Living History

From soccer to football

Hello, I thought I’d write in with a slightly different kind of ‘football’ story for your Living History project… I was born in England and migrated to Australia in 1983, I’d never heard of AFL until then. I used to play football (or as Australians call it, soccer) on the weekends and after school, usually in the street using bins for goals. (When we couldn’t find bins, we’d get our sisters to stand very still in the position…) My dad was a huge fan and sometimes went to the games. When he did he’d come home and tell us the whole story of the game, kick for kick, goal for goal, from start to finish, it was better than listening to the commentators on the radio! In 1966 when England won the world cup final (thanks to Geoff Hurst’s legendary hat trick) my dad threw a party - I don’t think he or his friends were sober for a week.

I moved to Australia with my wife Enid and our kids who were all under five at the time. Because there wasn’t much coverage of soccer-football on television, I started watching AFL. My wife likes watching it too, she’s always amazed at how high men jump when marking the ball, as they say: ‘They must be part kangaroo’. My kids really love the game, at one point they were all on their high school team and made it to the semi-finals. We’ve been to a couple of games ourselves as a family, mainly Melbourne games because my kids all barrack for the Demons, and then after we’ll have a traditional ‘fish and chips’ dinner. It’s a shame the kids don’t play soccer like their old man but they do get a touch of the World Cup Fever every four years and support Australia.

I think a lot of other migrants like me played soccer to begin with and then started watching AFL later on...

Clyde, Ringwood, Victoria

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