Tweet
Went to see this in the city today. If you're ever in Melbourne, there's only one reason a Swans fan would go. More on that in a minute.
The 'Hall of Fame' part of the name should be removed as false advertising. Here I was expecting decent sized exhibits for each of the inductees - I realise you couldn't have entire cabinets for every one, but at least a shelf of memorabilia (that would be about 8 inductees per cabinet, making about 24 cabinets and a decent afternoon's worth of stuff to look at) would have been nice.
Rather, each of the legends has a locker-sized exhibit (one of Bob Pratt's jumpers is in his one), and for the rest of the inductees there are 10cmX10cm cards on a wall... less info than you can find on the AFL site. Ridiculous. There's also a cabinet for each of the clubs... ours has one of PK's jumpers, his Brownlow and b&fs (good of him to let the HoF use them), a training jumper from the '80s (whoopie-doo) and the sort of Swans flag that you buy in K-Mart. Very little effort has gone into it at all, except for PK's contributions.
The 'AFL Sensation' is nothing special. The theme of it is that you're a rookie in Grand Final week. David Parkin and Garry Lyon do mock-up versions of a coach and assistant coach doing a post-match address, training session and stuff like that. There's a 'Footy Facts' trivia game that would be fun if it didn't take about 90 seconds for each question. You can pretend to be a Channel Nine commentator and host The Footy Show. You can play some weird game where you play volleyball against a robot on a TV screen.
After about 45 minutes, I was heading for the exit wishing I hadn't bothered. Until something caught my eye. It was a premiership cup. Not having seen one up close before, I wandered over to have a look.
It's ours! It's the 1909 premiership cup that was made retrospectively this year. Made my day, to see something that I wasn't even aware existed yet. The name on the cup is obviously South Melbourne... but it's OURS. Seeing that cup there made the early days when our club was a powerhouse seem to come back to life.
I stood there in shock for a bit. Walked around it, making sure I didn't miss a detail. I considered going and asking who I had to bribe to get it out of the case so I could touch it, then decided that I'd never forgive myself if I dropped it. That cup represents the history that has managed to survive despite everything that the last 30 years has thrown at it. I reckon it's pretty much worth the price of admission on it's own.
I don't know if there's 1918 and 1933 cups out there - if there is, I just hope at least one of them finds it's way to the SCG, where we can all see it everytime we go to a home game, and see tangible proof that we DO have a long and proud history.
The 'Hall of Fame' part of the name should be removed as false advertising. Here I was expecting decent sized exhibits for each of the inductees - I realise you couldn't have entire cabinets for every one, but at least a shelf of memorabilia (that would be about 8 inductees per cabinet, making about 24 cabinets and a decent afternoon's worth of stuff to look at) would have been nice.
Rather, each of the legends has a locker-sized exhibit (one of Bob Pratt's jumpers is in his one), and for the rest of the inductees there are 10cmX10cm cards on a wall... less info than you can find on the AFL site. Ridiculous. There's also a cabinet for each of the clubs... ours has one of PK's jumpers, his Brownlow and b&fs (good of him to let the HoF use them), a training jumper from the '80s (whoopie-doo) and the sort of Swans flag that you buy in K-Mart. Very little effort has gone into it at all, except for PK's contributions.
The 'AFL Sensation' is nothing special. The theme of it is that you're a rookie in Grand Final week. David Parkin and Garry Lyon do mock-up versions of a coach and assistant coach doing a post-match address, training session and stuff like that. There's a 'Footy Facts' trivia game that would be fun if it didn't take about 90 seconds for each question. You can pretend to be a Channel Nine commentator and host The Footy Show. You can play some weird game where you play volleyball against a robot on a TV screen.
After about 45 minutes, I was heading for the exit wishing I hadn't bothered. Until something caught my eye. It was a premiership cup. Not having seen one up close before, I wandered over to have a look.
It's ours! It's the 1909 premiership cup that was made retrospectively this year. Made my day, to see something that I wasn't even aware existed yet. The name on the cup is obviously South Melbourne... but it's OURS. Seeing that cup there made the early days when our club was a powerhouse seem to come back to life.
I stood there in shock for a bit. Walked around it, making sure I didn't miss a detail. I considered going and asking who I had to bribe to get it out of the case so I could touch it, then decided that I'd never forgive myself if I dropped it. That cup represents the history that has managed to survive despite everything that the last 30 years has thrown at it. I reckon it's pretty much worth the price of admission on it's own.
I don't know if there's 1918 and 1933 cups out there - if there is, I just hope at least one of them finds it's way to the SCG, where we can all see it everytime we go to a home game, and see tangible proof that we DO have a long and proud history.
Comment