ANY GIVEN FRIDAY NIGHT

by Clyde the Clifton Hill Cabbie

I'm very excited to announce how specially proud I am of the contribution I made to the Melbourne Football Club's Debt Demolition extravaganza the raised in excess of $2,000,000.00 on Tuesday evening.

My contribution was not as handsome, nor did it come in the form of the huge piles of cash contributed by the club's high roller supporters but it was still significant in its own humble way.

I speak here of the important and vital professional services I performed on the evening of the big event.

First, I drove one of the club's generous supporters to the function and then, close on midnight, I queued up in Elizabeth Street, Kensington along with about twenty other cabbies waiting to ferry the punters safely home from the event in the Clydemobile after having relieved themselves of a reasonable percentage of their personal fortunes. I also acted as interpreter for the other cabbies.

Not only that, but the evening was so lucrative for me personally that I ended up making a donation to the Debt Demolition fund in the form of the proceeds of the tip he provided at the end of the journey (the "tip" somehow managed to salute the judges in race 4 at Morphettville the following day paying a handsome $16.20 for the win).

In this day and age when much talk in the football world is about tanking, I have to admit that my fare on the outward journey was, err, fairly well tanked up himself.

I gathered from his babbling that he was suitably impressed by the events of the evening and in particular, one piece of vision shown early in the piece which carried the soundtrack of the famous speech made by the Al Pacino character in the movie "Any Given Sunday".

In the film, Pacino played Tony D'Amato, a character based on long time Dallas Cowboys head coach Tom Landry. The fare was so inspired by this speech to the footballers in the film that he wants Dean Bailey to repeat it verbatim to his players pre match on Friday night as the Demons gear up to face premiership favourite Geelong in their round 19 heritage game that marks the 150th year of Australian football. He thinks the words will motivate the young Demons to overcome the adversity of a seemingly unbeatable foe.

I have an alternative suggestion which is to get singer David Hobson to repeat his rendition of another piece of American schmaltz, "The Impossible Dream" but I'm meeting a lot of resistance. Nobody has ever sung a sixties pop song in a pre match warm up in the 150 year history of the game and lived to tell about the experience. I doubt whether things are going to change in that regard any time soon.

Pity!

Anyhow, I've been given the gig of driving this bloke to Friday night's game with the promise of another big tip (this time in the Liston Stakes at Caulfield on Saturday week) but I promised him I would try to convince the powers that be at the Melbourne Football Club that Bailey be asked to render the Inch By Inch speech to the players before the game. He believes that the only way the Demons can beat the AFL's power house is the little bit of extra inspiration that this speech provides. Here are the words from the script:

I don't know what to say really.

Three minutes to the biggest battle of our professional lives all comes down to today.

Either we heal as a team or we are going to crumble.

Inch by inch play by play till we're finished.

We are in hell right now, gentlemen believe me and we can stay here and get the shit kicked out of us or we can fight our way back into the light. We can climb out of hell. One inch, at a time.

Now I can't do it for you. I'm too old.

I look around and I see these young faces and I think I mean I made every wrong choice a middle age man could make.

I uh.... I pissed away all my money believe it or not. I chased off anyone who has ever loved me. And lately, I can't even stand the face I see in the mirror.

You know when you get old in life things get taken from you. That's, that's part of life but you only learn that when you start losing stuff.

You find out that life is just a game of inches.

So is football.

Because in either game life or football the margin for error is so small.

I mean one half step too late or too early you don't quite make it.

One half second too slow or too fast and you don't quite catch it.

The inches we need are everywhere around us.

They are in ever break of the game every minute, every second.

On this team, we fight for that inch. On this team, we tear ourselves, and everyone around us to pieces for that inch.

We CLAW with our finger nails for that inch.

Cause we know when we add up all those inches that's going to make the fucking difference between WINNING and LOSING between LIVING and DYING.

I'll tell you this in any fight it is the guy who is willing to die who is going to win that inch.

And I know if I am going to have any life anymore it is because, I am still willing to fight, and die for that inch because that is what LIVING is.

The six inches in front of your face.

Now I can't make you do it. You gotta look at the guy next to you. Look into his eyes.

Now I think you are going to see a guy who will go that inch with you.

You are going to see a guy who will sacrifice himself for this team because he knows when it comes down to it, you are gonna do the same thing for him.

That's a team, gentlemen and either we heal now, as a team, or we will die as individuals.

That's football guys.

That's all it is.

Now, whattaya gonna do?

Well, what do you think?

THE GAME Melbourne v Geelong at the MCG - Friday 8 August 2008 at 7.05pm

HEAD TO HEAD

Overall Melbourne 83 wins Geelong 118 wins 2 draws

At the MCG Melbourne 51 wins Geelong 49 wins

Since 2000 Melbourne 6 wins Geelong 8 wins 1 draw

The Coaches Bailey 0 Thompson 1

MEDIA

TV Channel 7 live from 7.00pm

RADIO ABC774 K-Rock SEN Triple M 3AW

THE BETTING Melbourne to win $9.00 Geelong to win $1.03

LAST TIME THEY MET Geelong 16.16.112 defeated Melbourne 12.10.82 at Skilled Stadium in Round 3 2008

This was a real impossible dream for the Melbourne Football Club, coming off two losses aggregating 199 points and playing the reigning premier on its home turf immediately after the unfurling of its 2007 flag. That's exactly how it turned out, although the Demons with Cameron Bruce back and young Tiwi Islander Austin Wonaeamirri making his debut after coming off the rookie list, made a great fist of things and even took an early 3 goal lead before the Cats went ape for a while when Ablett, Bartel and Corey took control. The Demons were dogged however, fought back a couple of times and were within a goal away from the lead half way through the third term. Geelong steadied and finally skipped away to a handy five goal win which was not the shellacking everyone expected when the Dees were at $34.00 odds to win earlier in the week. Bruce kicked three goals.

THE TEAMS

MELBOURNE

Backs Matthew Whelan Nathan Carroll Chris Johnson

Half backs James Frawley Matthew Warnock Paul Wheatley

Centreline Cale Morton Cameron Bruce Simon Buckley

Half forwards Brad Green Matthew Bate Lynden Dunn

Forwards Paul Johnson Colin Sylvia Addam Maric

Followers Mark Jamar Clint Bartram James McDonald

Interchange Nathan Jones Stef Martin Shane Valenti Austin Wonaeamirri

Emergencies Jace Bode Jeff White Adem Yze

In Nathan Carroll James Frawley Nathan Jones

Out Daniel Bell (hamstring) Aaron Davey (foot) Colin Garland (hamstring)

GEELONG

Backs Tom Harley Matthew Scarlett Andrew Mackie

Half backs Harry Taylor Josh Hunt Corey Enright

Centreline James Kelly Max Rooke Jimmy Bartel

Half forwards Gary Ablett Cameron Mooney Steve Johnson

Forwards Mathew Stokes Tom Lonergan Joel Selwood

Followers Brad Ottens Cameron Ling Joel Corey

Interchange Mark Blake Shannon Byrnes Ryan Gamble Brent Prismall

Emergencies Simon Hogan Kane Tenace Travis Varcoe

In Gary Ablett Shannon Byrnes

Out Darren Milburn (suspended) Travis Varcoe

Umpires Donlon Kennedy S Ryan

HONESTY IS SUCH A LONELY WORD

"Honesty is such a lonely word.

Everyone is so untrue.

Honesty is hardly ever heard."

If you ever have the privilege of travelling in the Clydemobile, you'll be able to enjoy music from my extensive Billy Joel collection including the song from which I've lifted the above words. Even the boguns I pick up from tme to time prefer Billy to the eardrum piercing sitar playing cacophony that some of my colleagues play in their taxis these days.

And unless you've been in the Himalayas or Ravi's cab this week, you would know that "honesty" is the buzzword in football at the moment. If only Messrs. H. & R. Shaw and A. Didak would have lived up to Billy's words they wouldn't have found themselves in hot water earlier this week.

In fact, had they taken the time to call Clyde to the rescue when they realised the state of their sobriety, I would have collected them from the Geebung Polo Club and delivered them to the bosom of their families without a single person on earth being any the wiser for the experience. As we all know, cab drivers are people of integrity; we don't gossip, we don't tell tales out of school and we don't tell porkies.

So, I'll level with you right now and give you the honest truth about tomorrow night's Melbourne v Geelong game.

The Cats are going to win!

See, unlike those Magpies, Clyde doesn't tell lies and he doesn't fill his articles with BS. No way Jose. And these are the reasons why the Cats are going to win.

Ablett's back.

Statistically, Geelong has the best ranked attack and the best ranked defence in the competition while Melbourne has the worst ranked defence and the second worst ranked attack. As it that isn't enough, the Cats have Ablett, Bartel, Corey, Enright, Ling and Joel Selwood in their midfield.

Geelong has the experience to easily cover anything the enthusiastic young Demons can muster and anyway, hope and enthusiasm rarely win matches alone.

Finally, even if Dean Bailey does deliver the Inch by Inch speech, the Cats are metres better.

Although Geelong will win this one by 45 points, it will never take away from the fact that Melbourne was the world's first football club and it beat Geelong by a year. I can say in all honesty that during that year, Melbourne was the dominant team in the competition and that I hope that one day soon, it will again take pride of place among all of the AFL's clubs.