I've been looking over the comments during and after each game this year but have hardly been drawn to comment as I let the season unfold.
Losing in Adelaide was a bummer but it was such a great game that there were moments when I thought "I don't care who wins this" - I last felt like that in a Gabba game where Baz kicked the winning goal after the siren. This time in Adelaide we had a couple of very dodgy decisions go against us (hands in the back Eddie, and "that wasn't 15 metres" even though it has been for the past 20 years. I'm glad we went all out in attack in that last minute, even if it meant that Eddie kicked an easy goal to seal their win.
It made me think back over last year. The 2014 GF flattened me (and so many others). It wasn't just losing but the way we lost with nary a whimper while surrounded by the Hawks' brutish, neanderthal supporters.
So last year I wanted us to play uncompromising footy and out-Hawk Clarkson's "unsociable footy". We didn't but we still made Top 4 though injuries made it clear that we wouldn't be 2015 Premiers. I didn't really care about the game much by then because the treatment of Goodes had left me with little enjoyment for the footy at all. Handing out the t-shirts at the SCG Crows game was a bright moment in a dark year for football.
This year we have a bunch of kids and we're playing really fun footy. I can go to the games and feed off their energy. I don't know if it'll last as young bodies get tired but I look forward to the game every week. And I can finally appreciate us having Buddy, not as a means to a flag, but purely for the sheer spectacle he provides.
I wonder if you are feeling the same? I feel like it's a bit like a new dawn. It's more than just the rule changes it's like Heeney, Mills, Papley have given us a lot to look forward to for the next decade at least.
And, after we battled out a win against a much improved GWS I texted a friend to say that I was glad we hung tough then ran away with it when we'd worn them out. She replied "it's the spirit of Brett Kirk". Maybe that's what we were missing the last two years.
Oh, I won't ever go to another Hawks game even if, or especially if, it's a Grand Final. Pies games at Olympic Park were bad enough for the train trips to and from but Hawks crowds are far beyond what I'm prepared to be part of as a modern egalitarian Australian.
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