Probably the truest part in the play, though, is that of Laurie—the poor old coach who, as is customary it seems when a team is down, finds his head the first one for the chopping block. And talk about nostalgia. Tears come to my eyes when I think of Danny, the skipper and long-time club champion who is about to get the axe after years of selfless service. It’s just like it was 1955 all over again and I’m about to get the old heave-ho as captain of my beloved Maggies. But best of all I like Jock, the conniving, interfering ex-president, former champion and jealous holder of the Club’s longest player record. When I saw the play he was played impeccably by my old mate Frank Wilson. It was a perfect character—a sure thing for an award from the Sacked Coaches Association. So there it is. I felt like I knew each of the six. I’m sure you do too—that’s half the fun of the play. The Club is about the hangers-on, the end of loyalty, the coming of professionalism, big business and massive transfer fees. It’s about each and every club in the Victorian Football League and about rugby, soccer and baseball too.

But for me it’s mainly about Aussie Rules football—the greatest game in the world. Good move, David Williamson!

Lou Richards

WINNERS AND LOSERS

What is The Club about? I suppose you could say that it’s about Melbourne—because Melbourne is about football, and the club is a football club. Melbourne, someone once said, is a city that has no summer; instead, it has a hibernation between football seasons. Every Saturday afternoon, from April to September, more of the people of Melbourne (a city of some two and a half millions) go to the football than attend the soccer in any one week in the United Kingdom. (Note that ‘football’ in Melbourne means Australian Rules—soccer and rugby and gridiron are something else again.)

You can, if you want to—and many do—watch or listen to football previews on television and radio on Thursday and Friday night and Saturday morning; go to the game on Saturday afternoon, listening while you watch to the broadcast reports of other games; and come home to replays and inquests on Saturday night, Sunday, and Monday evening. (The daily and weekly newspapers fill in the gaps left by the electronic media.)

An amateur sociologist once calculated that the opening gambit—after the conventional exchange of ‘How do you do?’ or, ‘Hi’—in 83.5 per cent of Melbourne conversations was ‘Which team do you follow?’ In Melbourne, team-identification is more important than religion, profession or social class. Football is Melbourne’s Saturday afternoon corrida: dying fans have asked that their bodies be buried between the goal-posts or their ashes scattered over the hallowed ground.