Morning all.
(Digression)
When I was told I had to preview the game against North, I found difficulty in maintaining focus. Desperate to find inspiration I wandered out into the backyard where I found myself gazing at a small slater slowly devouring a random tomato seedling, feebly struggling through the meagre compost layer in an attempt to find any minor source of sustenance. What an utterly pointless existence, I thought, as I looked around the unkempt debris of my neglected garden and brushed the biscuit crumbs off my Ben Nason
jumper. The poor thing wandered joylessly across the waste, paused, circled aimlessly once or twice and then headed back whence it came, never looking enthused, or doing anything remotely interesting until it disappeared from view. It’s probably dead now, but I don’t really care – its life was brief and futile and if it does turn up again, it will probably be doing something even more tedious.
(Digression ends. Not sure what that was all about).
It’s fair to say overall that Richmond’s form this season has been disappointing, but probably more accurate to use the term shithouse. Now normally (35 of the last 39 years), this would be business-as-usual, but due to unusual occurrences in recent seasons, some Tiger fans have become accustomed to watching their team win a few games and the inevitable reversion to mediocrity has hit some hard. But this is the circle of football – old players get older, young players are never as good, and the selectors are like your Granny, wearing the same hairstyle from the 1950s, because ‘It was good enough back then, and I don’t want to change now’.
Anyway. There’s a game of football on this weekend (no idea where or when) and Richmond are in it, so I guess those tired ‘supporter’ neurons of my brain will creak into action once more and I will find myself staring at a high-def rendition of grown men playing a child’s game. I may shout rude words at random pixels now and then, but overall I will probably remain near-comatose and at the game’s conclusion consider getting a head start on filling out those exciting census forms. Or Richmond may win.
And it’s North Melbourne. I like North Melbourne. Sure, there was only one kid at Primary School who barracked for them (Dad was a Sheffield Wednesday fan), their old ground was a true cesspit and getting there was like doing a tour of the backblocks in Sao Paulo, but they generally punch well above their weight and they’ve had some great players – Wayne Schimmelbusch, Malcolm Blight, and who can forget Brett Allison and that tremendous leap?
North are doing it tough right now, but that’s because their kids are not much good yet (rather like us, except that our old guys are not much good anymore, either). They’ve shown some spark here and there and managed to spring a few upsets - they may still finish last, but they’ll take a couple of teams down along the way. Which all means – you know what I’m saying here.
If we are to achieve our ultimate destiny this season (being slaughtered in the first week of Finals), we definitely need a lift from many players. This is the last Hurrah for our ageing leadership group, before the official handover to Nank, Lambert, Vlastuin and co, and so I’m hoping for a Coccoon-like resurgence. Jack’s a step slow now, and most of his goals have come in ‘junk time’ (or as it’s better known, the entire 2021 season), Cotchin’s about 3 steps slow and his disposal is growing more abysmal by the game, Grimes and Astbury are just hangin’ in there and Sheds is a shadow of himself – even when compared to last year. We need those guys to stand up as our kids have alternately sparkled (Bolton, Chol), fizzled (Bolton, Chol) or stagnated (RCD, Ross, CCJ).
Look, we can still make Finals, but we need to pull our proverbial fingers out and for some things to go our way (god, it sounds like 1990-2010 all over again). At least our forwards, mids and backs are all playing as a team (albeit a terrible one), reading our injury list is like channelling James Donald from The Great Escape, and some of the mathematical ladder permutations I’ve seen by optimistic Tiger fans would baffle Euclid but there is a faint hope.
It’s still good to be the King (if only for a couple more weeks).
(Digression)
When I was told I had to preview the game against North, I found difficulty in maintaining focus. Desperate to find inspiration I wandered out into the backyard where I found myself gazing at a small slater slowly devouring a random tomato seedling, feebly struggling through the meagre compost layer in an attempt to find any minor source of sustenance. What an utterly pointless existence, I thought, as I looked around the unkempt debris of my neglected garden and brushed the biscuit crumbs off my Ben Nason
PLAYERCARDSTART
Ben Nason
- Age
- 34
- Ht
- 179cm
- Wt
- 79kg
- Pos.
- Fwd
Career
Season
Last 5
- D
- 11.3
- 3star
- K
- 7.1
- 3star
- HB
- 4.2
- 3star
- M
- 3.3
- 3star
- T
- 2.3
- 4star
- G
- 0.7
- 4star
No current season stats available
- D
- 13.0
- 4star
- K
- 9.0
- 4star
- HB
- 4.0
- 3star
- M
- 4.2
- 4star
- T
- 3.2
- 5star
- G
- 0.6
- 3star
PLAYERCARDEND
(Digression ends. Not sure what that was all about).
It’s fair to say overall that Richmond’s form this season has been disappointing, but probably more accurate to use the term shithouse. Now normally (35 of the last 39 years), this would be business-as-usual, but due to unusual occurrences in recent seasons, some Tiger fans have become accustomed to watching their team win a few games and the inevitable reversion to mediocrity has hit some hard. But this is the circle of football – old players get older, young players are never as good, and the selectors are like your Granny, wearing the same hairstyle from the 1950s, because ‘It was good enough back then, and I don’t want to change now’.
Anyway. There’s a game of football on this weekend (no idea where or when) and Richmond are in it, so I guess those tired ‘supporter’ neurons of my brain will creak into action once more and I will find myself staring at a high-def rendition of grown men playing a child’s game. I may shout rude words at random pixels now and then, but overall I will probably remain near-comatose and at the game’s conclusion consider getting a head start on filling out those exciting census forms. Or Richmond may win.
And it’s North Melbourne. I like North Melbourne. Sure, there was only one kid at Primary School who barracked for them (Dad was a Sheffield Wednesday fan), their old ground was a true cesspit and getting there was like doing a tour of the backblocks in Sao Paulo, but they generally punch well above their weight and they’ve had some great players – Wayne Schimmelbusch, Malcolm Blight, and who can forget Brett Allison and that tremendous leap?
North are doing it tough right now, but that’s because their kids are not much good yet (rather like us, except that our old guys are not much good anymore, either). They’ve shown some spark here and there and managed to spring a few upsets - they may still finish last, but they’ll take a couple of teams down along the way. Which all means – you know what I’m saying here.
If we are to achieve our ultimate destiny this season (being slaughtered in the first week of Finals), we definitely need a lift from many players. This is the last Hurrah for our ageing leadership group, before the official handover to Nank, Lambert, Vlastuin and co, and so I’m hoping for a Coccoon-like resurgence. Jack’s a step slow now, and most of his goals have come in ‘junk time’ (or as it’s better known, the entire 2021 season), Cotchin’s about 3 steps slow and his disposal is growing more abysmal by the game, Grimes and Astbury are just hangin’ in there and Sheds is a shadow of himself – even when compared to last year. We need those guys to stand up as our kids have alternately sparkled (Bolton, Chol), fizzled (Bolton, Chol) or stagnated (RCD, Ross, CCJ).
Look, we can still make Finals, but we need to pull our proverbial fingers out and for some things to go our way (god, it sounds like 1990-2010 all over again). At least our forwards, mids and backs are all playing as a team (albeit a terrible one), reading our injury list is like channelling James Donald from The Great Escape, and some of the mathematical ladder permutations I’ve seen by optimistic Tiger fans would baffle Euclid but there is a faint hope.
It’s still good to be the King (if only for a couple more weeks).