Oh the drama!
Travelling to and from Wagga on the weekend with DVD players that wouldn’t work. I repeat wouldn’t work! The toilets at rest areas, hair pulling Olympics in the back-back seats and… Carlton’s Brock McLean not shaking Brett’s hand on Saturday night! Which just so happens to be a wonderful lead in to part two of my ‘influences’ blog following on from last week.
I think about how anxious I was with Indhi starting school and then watching half of the game on Saturday night (please excuse me for this, as it was not aired in Wagga until 11pm at night. Toothpicks in eyes kinda stuff…) and seeing some of the new red and white recruits running around the ground at Blacktown - it got me thinking. How did the parents of some of these young boys feel when they packed up and moved away to pursue their AFL dreams? Pride aside, surely there would have been some anxiety? Nerves? Worry?
The footballing world is like no other. It’s big business and now your 17, 18 or 19-year-old son is in the mix of it. Some might argue that this is not really different to your child going away to university. It is. It is very different.
At university there is no daily scrutiny on form, no media and cameras and journalists to speak to and no longstanding relationships you are trying very hard to fit in to.
And then on the TV the commentators flash back to the beginning of the game when Brock McLean refused to shake Brett’s hand and I think of the responsibility of role-modelling AFL players have. It’s not just about off-field behaviour and drugs and alcohol it’s about the simple, forgotten things too like the art of handshaking at the start of the game. Showing good sportsmanship is role-modelling regardless of what level you are playing at.
Hayley Kirk
Also-known-as-The-Other-Half
Brett shakes hands with his Pop, Wally Moras, a WWII Kokoda veteran
The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Sydney Swans Football Club
