Disappointees,
"a bloody point".
As my former mother-in-law used to say.
A bloody point.
Amatuer mathmeticians describe it in football terms as the "slimest of margins".
You can't be done out of playing in the Grand Final by half a point.
And there's only one way to get a bloody point in the rugby league and that's via the courtesy of the bloody field goal.
Not that Balmain didn't use the device to get to the post on more than one occasion during the season.
But still, it's still a bloody point.
The scoreboard doesn't lie.
Can't argue.
Those who drifted into the ground on a whim remarked on how it was such a lovely balmy night for football.
The Olympic public transport system had been cranked up to full scale for the evening and everything - then as now, ten years on -- worked perfectly.
No waiting, no delay, anywhere, anytime.
Magnificent [but will no doubt be topped by Delhi].
Nicely seated in the SW corner just back from the corner flag with a tip top view of the southern in-goal; seats not plated in platinum, but pretty good for thirty bucks.
Found ourselves next to a very vocal Rabid Western Suburbs Fan.
We got on well; me yelling "c'mon Balmain", him yelling "c'mon Wests" or "c'mon Magpies", in the true spirit of the joint venture.
The first half was a curious affair; as the Good Lady Wife remarked drily just before the break "we've been robbed blind in the penalty count, you know" [5-0 as it turned out], then, just as she said it, the Tigers finally got one for inside the ten..
Suddenly its dawned on me why the St George defence is rated so highly -- they continuously play from an offside position with the connivance of the cheatin' Bamfords!
Nice work if you can get it.
And yet Balmain somehow led 12-6 at half time, while looking good about it.
The Dragons are a pretty dirty side too; one of the worst in fact, putting on cheap shots a plenty.
They've not had a terribly good track record down at The Tribunal, as you'll recall.
The deliberate knees into the back of Lote "wot I do guv" Tuquiri, while he was on the ground and defencless, was a prima facie case.
In my day, that was clearly a send-off offence, and yet in this day and age of weakness on the part of officialdom when it comes to clear cases of foul play, the Bamford's attention had to be drawn to the fact that Lote had copped it bad in the back door, by the Bamford upstairs!
Can't abide that.
Lord save us.
As the massive crowd roared with that peculiar sound of a rugby league crowd in full throat; could not help thinking that the forces of evil were conspiring against "us".
Still, there was nothing to complain about heading to the bar at the break.
The pack, as usual, aquitted themselves well, while the backs did enough -- almost -- but it was that sort of game from early on where there didn't appear to be any stand-out Tigers player.
It was always going to be hard to pick a man of the match.
Not looking for heroes, as there were none to find.
The Rabid Western Suburbs Fan spent a lot of the second half warning the Tigers in no uncertain terms about the dangers of allowing the opposition too much field position where they might get into a place where they might consider trying to pot a drop goal.
Everyone's jaw dropped when that strange freak Soward did just that in the 75th minute from a fair way out at a fair angle.
And that was that.
Game Over.
Kaput.
Balmain turned over to receive the gigantic tusk up the runter through no fault of their own.
The Rabid Western Suburbs Fan wept openly on the full-time hooter; there was no way he could hide his humanity or the tears streaming down his cheeks from his convulsive weeping.
It was a pretty raw scene among the sobbing Balmain fans all around, really.
Is this what football does to people??...crossed my mind.
Then we all went home, profoundly disappointed, perhaps even "shattered".
They could have just put "all played well" in the Best: column in the Wests Tigers scorebox in the Sunday fishwraps.
That would've been enough.
In the dug out, SC Sheens could be seen resting his chin comfortably in his hands, showing not a hint of emotion at the denoument.
The bloke is reputed to only ever having smiled once.
He would have -- some time later -- in his cups, scratched that one into the "we'll learn from our losses" side of the Coach's Ledger, signed it off, and closed the book.
Ducked my head into the Front Bar at The Local mid week as is my wont, to be told that the result was met with a general shaking of lowered heads among the afficiandos on the day.
The Philosopher, in a rare outburst, was reported to have railed against the Hare-Clarke-McIntyre-Lewis-Duckworth system as "a complete joke", and left it at that.
As they say in the classics, there's always next year.
ST GEORGE-ILLAWARRA DRAGONS 13. Tries: Nightingale, Smith. Goals: Soward (2). Field Goals: Soward (1).
WESTS TIGERS 12. Tries: Lui, Tuqiri. Goals: Marshall (2).
Crowd: 71, 212.
At Olympic Stadium, Homebush.
And so endeth the Winter Game wire for another year.
Thanks for all the outrageous suggestions, crazed comments, cock'd'up criticisms, downright abuse and drunken ramblings...
It's been fun.
There will be the occasional post on the Summer Game wire on the escapades of MJ Clarke and any first class cricket that may be witnessed first hand, so, until then, get a dog up ya.
