What Sydney-based Collingwood supporters are saying.

[Tooth Fairy]

Originally posted by BAZooka Woman
Three guys go into a bar. There's a moron, a dole-bludger and a Collingwood supporter.

And that's just the first guy.

[TazzaInThePocke]

So this is the best you petty little Swans supporters have hey?

Collingwood comes to Sydney, doing what the Swans have never done, that is bring football to the masses who live AWAY from the sacred Eastern Suburbs of Sydney and all you do is bag them out!

Deadset, you do not have a clue do you.

Sydney have had many opportunities to build a large support base here, but they just havent.

Your club has been to focused on the Eastern Suburbs rather then Sydney as a whole.

Maybe you should be going off at your club, rather then other clubs who are all for the development of our great game in this AFL wasteland.

By the way, Sydney Suck!!!!

[Thunder Shaker]

A Family of Collingwood supporters head out one Saturday morning to do their Christmas shoplifting. While in Rebel Sports the son picks up a Richmond footy jumper and says to his 10 year old sister, "I've decided to become a Tiger supporter and I would like this for Christmas". His sister, outraged by this, promptly whacks him round the head with her carton of Winfields and says, "Go talk to Mum.

Off goes the little lad with the Richmond footy jumper in hand and finds his mother. "Mum?" "Yes son?" "I've decided I'm going to be a Tiger supporter and I would like this jumper for Christmas". The mother is outraged at this and throws her moccasins and a full stubbie of VB at him, promptly whacks him around the head and says, "lets go talk to your father".

Off they go to Pentridge prison during visiting hours with footy jumper in hand and find bubba, his father. "Dad?" "Yes son?" "I've decided I'm going to be a Richmond supporter and I would like this jumper for Christmas". The father is outraged and promptly whacks his son around the head with his fists and says, "No son of mine is ever going to be seen in THAT", and then kicks him from one end of the rec. room to the other for further good measure.

About half an hour later they're all back in the car and heading towards home (Reservoir). The mother turns to her son and says "Son, I hope you've learned something today?" The son says, "Yes knackers I have." "Good son, what is it?"

The son replies, "I've only been a Richmond supporter for an hour and already I hate you Collingwood bastards."

[Grant]

Love it..........and how so very true

[swansrule100]

Originally posted by TazzaInThePocke
So this is the best you petty little Swans supporters have hey?

Collingwood comes to Sydney, doing what the Swans have never done, that is bring football to the masses who live AWAY from the sacred Eastern Suburbs of Sydney and all you do is bag them out!

Deadset, you do not have a clue do you.

Sydney have had many opportunities to build a large support base here, but they just havent.

Your club has been to focused on the Eastern Suburbs rather then Sydney as a whole.

Maybe you should be going off at your club, rather then other clubs who are all for the development of our great game in this AFL wasteland.

By the way, Sydney Suck!!!!

feel free to come say that to my face... u wont get past the first line

[robbieando]

Originally posted by TazzaInThePocke
So this is the best you petty little Swans supporters have hey?

Us petty, hardly. You guys on the other hand........

Collingwood comes to Sydney, doing what the Swans have never done, that is bring football to the masses who live AWAY from the sacred Eastern Suburbs of Sydney and all you do is bag them out!

All Collingwood brought to Western Sydney was a bunch of toothless supporters who would know a piece of soap from a dog turd.

Anyway do you really think that doing 1 Auskick clinic per year does anything for the game up here and do you think holding a training session in front of your own supporters (all 400 of them) makes you any more special from the efforts, Essendon, Adelaide and West Coast have done in the past??? In any case we hold more training sessions and Auskick clinics in the West of Sydney than you do.

Deadset, you do not have a clue do you.

Far more of a clue than you and the rest of you Eddie sheep.

Sydney have had many opportunities to build a large support base here, but they just havent.

Its not like we are playing in a market that loves Aussie Rules football

Your club has been to focused on the Eastern Suburbs rather then Sydney as a whole.

Really, got the proof to back that up or are you just basing that upon the fact most of our members come from the Eastern Suburbs?? No doubt its the myth, because Collingwood opporate on myths.

Maybe you should be going off at your club, rather then other clubs who are all for the development of our great game in this AFL wasteland.

The Swans do far more in the entire city of Sydney than Collingwood do in Melbourne and thats a fact.

[Tooth Fairy]

Originally posted by robbieando



The Swans do far more in the entire city of Sydney than Collingwood do in Melbourne and thats a fact.

Hallelujiah!

[BAM_BAM]

Originally posted by TazzaInThePocke

By the way, Sydney Suck!!!!

and it only took you a month to think of it. Good for you!

[Glenn]

Don't be to harsh BB, he graduates Kindergarten this year

[TazzaInThePocke]

Oh here we go. Look, Sydney Swans arent the only team who people support in Sydney. You guys started the whole interboard thing, so Im here to give you some of yours back.

Im not here to put **** on you as supporters, good on you really, but I am here to point out the downfalls of your club.

I have lived in Sydney for 20 years, and the swans had their opportunity to get me as a supporter, all they had to do was to visit Campbelltown and they would have had me! But they didnt. I support Collingwood, not because they are Collingwood but because they are the Magpies, the same League team that I used to follow.

Why didn't Sydney Swans take the forward step and build when the NRL cut back sydney teams? Logical step right? At least I would have thought.

Im not here to put **** on you supporters like i say, im simply here to chat and see what opposition supporters think. Oh, and maybe one day there will be a Collingwood joke I HAVENT heard...

[NMWBloods]

Originally posted by TazzaInThePocke
Oh, and maybe one day there will be a Collingwood joke I HAVENT heard...

Maybe one day there will be a Collingwood joke you can read... nah, unlikely...

[liz]

Originally posted by TazzaInThePocke


Im not here to put **** on you as supporters, good on you really, but I am here to point out the downfalls of your club.

I have lived in Sydney for 20 years, and the swans had their opportunity to get me as a supporter, all they had to do was to visit Campbelltown and they would have had me! But they didnt. I support Collingwood, not because they are Collingwood but because they are the Magpies, the same League team that I used to follow.

Why didn't Sydney Swans take the forward step and build when the NRL cut back sydney teams? Logical step right? At least I would have thought.

Do you actually know anything about what the Swans do in terms of clinics and other community work around the greater Sydney area?

[DST]

Hi TazzaInThePocket,

I don't know if you can be that simplistic about the whole situation.

In the last 5 to 10 years the club has been much better in connecting with the general public through footy clinics and the team swans program. This has come as a direct result of the club finally being able to generate sufficent revenues to allow them the opportunity of funding these types of programs. The Swans now currently do more promotional work, footy clinics and community service work than any other club in the league.

However you are correct, early on in our move to Sydney the opportunity to get out amongst the community to promote the club and AFL in general was not handled well at all. But hey you can hardly blame them, they were a flat broke club from Melbourne who were transplanted into Sydney with no extra funding or even the most basic training and administration facilities. They were then sold to a mad doctor who had no vision of making AFL work in Sydney and the greater NSW other than using it as a promotional tool for himself. They were flat out just trying to survive, let alone grow the game.

If the AFL had it's time over again, you can be assured that things would have been very different from the funding and facility side when first moving the club to Sydney.

Allowing the club to concentrate on building support in the community from day one, would have had a marked difference on how they went about it.

DST

[TazzaInThePocke]

Firstly, NMWBloods, like i say, get back to me with one I HAVENT HEARD.

Secondly, although the swans are supposidly (i have yet to see them in Campbelltown, despite the fact that this area has one of the, if not the largest level of participation in the Paul Kelly Cup) developing footy in Sydney, they have had 20 years to do so!!!

Sydney made the finals big time in 1996 (forgive me if I am wrong, I was following Rugby League then).

Why then didnt they operate busses, etc to the ground from places such as Campbelltown. You would remember a few years back when north came up and played the 3 or 4 games at the SCG they chartered 5 or 6 busses to run in from Campbelltown to the games. The day cost $20 bucks got me in to the SGC and back home, as well as a ticket into the bradman stand. Bargain! Why doesnt the swans do something like that for supporters from Campbelltown and the outer suburbs.

Sydney Swans need to move away from the whole eastern suburbs centric mindset they are in, that is if Sydney as a city will ever be interested in AFL.

Thats why Collingwood comes up to Sydney for. Collingwood are, lets face it, the biggest team in the country. Forget all this Collingwood are wankers, blah blah blah stuff and look at the money side of it all.

Collingwood have just tonight opened the Lexus training centre, and injected $4 million in to fitting it out. Collingwood consistantly have the largest ground attendences and the largest television ratings of any team in the competition. Collingwood are the Man United or the liverpool of the AFL.

And heres the reason, its their supporters. When you support an AFL team, you follow them through thick and thin. REGARDLESS. Thats what alot of Sydney fans dont do. When the swans are on top, attendences rise, when they arent they fall. the Swans, if they are to ever rule this town, need to stop the crowd rising and falling.

Collingwood have worked with the swans, and as a result the second biggest match of the year (behind the GF) is now played at Homebush every year!

So swans, do Sydney a favour and be the team FOR SYDNEY. You are called the Sydney Swans, not the Eastern Suburbs Yuppy Swans.

It wont change me from Collingwood, the black and white runs in my veins, but it may make the public look up and say, hey this AFL is a pretty good deal. And isnt that what its all about? Bring our game to the masses? Its not about Collingwood being whatever, its not about the swans being whatever. Opinions are valid, but its a case of looking at the bigger picture.

Brisbane (salary cap cheats) have done it, and I know you havent won a GF, but there comes a time when you need to take stock and say, maybe we havent done it...

[liz]

Collingwood have had 100+ years operating in a footy mad town. The Swans in their current incarnation have had just over 20 operating as an ill-supported and misunderstood (until about 10 years ago) outpost in a city that has huge cultural support for a different code of football. To compare the situations of the two is ludicrous.

No one will deny that the move to Sydney was mismanaged, both by the AFL who didn't understand what it would take, and by early administrations of the Swans. That doesn't mean that they aren't doing their darndest to integrate the Swans into the hearts and souls of the Sydney public now. But it will take time - more than the 10 years they have been trying to do it "properly".

If you think that Collingwood are more than "just another club in Melbourne" to the vast majority of Sydneysiders who take a passing interest in AFL you are kidding yourself. Essendon, for example, have done far more over the past 4 or 5 years to help promote the game up here than Collingwood could dream of. The difference is that they just go about doing it, rather than making noise about doing it.

As for the bandwagoners, you're right, there are many Sydney people who jump on and off the team depending on its onfield fortunes. But that is true - to a greater or lesser extent - for every single club in the league (and probably every single professional sports team in the world). Collingwood's membership is at an all time high at the moment, on the back of two recent GF appearances. How was it back in the late 1990s when you hadn't come within a sniff of the finals for three or four seasons. Sure, it was bigger than the Swans at their best, but it was still much lower than it currently is.

Back in 1996 the Swans had fewer than 10,000 members. And that was a huge increase on the number a few years earlier. There now seems to be a floor on the "hard core" members of around 18,000 (I'm ignoring Melbourne members for the basis of this, because their cultural and emotional links to the club are, mostly, a bit different to we "newbie" Sydney based fans). Sure, it's still towards the lower end of the AFL membership league but it represents real progress in under a decade.

If Eddie M and his fellow Melbourne power lords really want AFL to flourish in Sydney, they need to stop taking ill-founded pot-shots at the Swans, pot-shots that you and your fellow Pies supporters lap up without question. They need to take note of the huge amount of work the Swans and the individual players do up here to promote the game at the grass-roots level, and maybe acknowledge it, rather than coming out with daft claims about how they do more good in one weekend than the Swans have done in 10 years. And maybe they could take a leaf out of the books of the Bombers and help promote the game steadily and quietly.

The Swans still have a long long way to win over the hearts of more than a small minority of the Sydney populus. They may never do it, with the strength of the league culture here. But then they have never claimed that they have done it. On the contrary, they keep trying to remind the AFL of how much work there still is left to do. They are just one club working in a cultural vacuum in the largest city in Australia. Do not expect them to work miracles "overnight" and do not kid yourself that a once-a-year McGuire roadshow will make any real difference either.