Football tragedies

[Moi]

Listening to the Peter Crimmins story and how he was left out of the 1975 Grand Final side.
They've got a file tape of Crimmo getting stuck into the selectors Ken Herbert and John Williams who voted him out of the team.
He's saying, he could not go to the game and sit with them (is very disappointed - extremely bitter - with them and the club).

I worked with John Williams at the time, and remember coming to work the day after selection night, and will never forget how distraught he was that he left him out of the team.  John's reasons, if i remember, was for the team and just couldn't include Crimmo.

Shame Peter had such animosity towards him, because I don't remember ever seeing a bloke so cut up at this decision.  Damn sure i wouldn't have liked to have been in his position

Great little player, Peter Crimmins 

[mightytiges]

On the 100 years of Australian Football DVD that came with the AFL game, there's a section on Peter Crimmins and him missing out on the 1975 GF after training so hard to get back for that game. It's the best non-Richmond story on the DVD by far. Very well done. They don't go into what Crimmins said to the selectors but they interview John Kennedy and he says that Crimmins let them know what he thought of them and the decision. IIRC Kennedy said the final vote came down  to him and he didn't think Crimmins was fit to play and so he didn't play. Kennedy then added "and we lost".

I'm not sure why you'd play the recording now as it does a disservice to Crimmins. Even Kennedy said he understood as Crimmins would have been devastated by the decision.

[Moi]

I'm not sure why you'd play the recording now as it does a disservice to Crimmins. 

Yeah, i was thinking the same at the time.  It sounded very bitter and twisted, and makes these guys sound like a couple of dogs, when they were just working in the best interests of the club.  Whether he could have played or not, the whole thing was a great tragedy.

[julzqld]

I remember when he died, we had some sort of fundraiser at primary school  to raise funds for the Peter Crimmins Foundation and they had a competition to see who could write the best letter to the Foundation and yours truly won and had to read the reply letter in front of the whole school at Monday assembly.

[mightytiges]

I'm not sure why you'd play the recording now as it does a disservice to Crimmins. 

Yeah, i was thinking the same at the time.  It sounded very bitter and twisted, and makes these guys sound like a couple of dogs, when they were just working in the best interests of the club.  Whether he could have played or not, the whole thing was a great tragedy.

Agree Moi. Playing the tape now also takes things out of context. Crimmins had hardly played a game that year if at all (I'm was too young to remember) and the Hawks had made the GF without him and had defeated the Roos two weeks earlier. Sure Crimmins was the captain, a great footballer and had worked his guts out on the track to get back but as a selector you wouldn't have changed the team if you're being objective. In hindsight because they lost, it looked a poor decision. On the DVD they played Kennedy's half-time GF speech and oddly it was about Crimmins not being there. From that it seemed the whole would/wouldn't he be selected had distracted the Hawks and taken their focus away from the game. Who knows really though as all the support was for the Roos to win their first flag. As you say Moi, the whole thing was a tragedy.