Glenn McFarlane explores the bitter rivalry and hatred between Collingwood and RichmondGLENN McFARLANE,
Herald Sun
April 29, 2018 IT’S one of the most bitter football rivalries laid dormant for more than a generation, almost cryogenically frozen, and it threatens to stir back to life as early as this Sunday afternoon.
You can almost hear the rumble — Collingwood hates Richmond; Richmond hates Collingwood.
Just like it is on the strip of bitumen along Victoria St that separates the neighbouring suburbs, there is nothing else in between, despite the fact the two clubs haven’t played in a final against each other in 38 years making the relevance of the rivalry long questionable.
But as the old foes prepare to square off against each other, before a likely 80,000-plus fans at the MCG, it could herald a rebirth of one of the game’s most antagonistic rivalries.
If it is, it seems appropriate one-time star Geoff Raines — who played for both teams and who was one of the players at the centre of a poaching war between the two clubs during the 1980s, will have one of the best seats in the house at the MCG.
The gun midfielder has been invited to the pre-game luncheon by Collingwood president Eddie McGuire, who himself was transfixed by that rivalry as a kid growing up.
Raines was a three-time Tigers best and fairest winner and had been a member of Richmond’s 1980 premiership victory over Collingwood when the Magpies poached him and teammate David Cloke in what was a tit-for-tat recruiting spree between the two clubs. He was offered three times what he was being paid at Punt Rd, and financially had no option but to move.
That poaching war, which took in a host of players switching sides, ultimately took both clubs to the point of financial ruin, such was the “unfriendly fire” inflicted on each other.
“I am actually going with Eddie and with Collingwood, they’ve invited me to the president’s lunch,” Raines told the Sunday Herald Sun.
“I reckon it is one of the first times I’ve been invited back (to Collingwood), so that’s nice. I can’t wait to be there, as it looks as if there has been a rebirth of the old rivalry again.
“Richmond’s up and about again after winning the flag again last year. Now it looks as if Collingwood is back on track again, which is great for Nathan Buckley. I can’t wait.”
Collingwood and Richmond have met 206 times across 110 years, after the Magpies went out of their way to try to provide a pathway for the Tigers to come into the VFL in 1908.
That act of neighbourly kinship didn’t last long, as a series of defections, on-field — and sometimes off-field — aggression, and ill-will divided the two clubs into very distinct camps.
That lasted well into the 1980s, though the relationship hasn’t quite had the same edge — or animosity — given the lack of finals matches against each other, despite the fact both teams have always possessed strong armies of supporters.
That appears set to change, with Richmond winning last year’s premiership — its first success since 1980 — and becoming the benchmark of the competition, and Collingwood looking as if it is back on track following a dip in fortunes after the 2010 flag and 2011 runners-up performance.
McGuire said he admired what the Tigers had achieved over the past 12 months, saying their recent success mirrored what the Magpies were able to achieve eight years ago.
“You can’t beat the black and white stripes against the yellow and black at the MCG, it just looks right,” he said.
As a kid growing up as a Magpies fan, McGuire will never forget one of the high marks of that rivalry, when 92,436 fans attended the Collingwood-Richmond Anzac Day clash in 1977, when former Tiger Tom Hafey coached for the first time against his old side.
McGuire, then 12, started the day as the euphonium player in the CBC St Kilda school band on the Anzac march, and ending it cheering the Magpies home to a 26-point win,
“I caught the train into the city and I was in the school band,” McGuire said. “We went with the diggers and they used to put on a spread for all the kids who were marching in the band.
“At the game I was standing on centre wing on the southern stand side under the clock, and I will forever remember ‘Sheeds’ kicking the ball the wrong way to Phil Carman at the start of the second quarter. I still remind him of that every time I see him.”
Sheedy joked about the incident this week: “I was ahead of my time, they all kick backwards these days.”
He used that Anzac Day clash as the template for helping to establish what has now become the traditional Essendon-Collingwood Anzac Day tradition, starting in 1995.
Sheedy recalls how long-time Tigers administrator Graeme Richmond — who ruthlessly pursued success and hated Collingwood almost as much as club legend Jack Dyer — reminded the Richmond players before each game against the Magpies why victory was the only option.
“He would say, ‘Those herds of mongrels marching down Hoddle Street are coming to take our land, cocko,” Sheedy said.
Tony Jewell, who coached the Tigers to the 1980 premiership, said hatred almost wasn’t a strong enough word to describe how some of the Richmond greats of the past viewed Collingwood.
He recalled how Paddy Guinane once told how “when he was boy he wandered up to the Collingwood Town Hall to find a girl one night, and all the Collingwood gang turned on him”.
“The players of the Jack Dyer era hated Collingwood,” Jewell said. “He said he hated them so much that he wouldn’t even watch black and white television.
“There is the story that Jack one day asking (property steward) Charlie Callander to take the hinges off the changeroom door before a Collingwood game. He gave a blood-curling speech and then charged through the door ... (with the players believing he had knocked it over).”
Raines called it “tribal warfare” when he played during the late 1970s and early 1980s. “GR (Richmond) was a great orator and one of the great motivators. He used to talk as if Collingwood was the enemy and it was like it was trench warfare.”
“This had been going on for decades and decades, two clubs separated by Victoria Street — one side was Collingwood and one side was Richmond, and nothing else mattered.
“Just imagine if we could get back to that.”
McGuire hopes that is about to happen.
He doesn’t want to put a figure on what crowd will be on Sunday, but he knows it will be one of the biggest clashes in recent memory.
Only once this century has a Richmond and Collingwood game had more than 80,000 fans attend — 81,951 in 2013. But with Richmond roaring along as the reigning premier and Collingwood surging to what could be a first finals series in five years, that figure could be challenged.
“We’ll get a bumper crowd,” McGuire said.
“(The renewal of the rivalry) is one of the reasons why I have pushed for a new stand at the MCG. I reckon what they should do for big games is to have availability of standing room if required, so we can get the big crowds back.”
SEVEN “DEADLY” SINS - WHY THE MAGPIES AND TIGERS HATE EACH OTHER1. MINOGUE WALKS OUTFormer Collingwood captain and returning war hero Dan Minogue walks out to join suburban rivals Richmond after returning from the front in 1919. The furious Magpies make Minogue stand out of football for a year and refuse to pay entitlements from his retirement fund. Minogue exacts his revenge in helping to lead the Tigers to the 1920 Grand Final victory over Collingwood, and two clubs never forgive each other.
2. BORDER WARSCollingwood defeats Richmond in three successive Grand Finals (1927-29), which is bad enough. But on the eve of one of those playoffs, local police are called to break up a brawl between supporters of both teams. History, or police records, fail to recall who won the fight.
3. BOILING POINTCollingwood goalkicking star Gordon Coventry has boils on the back of his neck leading into a game against Richmond in 1936. Tough Tiger backman Joe Murdoch keeps striking him on the back of the neck, prompting the genial forward to retaliate with a rare punch. He is reported for the only time in his career and is banned from the finals, costing him a sixth premiership.
4. IN THE NAME OF THE FATHERJack Dyer, who hates Collingwood with a passion, is suspended for four weeks for striking the son of Collingwood’s legendary coach Jock McHale in 1944. He later explains: “My dream, and I dreamt it often, was to crush McHale (Sr.). But it was an impossible dream. Then lo and behold!! One day Jock McHale (Jr.) did line up on me … in a Collingwood jumper for four premiership points. So it wasn’t the old boy … so what? It was the fruit of his loins.”
5. HART-BREAKINGCollingwood leads the 1973 preliminary final by 45 points during the second term, with Richmond star Royce Hart stuck on the bench as the 19th man with a sore knee. The Tigers introduce Hart during the third term and helps inspire a massive comeback victory, as the Magpies give up yet another seemingly unlosable final. Richmond wins the flag the following week; Collingwood is left to lament what went wrong again.
6. GRAND FINAL MAULINGRichmond records what was then a record Grand Final winning margin of 81 points in a lopsided 1980 premiership playoff against Collingwood. It is the sixth straight finals loss the Magpies suffer at the hands of the Tigers (they have not beaten them in a final since 1937), and the teams have not played in a final since.
7. THE OTHER COLD WARAs the US and the USSR play out the Cold War on the global stage during the 1980s, Collingwood and Richmond go nuclear on each other, pushing each other to the point of extinction. The clubs embark on an expensive poaching war — the Magpies secure the likes of David Cloke, Geoff Raines and later Brian Taylor; while the Tigers claim several Magpies including Phil Walsh and John Annear. Each club almost goes bankrupt in the process.
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