Vdubs
Hall of Famer
As usual, very well put.It's pretty much impossible for me to compare, to be honest. For a start, I'm an MCC member, so for every Geelong v Hawthorn game, I'm in an area that would be at least 60% Hawthorn. I'm a Premium B City member, so if it's a City home game, there's just a sprinkling of Victory people around and I'm about five metres from the sideline, compared to usually level two at the MCG. I also have far more genuine dislike for Hawthorn than I do for Victory. I'm hungry for City to start to consistently be the best Melbourne team and bridge the gap in attendances and members over time, but in general, I don't have anything against Victory (besides some of the tossers that come in here). I went to the game last night on a Victory supporter's membership, sat with a bunch of Victory-supporting mates and cheered Finkler's goal. Unless I've got money on the result, I always want Hawthorn to lose and even though I have plenty of good mates that are Hawthorn supporters, I can't imagine ever going to a Hawthorn game against anyone other than Geelong.
The game day experience is also far different, as I'm sure most of the people on Big Footy (especially Victorians) grew up alongside friends that supported all of the Victorian clubs and it was never a big deal, a bit of good-natured banter aside. I've resented the times when I've been told that I need to exit AAMI Park at a different gate to where I would choose. With City/Victory, there's far too much monkey see/monkey do with our excitable European friends and I just have never understood all this firm/ultra BS.
A classic example of this would be walking to the Christmas derby up Swan Street, with a mate who wasn't going (but is, incidentally, a Victory member). We were walking past the Post Office Hotel (the nearest pub to the rail bridge on the eastern end) and there was maybe 15-20 Victory supporters milling about out the front. I would have been to dozens of Geelong games at the MCG walking the same route and seen a similar-sized group of Hawthorn/Collingwood/Carlton etc. supporters, so didn't even give it a second thought. But once I got to the middle of the group, they formed a circle and started chanting 'YOU'VE GOT NO FANS...YOU'VE GOT NO FANS...etc...' I just laughed at them and started clapping as I walked on, but they probably did the same thing to every MC supporter that walked past. And I don't care what anyone here says about A-League supporters being persecuted in the media and by police: if I had walked past the same spot six months from now in a Geelong polo shirt and Joffa and 20 Collingwood cheer squad members had been sitting there, I'd be surprised if they even looked up. There is a bit of mob mentality and a lot less respect generally between the opposition supporters, as far as I'm concerned. Heart/City is hardly blameless in this regard either: way too preoccupied with what Victory is doing and the anti-Muscat, anti-Thompson, anti-Victory chants are bad enough at a derby; they're absolutely pathetic, when they pull them out when we're playing another team. Small town mentality and it's symptomatic of what's been wrong with this club historically (starting with the CEO).
It's a different experience between the sports and I think anyone that doesn't acknowledge that is kidding themself, frankly.
Where would your seat normally be using the City bench as a landmark, looking down on the game?
Divorcing all those issues is not easy. I am just starting to feel that the atmosphere at a Derby is electric, even without scores, and hard to remember the last AFL game that felt like that with 27000 people.