rugmop
Senior List
Actually, they didn't have any better ruckmen in my lifetime. For this reason, the only player I'd include in this team, if the interchange bench were extended, as it was for the Fitzroy TOC, that would be Alan Gale. In general, I've restricted myself to players I've seen. The exceptions are Bunton, whom my dad and Jack Dyer said was the best player they'd ever seen. Pretty difficult to argue with that. I never saw Ruthven play, but for a period of at least a decade, he was easily Fitzroy's best player, and certainly in the top five in the League over that period. Anyway, here goes:
B: C. Johnson G. Pert J. Leppitch
HB: K. Murray P. Roos N. Lappin
C: M. Conlan M. Voss J. Akermanis
HF: O. Abrahams J. Brown G. Wilson
F: L. Power B. Quinlan A. Lynch
R: C. Keating S. Black H. Bunton
Inter:J Charman; N. Johnstone; A Ruthven; J. Murphy
Coach: Len Smith
Osborne and Smallhorn can consider themselves unlucky, as if they'd give a toss, especially Wilfred.
Some may be surprised at the nomination of Len Smith. There is a good footy reason, and a personal one for this. When he took over the senior team in 1958, after coaching the thirds for several years, he transformed a bunch of no-hopers into a finals team by being smarter than his opposing coaches. He invented the idea of players constantly rotating positions through half-forward and on-ball throughout a game. He invented the flick pass which gave rise to the use of handball as an offensive weapon, rather than as a method to overcome the panic of being tackled.
Most of all though, Len was one of the nicest football people I've ever met. In 1963, he coached a bunch kids from my school for a couple of hours at the Brunswick St Oval. I learnt more about footy and the philosophy which underlies the playing of the game in those two hours than I had in the previous 15 years, or in the subsequent however many years that is.
He also has written the only credible methodology for a coach to conduct himself in his job. These notes are still as relevant as they were when they were written in the 1960s, and I'd bet putative coaches still read them to this day. He changed the game to a form which is recognisable today, in the space of five years.
Finally, Len had to be my coach because he and his brother Norm were playmates of my father, as they all grew up in what were then the paddocks adjacent to the railway line at Westgarth.
To me, this was a simply brilliant idea for a thread, and I hope I haven't bored you witless with these ramblings. I hope I've managed to convey some of the passions I've developed in following the Lions throughout many years. The disappointment I felt in 1996 has been ameliorated by the pleasure the newer manifestation of the Lions has given me.
