind of surprising how easy it was to become an international member which is not the easiest way to watch the games live and on playback so yeah so I went from there joined as an international member it's quite reasonably priced send me out a lovely good impact on the club and watch the members since. Now a third year member and I like the fact that you get a little badge for every year that you remember, but loving it. So just a really fast, interesting game that's football, English football can be very much stop start, AFL doesn't seem to be that hard, I thought it's very fast. Even though I have lots of stops to start in the game, it's a very fast game and quite a long game.

Starting point is 04:14:53 Just really excited. I love an underdog, I follow all the map, I think they're my team. And they've not done well for a long time But it's a little thing. It's a little New aunties are now and again success That gives you hope and it's a hope that killed you I guess and I guess that's why I Went to the States and you know something about the underdogs screens to me is that as just you know, someone they need support,

Starting point is 04:15:27 but it's just much more exciting. You know, people support around here, there is a support manager in the United, a manager city, they're right on my doorstep. Why would I support them? You know, who got millions behind them, you know, the guarantee of success, you know, it's not for me.

Starting point is 04:15:50 I'd rather watch the underdog and enjoy the smaller success is more exciting that way. So yeah this year for the Saints, as we're calling this, they are into finals, which is just awesome to see. It's been a really exciting season. I think stand that moment for me at some of the Jax, there's lots of Jax on the team. Jax is popping the collar at the 150th game for the 150th anniversary game and that was an amazing game. The game the other week against G-Long, against the standard performance. The team do really well. Jackson Clay, he's awesome. Jack Steal, playing with the broken collar ball.

Starting point is 04:16:32 What's that about? We wouldn't get out of four balls. They hurt the knee and they go down out there being shot. So she's been incredible. I'm going to make guys I need to go find my dog. You just got to find him. One minute. Good carry on. I'm going to make you guys a little fan of my dog. You just got up to the top. You're not going to get up to the top. You just carry on.

Starting point is 04:16:47 So yeah, so when I watch the Saints, it tends to be an odd hour, usually early in the morning. If it's too early, I'll just get up and watch the game later. Sometimes I watch the game later in night, where the couple beers, just relax and play for a wedding, no for a way to know the rest of the rest of the £100 probably know what the outcome is. Enjoy listening to St TV podcasts, it's awesome, I just just enjoy and enjoy calling them for my part, hope to get there next year. I'm 15 December, didn't get there this year, but I'm probably a family holiday so maybe around Easter time hopefully that comes to coincide with the start of the season.

Starting point is 04:17:31 We can get to a game but if not you know it should be nice to go over there and visit Australia anyway. And yeah, it's put to be a saint. So go on your mind to centers. Cheers, bye bye. Oh, thanks so much for that fall. Love it. I love it.

Starting point is 04:17:52 You took us out for a little walk with the dog. That was really nice. It was a little walk with the other dog there. Relaxing. I think anyone who can honestly say on record success is not for me. You are a secured fit. How much weird did it was drawn to the club. My favourite line was it's the hope that kills you again.

Starting point is 04:18:10 That's really a line with all our guests. Our guest supporters that we've heard from today. No that's ugly. We met Paul last year when we did a show in Manchester and we were talking about a lot about him. How he's a fan of Aldham, Athletic, who played there in the... They were the Premier League, they're nothing but... We can now they're in the National League, the 50th year. So he's really following. I follow him on social media and he's very passionate about the Saints and Aldham. He gave me an Aldham hat when I was there as well. Flat cap which I love. And yeah, old him are definitely my fifth...

Starting point is 04:18:54 Your fifth league team? Fifth league team, yeah. I don't know. Yoville's not in that league, is it? Is they? Look at that for you. I've got so many English teams that I'm like it's okay when they're in separate leagues but what if they Yoville or Charlton they're not in the same league though. There'll be some of the teams will be absolutely mortal enemies of each other anyway We're so close to the end now Dave Let me tell you about just the last Lasting so the team made the finals in 2020 the COVID year like Paul was saying We had quite a good year one a final again. So Dave against the Bulldogs. We've got a good finals history against the Bulldogs, I'm realizing as we go on. You're welcome.

Starting point is 04:19:29 Except for 92. Yes, that's right. They knocked us out 92, and we never let them, we never let them back in. Don't say that. Even though they've won a premiership in the year since. So yeah, that was our first time back in nine years. Unfortunately, it was during COVID,

Starting point is 04:19:44 and there were no crowds allowed. That was a Queensland. That's right. And we, again, lost the eventual premieres in Richmond. We did. Then this year to celebrate our 150th year we've made the finals again. Like I said, the time recording,

Starting point is 04:20:00 we're a few days away, actually we're now one day away. Nick and I will be at the MCG tomorrow. Yep playing the Giants the MCG And whatever happens in that game is episode forever exists in a time where we're about to play finals and anything is possible And I quite like that even though you deal listener listening to this in a time where the game is resulted You can't affect me from here. I'm in the past, untouchable, and stoked that the mighty sailors are once again playing in September on the big stage. One thing the Saints faithful is very good at, it's continuing to believe and hope that the second premiership is around the corner. And I believe that to

Starting point is 04:20:39 be the case. Come on you once mighty sailors. Beautiful. Beautiful. You know, I was thinking about this the other day, how you can bottle hope. How do you bottle hope? This is the thing that we're not really used to, right? Go into finals, hopefully winning finals. But we generally lose. And so that hope is gone, at least for another year. This is a way.

Starting point is 04:21:04 This is eternal hope. Captured in the moment. That's right. We can't be touched from here. Not now. This will be out on the internet forever. Eternal hope. Exactly.

Starting point is 04:21:13 This is bottling. This is bottling it. Thanks so much for joining us, Nick. Do you like being involved in world records? Because this is, I believe, unless the end of it is really brutal. This is by some margin the longest ever episode we've done. I'm honored. I'm absolutely honored to be here.

Starting point is 04:21:30 It's my favorite thing to talk about. I do it all the time anyway. So yeah, thanks for having me. I've loved it. And yeah, I was thinking, I don't know if we think of a quirky story from the history after this. You'll have to come back and tell it. But I think we have covered nearly everything.

Starting point is 04:21:48 Some people will be out there, can't hardly. That didn't mention the 1949 blimp disaster. Remember when the Saints had that blimp? But we probably did. But thanks so much for joining us. No, I loved it. Thanks, haven't we? I guess the people who are looking for a way to get into OZROLZ and AFL,

Starting point is 04:22:06 I could check out zerohanger.com. That's right. Absolutely. The GMM, himself, is here. And on Plugged Podcast. Yes. The episode that came out on August 31st, please give it a listen. And yeah.

Starting point is 04:22:20 And yeah, I love listening to it every week. The thing I love about it the most, it's just, it's a safe place for St. supporters. I hate consuming footy media after a loss, apart from unplugging, because it's like a deep brief with people who care about it as much as you do. Probably more to be honest. And it's start to think of people who would care about and wear a St. Sos heart of the night do. But yeah, you three do. And I love how I was saying this to you after I was on the episode. I love how the three of you have such unique voices.

Starting point is 04:22:54 You all look at the game a little bit differently. And you seem like you've probably from three totally different worlds, but the Saints bring you together. Yeah. And the deep reef and the pre-brief. Was that just the brief? Every week about the following week's game, that's always exciting. And you're able to put it into words things about the game that I cannot

Starting point is 04:23:15 annunciate. It's generally lucky that we don't record straight after a game or kind of first thing in the week that we kind of wait until midweek when some other thing Especially when we've lost and we've had a bad a bad loss that kind of the storm has settled And you're able to kind of look at things a little bit more objectively But I think we can still be fairly critical when it when it needs to happen But yeah, we're all from different worlds of different experiences But the one thing that's kind of always bound us together has been this witty club. good. And yeah, we'll catch up for pre-drinks tomorrow. Sounds good. Forever. Forever. Forever. To be having pre-drinks forever. It's my favorite bit.

Starting point is 04:23:53 Almost having pre-drinks. Eternal drinks. Yeah. They have we converted you. I know you've been a lifelong sort of Bulldogs fan. You know, my passion for the Bulldogs run steep. But this final season, I know who I'm passionate for the little dogs run steep, but this Final season I know who I'll be rooting for tomorrow. Yeah Dave now knows more about some kilter than 99% of some killer fans It's amazing somehow I've wound up on a football Look at me go Well, thanks so much for joining us Nick. We'll let you go in a moment, let's do everyone's favorite section of the show,

Starting point is 04:24:25 where we think some of our fantastic Patreon supporters. Yeah, so this is everyone's favorite section of the show. And obviously, people liked that first bit, and they sit through it. Yeah, it's just like it's a four or five hour warm-up. Yeah. But now we've got to the big dance. They're like the preliminary finals. Exactly. Which we won. And this... our bonus. We got into the granny. And

Starting point is 04:24:49 what we do here is we thank some of the many grand final. Many grand final. We got we got another granny. Yeah, that does sound a bit sus if you don't know the context. But what we do in this little section at the end of the episode, we spent about half an hour, maybe 40 minutes, thanking some of our great Patreon supporters and These are the people who you know keep the show alive and They do so by signing up at patreon.com such do go on part and that supports this show do go on but as also the Back from hiatus book cheat where Dave Consumes a book and then he spit like a bird, he regurgitates it

Starting point is 04:25:26 into your mouth in bite-sized chunks so you don't have to chew for yourself. That's right, too, Bren, you ever says that for the new season already, a good man is hard to find by Flannery O'Connor, spooky gothic tale. And more recently I just covered in Brisbane, goodbye Mr. Chips. Oh man, and I was meant to be there, but I, I don't know if people can hear in my voice, I'm just recovering from a bit of a sickness and I missed it. I didn't get up to Brisbane, which means that Dave also hosted my show, which is on this network, Who New It With Matt Stewart.

Starting point is 04:25:57 Yeah, what's it gonna be with Dave Warnakie? I love that so much. And yeah, that's, we've just got to our one year anniversary I think for who knew it. And so a 50-odd episodes deep recently had guests including Tom and Kyle from the Little Dum Dum Club. Maceau has been on it a bunch from the weekly planet. Jess and Dave have been on it the most. I think Dave maybe is the record holder for at least games played if not games won. That's probably been... I don't think I'll be up there least games played, if not games one, that's probably been. Definitely don't think I'll be up there for games one,

Starting point is 04:26:28 but you know, I've been on the ground more than tons than any other. But you've given yourself the nickname of the carryover champ. So that does sort of feel like you're a winner, even if you're not. But anyway, if you support us there, you're supporting all these shows.

Starting point is 04:26:41 And you get bonuses like bonus episodes. We do three extra episodes every month. We're about to record one now. So if you sign up, you might hear the most un-hid and sh- bonus episode we've ever done. It's just me and Dave, one-on-one. Mano and mono. And we've already been talking,

Starting point is 04:26:59 this episode will be edited down, but I'm looking at the clock. We've been recording for over five and a half hours. I'm gonna roll the clock. We've been recording for over five and a half hours. I'm going to roll straight into a bonus. I've got a tail. It's a, it's a wild tail too. I'll tell you that even without delivery, it'll be wild. I'm really excited to hear it. So yeah, good bonuses like that. You also get shout outs. You get early info about tours. Like for instance, our patrons heard that we were so close to locking in an American tour this year but they're also the first to hear that that didn't quite happen, is that

Starting point is 04:27:30 right Dave? That's right, they heard it before anyone else that we almost got a visa in time but then we got knocked back and asked for a few more documents but that meant we didn't have time to continue on with the application so we're going to have to postpone to next year but now we think we know what they want. Yes, so if you want to be the first to hear good and bad news, sign up at patreon.com slash the gone pod. We also do shoutouts but we always start with the section called the fact quote-a in this one is to sign up at the

Starting point is 04:28:07 Sydney Shamburg level or above and then you get to give us a factor quote or question or a braggar I suggest and really whatever you like and you also get to give us or give yourself a title and I read four of these out each week. First up this week we've got one from Chris Torres and I should say I don't read him out until I read him out. No, this is fresh news for you and me. So these great supporters could put any words in my mouth. Oh my gosh. And I'll refuse to edit them out, whatever they say. That's not quite true, but Chris, so far no one's ever made me say anything too offensive.

Starting point is 04:28:40 Except for tongue twisters. Oh yeah, the offensive tongue twisters. Um, the first one comes from Chris Torres who's given themselves the title of official North Carol onion living in Ohio with family and Gary Indiana of the podcast. Oh my gosh, the trip ditch of amazing places. Geez all that along the golden mile. If you tell me that you're someone in your family also lives in Vermont. Mm-hmm. You've got access to Creamies. I'd be so happy to hear it. I don't know if we've officially, until right now, added North Carolina to the Golden Mile.

Starting point is 04:29:11 It was a relatively straightish line, but I think we've put a bit of a hook turn on it, and now it's going south down to North Carolina. So that is awesome. Chris, you are all over that Golden Mile, and Chris is offering us a fact writing, hey gang, you may recall that I was on a quest to update you or go to fact about North Carolina. Since it seems like I've been successful, Venus fly traps are native to North Carolina, that's one I bring up quite a bit. That's the one that's taken off. Well that one of the maybe the blue fire engines.

Starting point is 04:29:40 And also the mini golf course. Yeah. Which was had a punny name that it was called like, have a go. Like I remember it was. It says, I thought I might pause my quest to follow up on David Lawrence's fantastic Flamingo fact, triple F, from the barbie episode. Writing, as it happens, I'm a bird evolutionary biologist

Starting point is 04:30:01 and paleontologist, and one of my specialties is Flamingos. Oh my god. So good. David is exactly right. Flamingos are badass. They often live in places that are so extreme that only flamingos and what they eat can survive. Matt, you were partially right when you said

Starting point is 04:30:17 that they get their pink color from what they ate. But it's not from the fungi. It's from the blue-green algae. Damn it. So close. God, it's from the blue-green algae. Damn it, so close! Gotta have some of that fire brother blender. Which are neither fungi nor algae, but bacteria. Cyan no bacteria directly, or by eating things that eat cyanobacteria, like little crustaceans. Which brings me to my main fact.

Starting point is 04:30:42 Which I think is either grim or fun. Matt and Jess, please judge accordingly. Well, Jess isn't here. She's resting on her laurel so I'll be the judge of this fact. Dave, do you want to step up for fun fact judgment? Oh, I really use here, I'm for boring facts, aren't I? Yeah, I think you could step up. But if I say it's not boring, it's probably the opposite. Right, if you say it's not boring and I say it's not grim, it's only fun.

Starting point is 04:31:03 It's one of the three. Yeah. As AJ pointed out on the bar Barbie episode, baby flamingos aren't pink. That's because their mouths are shaped totally different from adult flamingos and so they can't feed themselves. So they rely on their parents for food. Parent flamingos secrete what's called a crop milk, a nutrient rich fluid that they transfer to their babies beak to beak. That much like you do with bookcheek. Yeah, from bookcheek to bookcheek beaked. That's right. Baby chick. Bookcheek to bookcheek. Anyway, so that crop

Starting point is 04:31:37 milk is bright red, so sometimes it looks like parents are coughing up blood into the faces of their babies. There's not actually any blood in it though. Well that's borderline grim. Yeah. As the babies grow up, their beaks change shape, then they can start feeding themselves and they turn pink. Sorry for the long fact, but I got very excited. What are you thinking Dave?

Starting point is 04:31:56 That's not boring. I don't think it's grim. I think it's fun. It's must be fun! Uh. While I wait to see if the Venus flytrap thing sticks around, I've decided my next quest will be to find a North Carolina fact that Jess thinks is fun. She wasn't too impressed by my Venus flytrap or mini-go facts, so I want to find one that will win her over. Books Forever! Thank you.

Starting point is 04:32:22 And Books Forever to you too. Book book. Let me see if I can find this mini-girl thing. I know we... Here we go. Yeah. What was it called? Havago. This all do. This all do. That's it. Love it. This all do. So was it... Love it. This will do. So it was it as opposed to my example, it was an actual pun. Yeah. Have a go. Have a go. And the next one comes from Lee, right? Okay. Mr. Webb, Wally Webb, Sieg Crowe, and Deadman 3.

Starting point is 04:32:56 Okay. What a combo. And we got a quote here from Lee, writing. I've got a bit of a quote in a suggestion for you. Here's the quote, I want you to try and remember what it was like to have been very young. And particularly the days when you were first in love, when you were like a person sleepwalking, and you didn't quite see the street you were in,

Starting point is 04:33:18 and didn't quite hear everything that was said to you. You're just a little bit crazy. Will you remember that please? Does that ring any bells to you, Dave? No. This... Quite a nice thought, though. Go back to your memory. This quote is from Outtown by Thornton Wilder, and that's the second part of my answer. Read or Betty at Watch Outtown. Dave may have come across it in his days of theatre. It's truly a classic. The first player I ever did and the last one I did in high school. It was also the first player ever set designed. And now I'm a technical director by trade. So pretty influential in my life.

Starting point is 04:33:56 And the inspiration for my newest tattoo. I wouldn't fold in latter and the moon. Cool. The play and some great scenes and quotes are also featured in the movie Wonder with Julia Roberts and Owen Wilson. Thank you so much for that, Lee, right? You're writing that down, Dave. Yeah, yeah, first of all, it was our town. Our town. Our town.

Starting point is 04:34:16 I've been looking up Thornton Wilder. I've nearly done for my Christmas episode before he's got a play called The Long Christmas Dinner. Oh, my favorite kind of Christmas dinner. It's a Christmas dinner. It's a Christmas dinner. It's a Christmas dinner. When you look up, stories about Christmas or Christmas stories. So maybe I'll be doing some Thornton Wilder.

Starting point is 04:34:32 Do you think so? So then, you know, is that a Christmas dinner with Long David and his friends? Yeah, Long David. No, the same. I'm going to that, we talked about that about three weeks ago. Long David, Long Christmas.

Starting point is 04:34:44 The next one comes from Andriana, Genuoldi. And thank you so much for writing that out phonetically. And Andriana is known as Doctor of Podcasts. Congratulations. Well done. Yes, you finished what Dave never told. Exactly, I couldn't even start. A few contacts a year ago, just before we started the podcast,

Starting point is 04:35:05 I did apply to do a PhD after I did my masters in media. And the subject was going to be podcasting in Australia. And instead of doing that, I just started a podcast in Australia. Hey, you went on the job. That's right. All right, and we've got a fact here, Andrea and Rott's. Hi, gang, this is my first fact-quad question, and I thought I would combine a fact with a question

Starting point is 04:35:27 that's close to home for you all. The fact is, episode 14 on Doohgoon was the episode where Jess took up the mantle of Arbiter of Fun Facts, goes that far back. And the question is, what was the topic of that episode? Oh, question number 14. Oh, 14, Mary Poppins maybe. All right. Andrew, I'm just gonna clue here. It was a matte episode. Okay. Back to the future.

Starting point is 04:35:52 No, it was very Jess-related. Jess got involved with this. The triple J hottest one. That's right. That's right. Good one. That's, you know, I said we got to that so quick. Yeah, that was in the first 14. Hmm. Jesus, yeah, that must be due for an update. Yeah. Uh, Andriana says, thanks for making this show. It brings me so much joy. Oh my God, Andriana, reading that brought me so much joy.

Starting point is 04:36:18 You bloody legend. And the last one this week comes from Tessa Chilcot. Okay, elephant and sparkly sloth wrangler when they escape the do-gone zoo. And I guess that happens pretty regularly if we need someone on that full-time. So, you're doing great work. That's who you want to be. I mean, I'm up for the sloth wrangling. Elephant wrangling a little trickier.

Starting point is 04:36:44 Yeah, that feels like you're draw the short straw on that one. Yeah. Uh, and Tessa writes, so when I was a wee baby test, I was obsessed with the cartoon, Babar, Babar, I should say. I love Babar. Babar, is what we said,

Starting point is 04:36:59 but like we said, but I know I've heard it different ways. I always thought it was Babar. Babar, Babar, Babar. Babar, I definitely said Babar, but I don thought it was Babar. Babar, Babar. Babar. I definitely said, Babar, but I don't know that's true. There you go.

Starting point is 04:37:09 I loved Babar as I caught as a kid, the cartoon. And I feel, surely did you learn it from reading a book? Yeah, probably. Well that's maybe why, because I record I learned it from the cartoon. So would be funny if I got the pronunciation wrong. Definitely watch the cartoon with Cornelius, the old. That's rather rhinoceros. No, the old elephant was

Starting point is 04:37:28 Cornelius. Yeah, I think you love the grandfather. But the room, much plot-wise, except that I liked it. So yeah, test was obsessed with Babar and Winnie the Pooh. When you were little, what was the one show or cartoon that you were absolutely obsessed with? I mean, at different times, with different cartoons. Just depend about the era. I remember loving the Ninja Turtles at a time. Captain Planet. Captain Planet was definitely one that came to mind for me. Which in the world watcher? A lot. Is it definitely cartoon?

Starting point is 04:37:58 Yes, cartoon. Because Power Rangers also came to mind. But yeah, definitely. And then later in middle primary school, it was Pokemon. And then Dragon Ball Z was huge. Ooh, got a catchable. All the Dragon Balls. Got a catchable. You got to re-enight them. I'm trying to think of the cartoons.

Starting point is 04:38:17 Really young, I remember loving the lost cities of gold or something. It's the vagus memory. I think I watched it when I was three or something. I loved Harvey Birdman, Attorney at Law, but that was probably when I was a teenager. Oh yeah. I loved of the Hannah like Barbarista ones. I loved Topcat.

Starting point is 04:38:35 Oh, okay. I remember loving the Flintstones Christmas specials when they were playing TV when all Christmas in December. I loved watching some of those old cartoons. Other cartoons. I'm gonna think all Christmas in December. I'll have watched some of those old cartoons. Other cartoons. I'm gonna think of a bunch later. What else? Oh, I love the show builds.

Starting point is 04:38:51 What cats? Oh. Some more obscure one. Astro boy. Love the Astro boy at a time. Park a mice from Mars. The Samurai pizza cats. These are all the knockoff.

Starting point is 04:39:06 The Ninja Tilted. The knockoff, yeah for sure. Yeah, so many good ones. I liked... What duck towels I loved? A bit of Dexter's Laboratory, which we covered in episode on your... I'm a response cat. That was great.

Starting point is 04:39:21 Dark Wing Duck. Oh, that was good. I enjoyed that a lot. Do you remember Camp Duckula? Yes, I had a toy of that one. A toy of that one. A toy of that from a happy meal. Remember, that's a good get.

Starting point is 04:39:35 Hey Arthur or just Arthur? Oh yeah. Hey Arnold. Hey Arnold, that's what I've put two together. Absolutely. Yes, I like both of those. Are real monsters? Love to that. Man, we watch a lot of cartoons, the absolute love. Yes, I like both of those. Oh, real monsters, loved that.

Starting point is 04:39:45 Man, we watch a lot of cartoons. Street sharks, let's come up here now. That's another big turtles knock off of me. Yeah, that one had really good toys. Mm. That was just for selling toys. Transformers. Oh, yeah.

Starting point is 04:39:57 X-Men. I don't think I ever, I don't remember ever seeing X-Men, but. Oh, my absolute favorite cartoon network cartoon. Angry Beavers, did you ever watch that? No. I absolutely loved it. That's how you found it. Daggett and Norbert, the Angry Beavers.

Starting point is 04:40:12 What about bangers and mash? I don't know that much. Bangers and mash. Bangers and mash, the chimps are in there, run up, bam. I did a promise about that as well, once a couple of chimps. But it was a short show that was, like, for little kids. Oh, what about Super Ted, did you promise about that as well once a couple of chimps But it was a short show that was life of little kids. Oh, what about super Ted? You watch that? Yes, when he takes his Special pill he becomes super Ted same as banana man

Starting point is 04:40:35 So I've been I love banana man and also loved while making those days there was Roger Ramjet. Oh, yes Roger Ramjet and he man get all the books there after. My dad left it. That's how many is a kid. So when that was repeated, he'd be like, we've got to watch this. Well that's the funny thing about cartoons. They didn't look as dated as other TV shows. Oh yeah. Some of the kids shows. So like old kid shows could look sort of creepy somehow. I think there's something about old Kid shows date really badly But cartoons don't know oh two more I loved Inspector Gadget. Oh, I loved Inspector Gadget. Penny. Oh

Starting point is 04:41:13 Penny brain was the dog's name. That was brain Pinky in the brain Biggie in the brain actually like that too. Oh, I'll see I said two more and then I've lost the last one Ran it's dempied was that on yours? I never like that one. I said two more and then I've lost the last one. Ren at Stempi was that one of yours? I never even get that much into Ren. I didn't know. I didn't know.

Starting point is 04:41:30 I think my mom proved of it. I can't remember. I feel like that was maybe on MTV. So it was Beavis and Butthead, which I never really was so much. Oh, you didn't say that either. I'll Scooby-Doo, huge into that. I'll just go and go. I'll just go and go.

Starting point is 04:41:40 How do Scooby-Doo? Hat. Trying to think of other shows that were on Saturday Disney with hosted by a champagne, James Sherry, who went on to be the Marvel Stadium MC at times. Good on him. He hosted Amazing as well. Oh yeah, that was fun. Which wasn't cartoon still. Oh, there was the Where's Wally adaptation. Oh yeah, I had that at home. The first edition.

Starting point is 04:42:02 The Where's Wally. Where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where, where? Um, geez, that was that question kicked us off a bit there. Tess had to appreciate that very much. I don't know if Tess had to, yeah Tess had to answer a question. Babar and Winnie the Pooh. I never, Winnie the Pooh was on last on Saturday, do you mean? Pooh bear, Winnie the Pooh. And I always found that to be the downer of it.

Starting point is 04:42:37 I liked, I liked it. I would. I would have been because I was associating it with the show coming to an end, because it was the last one they played. And you'd be like, oh no, I was finishing. Oh, what about that one? I've talked about in previous episodes where Blue Bear from the Jungle Book

Starting point is 04:42:49 became a pilot in a different speed. The tailspin. And then we couldn't believe that that was real. And then it was. Yeah. Okay, yeah, I liked a lot of shows as it turns out. And I reckon I haven't thought about a lot of them in a lot of time.

Starting point is 04:43:05 Great question. Thanks, Tessa. Thanks, Andriana. Thanks, Lee. Thanks, Chris. Next thing we like to do is shout out a few of our other fantastic supporters and normally just comes up with a bit of a game based on the topic at hand. Do you have any ideas for this?

Starting point is 04:43:19 I've got to say some incredible nicknames came up on this episode. We spud buckets buckets. Nicky Hollywood Elvis Hollywood Trevor. I think I put that on there. But he had his Hollywood good looks. Yeah his name was Barks, but I think Hollywood Trevor is way better. Yeah there was some incredible nicknames. I thought that maybe I don't know. Do you do we come up with any name or do you

Starting point is 04:43:46 assign them a nickname from a Saints play? Yeah, the do enough for James Will, because it sounds like the youth for Jason Blake, who we called him the youth because he was a utility, could do anything. Yep. Love Blake. He's on one of my favorites. He's on the board now at St. Kilda. He really can do it all. You can play any position on the ground and in the back office as well. All right. Yeah, so what do you want to do? You want to read out the names and I'll find a list of saints. Oh wow Jones and Holy crap. Oh, I don't use them up. We've got to use some of these.

Starting point is 04:44:23 All right. I've got I've got the names here. If you want to assign them a nickname each. First one, thank you so much to Petron supporter from Everett in Washington in the United States. It's Dean Rackdale. Dean Rackdale. All right. Rackdale could be Dean Rackdale.

Starting point is 04:44:40 Dean Rackdale. We're doing nine names, aren't we? Yeah. I've found an article, it's a listicle, and it's counting down the top 20 nicknames of Saints plays. Oh, great. So I'll just, maybe I'll just pick out my phone. Should I just do the top nine?

Starting point is 04:44:57 I'll just do the top nine. Okay, start. I'll take it out of my hands. Starting at number nine, Dean Rakedale, AKA Doggie. Doggie Dean! Doggie Dean. Doggie Dean. That sounds good. And that was A&Rollland's nickname.

Starting point is 04:45:09 He played from 60 to 66. It was a leading goalkeeper in 61. Good, good on your doggie Dean Rektel. Next up, I'd like to thank from Albany in New York State. It's Alexa Riley. Alexa, the tank Riley. Awesome. The tank was Eric Arthur Guy's nickname, a tough and fearless half-backed banker. Alexa Riley. Alexa the tank Riley. Awesome.

Starting point is 04:45:25 The tank was Eric Arthur Guy's nickname, a tough and fearless half-backed flanker, served as vice captain for three of his six seasons, as well as representing Victoria at Interstate Fuddy. Good on you, Alexa the tank Riley. Now from Cran, CranBurn West in Victoria. It's Megan Graham. Megan tractor Graham Tractor was the nickname of John C. Dunin was a defender from Narendera All right so far where three I'm zero from three of having heard of these players. That's amazing, but they're obviously all Some of the greats nicknames wise and-wise, I'm gonna go that far.

Starting point is 04:46:06 Cractor. Cractor is awesome. So that's for Megan Graham, though if she was from America, she'd be Megan Graham. Mm-hmm. You know what I realized when I was in America last month? What was that? Went to a supermarket and I've heard of Graham crackers.

Starting point is 04:46:20 Yes. That isn't G-R-A-M crackers. That's a Graham Cracker. Whoa! What? How about that? Oh, there was a bit of a discussion in the Patreon Facebook month. And a lot of Americans were talking about how they, when we say pawn shop, it sounds like pawn shop.

Starting point is 04:46:50 And I'm like, yeah, I think they are like pornography. Yeah, porn and porn, but they must say them differently. They must hit the W more. Yeah, that also surprised me as well, because I always thought they were said the same. I thought that often a joke would be a pawn shop. What do you mean, pornography shop? Yeah, that's right.

Starting point is 04:47:04 Apparently they hit the R or don't hit the R, don't? Yeah. There you go. Which is interesting, it's also, it's funny because in the explanation someone said, we say pawn like it rhymes with dawn, not pawn like it rhymes with dawn. And I'm like, well, it's all rhyming in my head. Mine exploding. So, who'd you give us then?

Starting point is 04:47:26 That was Megan. The dragon. Next up, this one is from America, from Tacoma, Washington. Big shout out and thank you to Drew Goodman. Okay, the doc. And this is the greatest ever saying. Darryl Baldok. Okay, which I'd never heard the nickname before, but Nick was saying, also known as

Starting point is 04:47:44 the magic one wasn't oh Yeah, something like that the dark Darrell the doc ball doc. Who we whose nickname is the doc now true goodman drew the doc Goodman and also the doc works with where they're from Tacoma Tacoma Talk from the doc from talk Oma Oma I like to think now from a location unknown, we can only presume they're deeper than the fortress of the moles as we speak. Listen to this podcast and it is shout out to Wesley Wesley, okay, Wesley Muncher. Muncher was Brian Maloney, a serviceable rockman originally recruited from St. Pat's in Ballarat. He was a hardworking toilet.

Starting point is 04:48:28 Wow, have you heard of him? No, I haven't heard of Muncher. Don't say what Eerie played in. Wesley Muncher. Munchers are going to nickname though. But remembering where these are ranked in ascending order. Do you feel like the quality's been increasing with each one? But only slightly because we started so high. Yeah, that's right. Because the next one is probably so good. Okay, well this one is going to go to another

Starting point is 04:48:53 person in a location I've known. It's Philippa Lions. Philippa Lions, okay. Philippa Jazz Legs Lions. Oh yeah, that's great. Jazz Leg. Jazz legs was one of the finest senkiel to football as of the interwar years. Cyril Gambetta, eaked out of AFL Korea for himself despite suffering from badly bowed legs, which were a legacy of an attack of polio as a youngster. Oh wow!

Starting point is 04:49:21 That's it, yeah, maybe. That's amazing, still made a career. One of the, yeah, and one of the finest to do it in that period. Even the name Cyril Gambetta's good, but Cyril Jazzleg's Gambetta is, we're getting into all-time greats territory. Incredible.

Starting point is 04:49:35 Thank you, Philippa, Jazzleg's, Lions. Now from Dublin, I would like to thank E-Tain Hobson. E-Tain Hobson, coconut. Which is the nickname of brown-low-medalist Neil Roberts. Okay. I didn't realize that. Who excelled at cent-half-back?

Starting point is 04:49:52 I think it was he the one that Nick was saying was switched from half-four to half-back. And then one that brown-low-medal in 58, capped on the side from 59 to 62. Yeah, he's one of the old time grades of the Sanctuary. Think he's in the team of the century. Coconut Hobson. That's a coconut.

Starting point is 04:50:10 What a great fruit. Oh yeah. I just, I talked about kid shows. I remember it was maybe, it was either on Sesame Street or Play School, you know, when they'd cut away to a video. And there was this sort of short documentary without any narration of just this guy on an island, climbing up a tree,

Starting point is 04:50:27 cutting down the coconuts, and then chopping them open and drinking from him. I'm like, that just looks like what a life. That's paradise. Yeah, really did. I wonder, that's going to ring a bell for someone out there. Yeah, let us know. And from Robin's Dale, man, is this Minnesota? This gets me every single time. Main, that's so many. It is Minnesota. Robin's Tale, Minnesota, shout out to Bradley Bost.

Starting point is 04:50:54 Oh Bradley Bost, okay, the Golden Greek. Okay, Bradley Bost, the Golden Greek. The original Golden Greek was Con A. Gorozidis who had tremendous skills and flair played in the 80s. Oh, great one. I was being a thing in a footy field in the 80s. The Golden Greek. And finally I would like to thank from Stauberidge in Great Britain. It's a big shout out to one name here. Only needed Joe.

Starting point is 04:51:21 Oh, Joe. Okay. Cowboy. Cowboy Joe. Cowboy Joe. That's great. And cowboy was another one of the 66 heroes that was Kevin Cowboy Neil a burly tough character from South Warnable who was one of the most popular players of all time at St. Kilda. His bow legs and distinctive gait and his high flying led to the nickname cowboy. So two of the two of the great nicknames had bowed legs. Yeah. I think he was also the one who, after winning the premiership, he put his premiership jumper on the statue of,

Starting point is 04:51:56 there was a statue in Merabin of this guy, Tom Bent, I think. And he was, I think he maybe even was a dodgy guy, but he was who Bentley's named after the next suburb to Merabin. And he put his, his premiership jumper on, I think that was right, on the Tom Bent statue in the long celebrations after the game. Another iconic moment. There's so many more.

Starting point is 04:52:21 I think we're going to do another five-hour episode. Follow up. Coming up soon. coming up soon. Come on up soon for the 151st anniversary. So thank you so much to cowboy golden great coconut. Jazz legs, Muncher, the doc, tractor, the tank, and doggie. You know who you are.

Starting point is 04:52:37 Okay, Joe Bradley, a Tane, Phillipa, Wesley, Drew, Megan, Alexa, and Dean. And that leaves us only with one last thing to do. And that's welcome. A few people in the TripDitch Club, appropriately this week, just three into the TripDitch Club. Dave, do you want to quickly explain how the TripDitch Club work? This is our whole of fame for people

Starting point is 04:52:57 that have been supporting the club, well supporting the show, fourth. Whether they're going for ball club. Yeah. Well, it's a grand old pod, it's a hot, hot, hot, hot, hot, hot. We basically to shout out to people Whether do it on football club. Yeah, well it's a grand old pod, it's a high-flying pod. We basically to shout out to people that have already been shouted out to, basically these people have already had their shout out, but to say thank you again,

Starting point is 04:53:12 if they've been on the shout out level or above for three consecutive years, Matt checks the records and he welcomes them in each week, new crop comes in, and once you're in, you can't leave, but why would you want to? Because it's inside, it's a restaurant, it's a hangout zone, it's a live music venue, it's a chill bar. Jess has got food and drink, I've got music, you know, it's all happening. That's right. I'll play Jess this week, behind the bar, to celebrate the Saints, of course.

Starting point is 04:53:37 All drinks come served in a replica in 1966 Premiership Cup. Wow. And the drinks are all a red liquid. Maybe cranberry juice mixed with a white liquid. Check out the cover right now. Maybe cream. Milk? Milk.

Starting point is 04:53:57 I can't think of a white liquid. Milk cranberry juice on it. Look at this, that's it. And Sam Booker. Oh, really stuck to landing there. Oh, beautiful stuff. It curdles in the couch, so save it. Curdling in tummy.

Starting point is 04:54:10 Yeah, tummy. We curdle it so you don't have to. And yeah, the snacks are just classic footy francs, party pies, what not. Oh, yeah, absolutely. And Davey normally book a band. You are never gonna believe this. If you tell me you got the fable thing as I,

Starting point is 04:54:24 oh my god, you're gonna possibly got the fable sing as I, Oh my god. You're gonna possibly got the fable singers. I've been booking this band, trying to book this band for so long. Obviously, I've been trying to do this report for so long. So I can't believe on the same night we've just done the St. Guter Football Club tonight. Heating the stage, legendary Australian rock and roll band. The saint, saint.

Starting point is 04:54:39 Oh my god. Can you believe it? You certainly know your product Dave. Can't believe it. And I don't feel stranded in the trip ditch Club at all that is so good I'm burning just like firewood and So you're in for the after party enjoy the saints here Yeah, the fable thing is a probably dead

Starting point is 04:55:00 Although that hasn't stopped you before absolutely never stops me so three great and proud members of the TripTitch Club. I can only assume a staunch thank you to supporters as well. I'm going to welcome him, I'm standing on the door. I'm the dancer. I'm lifting up the velvet rope. You run in, if you name, Dave's on the stage. He's hopping you up. He's going to be a bit of software play on your name or your place of origin or you'll

Starting point is 04:55:28 live where you are. Oh my God, we're running out of steam. We're so good. We're not going on. All right, so three names this week. First in, please make them welcome. From address I know, I can only assume from people within the fortress of the malls, it's Travis.

Starting point is 04:55:40 Travis, I'm travertating towards you. You've got this pool. Dave, you have lifted this week. You're magnetic. You're playing on the It's the big dance and you're doing some of your finest work. Also, please welcome in from Glasgow in Scotland. It's Amy Murety Some people said they needed Lizetti, but I said no more. It's Amy Murety. He's on fire and finally from a pop-ca in Florida in the United States It's Adam Nidacore. Adam!

Starting point is 04:56:08 Son, thank god you're here! Come on here, Adam. I mean Adam. We did it in Travis. We did it everyone. Make yourselves at home, get ready to see the Saints. One of the old time, great. And one of the first ever punk bands to release a single. So, that really doesn't leave us with anything to do.

Starting point is 04:56:26 Anything we need to tell people before we go, Dave. Hey, we'll be back next week with another episode coming up so, so soon. We're heading towards Blockbuster Tover. So who knows, maybe coming up soon, all the episodes will be this long. Because, you know, we've got the biggest and best topics coming up from. This record may never be being. I think we say that every time we break it. Yes, so. Who knows. But yeah, thanks for supporting the show. You can check out all the links to everything at doogawonpod.com, including where you can

Starting point is 04:56:54 suggest a topic, buy some merch, support us on Patreon, check out all that other podcasts, and hit us up on email and the like. But until next week, also thank you so much for listening, and until then, it is thank you. And goodbye. Olaters! C kind of sign us!

Two In The Think Tank - 413 - The History of the St Kilda Football Club

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