ON my first night in Sydney nine years ago I spent two hours in a club with my mate trying to work out which of the women we were talking to at the bar were actually transvestites.
On my last Saturday night in Sydney, nine years ago, I spent the evening asleep on a bench at the airport waiting for a Sunday morning flight home as a security guard paced up and down beside me.
And I’ve got to say that both experiences were probably better than my latest Saturday night in Sydney watching the city’s football team.
Sydney FC, in fifth place, were taking on eighth and bottom place Perth Glory in the Hyundai A-League. Australia’s top flight has been through one of those oh-so common sports rebrandings – the local newspaper refers to the teams as franchises, the teams have new names and colours and before the match there’s even a reminder over the PA system to get your entries in for the clubs new nickname competition.
But the A-League is more like the Z-League when it comes to football. And the atmosphere at the Sydney Football Stadium is a little odd too.
When I last visited Australia in 1998 I actually watched Sydney, then called Sydney United, in action against Brisbane Strikers. The match was also a Saturday night, pre-pub kick-about, the fans were mainly ex-pats in their 40s and 50s wearing Celtic and Leeds shirts and the football was combative to say the least.
Now though the game is all about diving and pushing and shoving – all niggly fouls and ‘not me ref’ incidents.
I spent the match in The Cove – an area behind one of the goals reserved for the real hardcore fans. Though such is the nature of hardcore fans in Sydney that I was able to pay 18 dollars (eight pounds) for my ticket on the intenet. Games rarely sell out here.
The Cove is full of the sort of Australians we always wanted to send out of
our country – beer drinking, overweight, raucous and some truly dreadful hair.
If you thought the mullet went out of fashion with Hoddle and Waddle in 1987, think again. Twenty years on there are mullets galore here.
The fans in The Cove whip each other up into a frenzy with their songs straight off the terraces of England in the early 70s.
Their central defender Mark Rudan is off to join former Sydney boss Pierre Littbarski at Avispa Fukuoka in Japan and as this is his last game, the home crowd are keen to recite their little ditty for him:
“Mark Rudan is a big blue man/Get past him if you f**kin’ can/Try a little trick/He’ll make you look a dick/He’s big Mark Ru-dan”
Most of the chants are of a dreadful throwback nature – United We Stand, Hey Jude, Nick Nack Padywack – I mean which credible football fans in 2007 would chant “Give a dog a bone”?
Sydney play in a kit similar to Wycombe Wanderers and the standard of football is pretty much like watching Wycombe despite the fact there are five players on the pitch who have played in England.
Sydney’s star man is former Middlesbrough striker Juninho but he doesn’t play tonight. By the time the teams take to the field Hayden Foxe (ex West Ham), Tony Popovic (Crystal Palace), Steve Corica (Wolves), Nicky Rizzo (Liverpool) and most curiously, Michael Bridges are in the respective line-ups.
Most of the players in the A-League are mid thirty-something former Socceroos
– John Aloisi is probably the star name in the league at the moment.
As for Bridges, still only 29, the former Leeds and Sunderland man signed from Hull City in August forms a three-strong attack with Corica and rising star Alex Brosque, who is being watched in the crowd by new national boss Pim Verbeek.
Perth score twice late in the first half through Billy Celeski and soon after the break they are 3-0 up to the delight of their tiny contingent of visiting fans.
Steve Corica pulls one back straight away but by the time Michael Bridges slots in a 90th minute goal, Perth have scored again with Celeski completing his hat-trick and the game finishes 4-2 to the away team.
The football, to be honest, was shocking. – It’s easy to see how the standard of football in a nation like Australia drops when the best players are asleep in Europe waiting to play in the top flights in England, Scotland, Holland and Germany later that day.
But then football is way down most Australians list of sports they follow behind cricket, rugby, Aussie rules and surfing, so that may be why attending a match here feels like being in a timewarp.
Oh, and just to complete the retro feel to the whole occasion, a punch-up between two booze-fuelled Sydney fans breaks out just yards from me as the game draws to a close.
And to think just a few weeks ago Sydney beat David Beckham’s LA Galaxy 5-3 in the same stadium. It seems tonight the only thing worth beating was a path to the pub for a post-match pint.
On my last Saturday night in Sydney, nine years ago, I spent the evening asleep on a bench at the airport waiting for a Sunday morning flight home as a security guard paced up and down beside me.
And I’ve got to say that both experiences were probably better than my latest Saturday night in Sydney watching the city’s football team.
Sydney FC, in fifth place, were taking on eighth and bottom place Perth Glory in the Hyundai A-League. Australia’s top flight has been through one of those oh-so common sports rebrandings – the local newspaper refers to the teams as franchises, the teams have new names and colours and before the match there’s even a reminder over the PA system to get your entries in for the clubs new nickname competition.
But the A-League is more like the Z-League when it comes to football. And the atmosphere at the Sydney Football Stadium is a little odd too.
When I last visited Australia in 1998 I actually watched Sydney, then called Sydney United, in action against Brisbane Strikers. The match was also a Saturday night, pre-pub kick-about, the fans were mainly ex-pats in their 40s and 50s wearing Celtic and Leeds shirts and the football was combative to say the least.
Now though the game is all about diving and pushing and shoving – all niggly fouls and ‘not me ref’ incidents.
I spent the match in The Cove – an area behind one of the goals reserved for the real hardcore fans. Though such is the nature of hardcore fans in Sydney that I was able to pay 18 dollars (eight pounds) for my ticket on the intenet. Games rarely sell out here.
The Cove is full of the sort of Australians we always wanted to send out of
our country – beer drinking, overweight, raucous and some truly dreadful hair.If you thought the mullet went out of fashion with Hoddle and Waddle in 1987, think again. Twenty years on there are mullets galore here.
The fans in The Cove whip each other up into a frenzy with their songs straight off the terraces of England in the early 70s.
Their central defender Mark Rudan is off to join former Sydney boss Pierre Littbarski at Avispa Fukuoka in Japan and as this is his last game, the home crowd are keen to recite their little ditty for him:
“Mark Rudan is a big blue man/Get past him if you f**kin’ can/Try a little trick/He’ll make you look a dick/He’s big Mark Ru-dan”
Most of the chants are of a dreadful throwback nature – United We Stand, Hey Jude, Nick Nack Padywack – I mean which credible football fans in 2007 would chant “Give a dog a bone”?
Sydney play in a kit similar to Wycombe Wanderers and the standard of football is pretty much like watching Wycombe despite the fact there are five players on the pitch who have played in England.
Sydney’s star man is former Middlesbrough striker Juninho but he doesn’t play tonight. By the time the teams take to the field Hayden Foxe (ex West Ham), Tony Popovic (Crystal Palace), Steve Corica (Wolves), Nicky Rizzo (Liverpool) and most curiously, Michael Bridges are in the respective line-ups.
Most of the players in the A-League are mid thirty-something former Socceroos
– John Aloisi is probably the star name in the league at the moment.As for Bridges, still only 29, the former Leeds and Sunderland man signed from Hull City in August forms a three-strong attack with Corica and rising star Alex Brosque, who is being watched in the crowd by new national boss Pim Verbeek.
Perth score twice late in the first half through Billy Celeski and soon after the break they are 3-0 up to the delight of their tiny contingent of visiting fans.
Steve Corica pulls one back straight away but by the time Michael Bridges slots in a 90th minute goal, Perth have scored again with Celeski completing his hat-trick and the game finishes 4-2 to the away team.
The football, to be honest, was shocking. – It’s easy to see how the standard of football in a nation like Australia drops when the best players are asleep in Europe waiting to play in the top flights in England, Scotland, Holland and Germany later that day.
But then football is way down most Australians list of sports they follow behind cricket, rugby, Aussie rules and surfing, so that may be why attending a match here feels like being in a timewarp.
Oh, and just to complete the retro feel to the whole occasion, a punch-up between two booze-fuelled Sydney fans breaks out just yards from me as the game draws to a close.
And to think just a few weeks ago Sydney beat David Beckham’s LA Galaxy 5-3 in the same stadium. It seems tonight the only thing worth beating was a path to the pub for a post-match pint.
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