I’ll never forget a time when I was once playing on Barry Hall back in 2005, long ago in a previous life when I was playing for Essendon. Out of the corner of my eye I saw our team runner come over in my direction. I knew what this meant and I was pretty happy about it… I was being moved off Hally!

My initial thoughts were correct and I was immediately relieved when the runner started signaling me to push up the field, but as I got closer to him he informed me that I was now pushing up and would be tagging Adam Goodes!

I was hoping to be told to play across half forward, maybe even have a gallop up and down on the wing… not Goodsey! I was flat, and considered the situation to be like choosing whether you want to take on a bus or a semi-trailer.

Times are different now and I no longer have to play on Goodesy, and I have the enviable situation of having him as a team mate.

It was such a great feeling to give Goodsey the win he deserved on the day he broke the club games record. Michael O’Loughlin had flown down for the occasion and spoke to us before the game. He spoke at great length about Goodesy. He spoke about him as a player and as a person, and what he had done for the club over the course of his career.

Personally, I found it incredibly motivating, and I could see it had the same effect on the rest of the group. I think this played a part in how we played in the game too.

Josh Kennedy was the stand-out and has now won 3 best on ground medals so far this year, out of only five games! Josh now has a medal collection that even Michael Phelps would admire, and on top of this not one of those medals is a ‘Tool of the Week’ award (Unlike Jude, LRT and myself who are members of this prestigious club). Hope his form continues so one day he’ll be known as ‘the real Josh Kennedy’ as opposed to ‘the other Josh Kennedy’.

Canteen Award

This week the pie and Coke goes to Luke Parker.

There’s no denying Parks is a tough guy. He was pumped up for the game on the weekend - as we all were too - but he got a little too physical in the warm-up, as he was charging in at the tackle pads a little too hard for his own good.

This resulted in Parks getting a blood nose in the on-field warm up. As I saw him trying to get his nose right before we took to our positions I wondered, could Parks’ be the first player in the history of the AFL to be sent off with the blood rule BEFORE THE GAME HAS EVEN BEGUN????

Song of the week

Shane Mumford has had a bit of a rough patch recently trying to fix an infection in his back. To pick his spirits up I thought this week I’d let Shane choose ‘song of the week’ for this week. Here’s his choice*.

All by Myself’ by Celine Dion

Hope to see you on Saturday night when we take on the Crows at the SCG.

Ted Richards
@richards_report

* Shane Mumford may not have actually requested this song