After a looooooong cricket season, southern Australia can breathe a collective sigh of relief – footy’s back.
Tonight, my beloved Carlton Football Club will take on Richmond in the traditional season opener at the Melbourne Cricket Ground. I’ll be at home, on the edge of my seat, willing the Blues on to another Round 1 rout of the Tigers.
Two of the guys to watch tonight will be Tasmanian, Mitch Robinson (#12) and Carlton’s captain Chris Judd (#5).
Robbo’s playing his 50th game tonight and will hopefully attack the contest with his usual vigour (see the video, below). For those non-Aussies watching, all these things are good….. 🙂
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Chris Judd is just a freak…..
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For fans of all things Swedish, here’s the Abba girls in Carlton tops, circa 1977.
Whatever the AFL forked out for AC/DC’s anthem It’s A Long Way To The Top, it’s presumably more than the pair of dark Navy Blue guernseys it cost the then Carlton General Manager Keith “Caper” McKenzie to stitch up Swedish supergroup ABBA way back in ’77.
With the League landing Australia’s unofficial national anthem for use through 2012, thoughts turn to ABBA, specifically its old music clip “Chiquitita”, in which Agnetha Fältskog can be seen belting out the hit sporting the famous CFC across her front. McKenzie, who turns 90 in April, vividly recalled the chain of events which led to Anna and her fellow ABBA songstress Frida Lyngstad getting decked out in dark Navy Blue 35 years ago this month.
“When we knew they were about to land at Tullamarine I told our marketing bloke Michael Whitewood, ‘Grab a couple of guernseys, get up to the airport and take them out to ABBA’,” said McKenzie of one of the all-time great club marketing triumphs.
“The band later headed out to Western Australia to play for shows wearing the jumpers. I don’t know what guernsey numbers they got, but it was a real coup.”
SO there you go….. a Swedish connection.
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Ah, footy. Welcome back.
