Bigfooty rivalries

[PhatBoy]

I love Mr Magic. His presence gives me something to do in my quieter moments. Trying to unravel the mysteries of his mind and make sense of his rambling posts is as good a test of anybody’s critical acumen as they are going to find anywhere, I can highly recommend reading him for this purpose. Another huge favourite is Hawk supporter Leeda . He is pretty out there, his cryptic prose is a study in freestyle thought journey you are not likely to see replicated in your lifetime.

My thoughts sometimes when reading Leeda’s posts:

 

[Meteoric Rise]

The Richmond v West Coast rivalry on here is easily explained.

On the one hand you have the most footy club of footy clubs. With a heart, a soul, a history forged in 140 odd years of existence. A club whose home ground was the site of the first ever game of Australian Rules Football, and thus remains the epicentre of world sport, with sometimes a hundred thousand people at a time coming to be near the hallowed field and The Swinburne Centre. Sometimes quite a few of them drop into the boutique stadium next door as well to catch up with proceedings there. This is a club whose bonds with its members have been handed down from one generation to the next since time immemorial.

On the other hand you have the Indian Pacific Company and its board room manufactured football team.

Of course there is going to be a bitter rivalry from their side. They wish they were us but realise this can never be.


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The North v Bombers rivalry is also easily understood once you realise the foundation members of the EFC were a bunch of fox-hunting namby-pamby ponces, and North Melbourne and its football club have always been closely linked to the criminal under-class, something that has carried seamlessly into the modern era, ex-coach Brad Scott kicking the sh!t out of a defenceless Hobart security guard during one of North’s games there being just one example. But embezzlers, scammers, drink-drivers, wife bashers, thugs who assault parents watching their kid’s play footy, all in recent years, all proving the club is inextricably linked to crime.

So this relationship between these two clubs was never going to go well regardless of other events, but there were other events….

First thing here is you need to understand that the Essendon FC is not really the Essendon FC at all. They took the name of the suburb situated to the North of North Melbourne probably because it held some sort of cachet at the time, this being before airplanes were invented to render the area….well, watch The Castle, you will understand. There was a real Essendon FC, they were known as the Dreadnoughts, and played out of Essendon Rec Reserve, now known as Windy Hill, or to the enlightened, Windy Heap.

So anyway, the real Essendon Club was happily toiling away in the VFA whilst the imposter identity thieves were playing out of East Melbourne and anywhere else they thought they could worm their way into. And they were encroaching on the recruiting zones of West Melbourne FC, North Melbourne FC, Hotham FC and others by being there. They were essentially unwelcome anywhere, something that has also continued seamlessly to this very day.

So the Imposter Player Stealing Ponce Fox-Hunter FC was playing in the VFL and North Melbourne FC was playing in the VFA, trying to gain admission to the VFL all around the 1920 era. Anyway, the story goes the Bombers, after being evicted from the East Melbourne Ground in 1920 agree to merge with North Melbourne FC. This gets North into the VFL, and gives the unwanted-in-any-suburb “Essendon” Same Olds a home to slime their way into. As part of the deal, in 1921 North disbanded and transferred its players to the interlopers, after making a merger agreement including this detail. Only the Ponce FC went back on its word, tried to take over Elizabeth Arden St by adverse possession and picked up a load of North’s best players in the process, Sydney “Syd” Barker being the most famous of those.

Anyway, parallel to all of this the VFA were protesting to the state Govt that allowing the VFL club to occupy Elizabeth Arden St would result in all of its lucrative inner city venues having been taken over by the VFL. The Govt sided with the VFA and barred “Essendon” FC from playing out of Arden St. The interlopers then decamped to Windy Hill, evicting the real Essendon FC, the Dreadnoughts, from this ground in the process, leading to the death of that much loved club. And they took all of North’s best players with them. A new North club was formed and accepted back into the VFA, and a few years later admitted to the VFL in their own right. But they were seriously depleted by the backsliding Bombers having effectively stolen their best players, who could not now return as the VFA had banned them.

This is the reason there is a very ancient and deep-seated rivalry between these two clubs. But let’s face it, everyone hates the Bombers for one reason or another. Their disruptive history serves as a warning to all to avoid ever dealing with them. Bomber fans will even try to deny this rivalry exists because to acknowledge it would reveal their true identity, and it is one of which to be completely ashamed.

 

[bigpapagman]

The Essendon v North rivalry is one-sided. I don't waste my time hating on irrelevant clubs like North.

Wow. This is rich.

 

[Off Tap]

Richmond is the biggest fish (the minnow) in the pond while WCE (shark) is the biggest fish in the ocean.

Minnows are jealous of sharks.

 

[Philth]

One of the strangest things on BF is Collingwood supporters.
Mostly polite, well informed, amusing posters.
Where are the toothless bogans screaming that Dusty is a NTTAWWTter and throwing their beer at me?
Surely they at least have a smart phone with predictive text?

 

[Brutalitops]

The Richmond v West Coast rivalry on here is easily explained.

 

[Cursed Cat]

One of the strangest things on BF is Collingwood supporters.
Mostly polite, well informed, amusing posters.
Where are the toothless bogans screaming that Dusty is a NTTAWWTter and throwing their beer at me?
Surely they at least have a smart phone with predictive text?

agreed; always been an oddly respectful tone from Collingwood supporters; Geelong fans would have no complaints with them on the whole I wouldn't have thought

 

[Goomba1973]

At risk of turning this thread into an example, I reckon there was a shift when we won in 2019 and staked our claim as best of this sort of period, I feel like some Eagles fans felt that title was theirs for the taking. Prior to that it was pretty amicable, Richmond supporters generally worshipped Dom Sheed for his acts. In fairness to Eagles supporters some Richmond supporters were dismissive of the Eagles 2018 premiership.

It is quite funny to be honest but we both tend to have a healthy respect for what the other has accomplished, and for about 5 minutes Dom Sheed was the most loved man in Australian History and an honorary member of every club , well ...........except Collingwood that is.

 

[HTT]

It is quite funny to be honest but we both tend to have a healthy respect for what the other has accomplished, and for about 5 minutes Dom Sheed was the most loved man in Australian History and an honorary member of every club , well ...........except Collingwood that is.

More than 5 minutes for me, he's a hero for life unless he does it to us