Tigerland is home to the Sheahans of Mildura
John Harms | May 21, 2008
ON A wintry day in Melbourne, I went to the footy with the Sheahans.
They are, as we say in Victoria, a Richmond family.
Not that they live in Richmond, or have ever lived in Richmond. They have just been involved with the Richmond footy club for years. Richmond is part of who they are. They are Tigers.
I meet them in the second tier of the Great Southern Stand. Back far enough to be out of the vertical rain. But still dampened by the horizontal rain that occasionally gusts our way. It's cold and grey. The players don't look too keen running through the banner.
I know the Sheahans because my brother Mick married one: Janelle Sheahan. Not long after they met at St Anne's College at the University of Adelaide, Mick went to visit Janelle in her room. She was busy studying. Mick was making the talk of the interested, but awkward, suitor. He was delighted to see a footy poster on Janelle's wall: that famous Bob Pratt speccy from the 1930s.
"So you follow the footy?" Mick asked. "Great photo."
Janelle didn't even look up. "Yeah, that's my grandfather."
"Bob Pratt's your grandfather!" Mick blurted, genuinely impressed.
"Nah," said Janelle, without looking up. "The bloke he's jumping all over. Maurie Sheahan. He's my grandfather."
Maurie Sheahan is regarded as one of the best full-backs to play at Richmond. He played in premierships in 1932 and '34. He was then a teacher at St Pat's Ballarat, and a publican in the bush.
The Harmses, of course, are a Geelong family, although none of the past three generations has lived in Geelong. So Mick and Janelle have a typical mixed marriage, which has produced one premiership and two children: Harry, 7, barracks for Geelong, and Angus, 5, barracks for Richmond.
I sit with them, and Janelle's parents, John (better known as "Shorty") and Marg Sheahan, down from Mildura, Janelle's sister Linna, and Uncle Wal and Aunty Clare Sheahan. Harry and Angus are very excited. Their grandfather has taken them down to the Richmond rooms (Harry had to cover his Geelong jumper).
"Who's your favourite?" I ask. "Richo," replies the chorus. "We saw Richo."
The kids were in the rooms because Shorty also played for Richmond. In fact, his debut was against Geelong at Kardinia Park late in the 1962 season, so this is a special day for him. "I played on Roy West," he tells me. "Kicked five points."
It was his only game for the season. He and Marg were studying to be teachers. Shorty then went to play centre half-forward at Sandringham for a couple of years before Graeme Richmond got him back to Punt Road. Shorty is a man of relatively few words. Marg isn't, especially if she's had a champagne or two.
"Graeme Richmond broke our chair," she says. "We were just married. We had nothing. Hardly any furniture. A card table, a couple of plastic chairs. He sat on one and it collapsed."
Shorty wore No. 4. He played about half the games in the seniors in the 1965 and '66 seasons, and played in the reserves premiership in 1966. "It was one of the great days," he tells me. "Three Collingwood sides, and they all went down by less than a kick." He played with Michael Bowden, the father of Joel and Patty.
The Tiges start well. They kick the first two goals, following scrimmages in the square. Richo has been given the freedom to roam. He marks in the forward line. Then he contests on the members' wing. He warms the crowd. When Gary Ablett looks to have slotted through a running goal, Richo appears on the goal line to save the day. "Richo is everywhere," Shorty says delightedly.
The Cats are complacent. The Sheahans are animated; the Harmses concerned.
Shorty and Marg went to the bush in 1967. They had a young family and Shorty was offered the job of director of physical education for the Sunraysia district. He passed on the No. 4 jumper to Royce Hart ("Shorty's claim to fame," Marg says). He played footy at Red Cliffs in the Sunraysia league, and then Werrimul in the Millewa league, where he kicked bags of goals for season after season.
After half-time, the Cats lift their intensity and smash the young Tigers. The Sheahans take it reasonably well. Even young Angus.
The Sheahan clan walks down Swan Street in Richmond looking for a pub. The leaves blow along the footpath.
We get to the Vaucluse. Shorty gradually recognises it. It's like the opening scene from Brideshead Revisited. "We used to come here all the time when I was playing," he says. "This was Graeme Richmond's pub. He was a good man. The sort of bloke who, when he spoke, you listened. He just had that way about him."
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