Docker by proxy

It’s the hope that kills you, so says the old sporting cliché. I have heard it often enough but as a lifelong Carlton fan, I had forgotten what it was like to actually experience. I haven’t had hope this century. But today. Ah, today I remembered. For the first time since I was 18 years old, I was riding every moment of the AFL grand final, fully invested on behalf of my nine-year-old son, who is a passionate Fremantle supporter. By the end, I could barely watch. I had genuinely forgotten how high and low footy could make you feel.

Fletcher’s love of the Dockers is infectious. He chose the team himself, when he was maybe four years old and going through a phase during which he was obsessed – and I really mean obsessed – with pirates. He could quote nearly the entire 1950s Disney Peter Pan film and would dress up in full pirate garb, drawing his toy sword on us at random places around the house while we were carrying a laundry basket or preparing a meal.

So, when he started to become aware of football teams, naturally he chose the side that had anchor in its logo. At first, he called them the Fremantle Pirates and had limited interest in or understanding of footy. But they were his team, if anyone asked. I would never force my own team on any of my children, especially given the lows that Carlton had experienced. Nor would my wife, Zoe, who had drifted to Hawthorn when her childhood team, the Fitzroy Lions, ceased to exist in their original form.

Just like little Jackie Paper eventually grew out of playing with Puff the Magic Dragon, who ceased his fearless roar, one day, Fletcher played pirates for the last time. We will never know exactly when it happened; that’s the poignancy of parenting, you celebrate the firsts but you don’t know the lasts are lasts until it’s too late. But we always have Fletcher’s love of the Fremantle Dockers to remind us of the little pirate boy he once was.

And just as he used to dress up as Peter Pan, so now he puts on his Freo gear and embodies the Dockers. Barracking for Fremantle while living in Melbourne could be a lonely existence for a child, but Fletcher has always had an incredible inner confidence in himself. He was never going to be peer pressured into changing teams at school. He knows himself and he knows what he likes.

At his primary school there is an annual footy day at the end of term three, when the students dress in their team colours and as each club song is played, the kids who support that team run a lap and represent their side. I have had few prouder parenting moments than seeing him confidently jog around last year, the only Freo fan in a school of 550 students, high-fiving everyone as they cheered him on. For a young kid, that takes some nerve.

He loves Luke Jackson the most, but of course he likes them all. Shai Bolton. Murphy Reid. Alex Pearce. There’s barely a player on the Dockers list he doesn’t know all about. I think of myself at nine years old, poring over all the team lists, memorising player names and stats, and I see the same in Fletcher. I think my Dad was similar. When he was young, he made cut-outs of hand-drawn footballers from all the VFL teams and played out imaginary games in his bedroom.

Dad is a Geelong supporter and at various times during their 44-year premiership drought I recall him saying that he had become philosophical about football, not worrying so much about the results. I used to wonder how that was possible; now, with Carlton 31 years into their own drought, I know exactly what he means. It’s a defence mechanism. Keep your hopes low and you can’t be disappointed. Of course, when the highs eventually come, maybe you don’t experience them as vividly.

Geelong broke their drought in 2007, then won again in 2009 and 2011. And in 2022. At the start of this year, I took Fletcher and my Dad to see Fremantle play Geelong at Kardinia Park. It was a beautiful multi-generational day, even if Fletcher did end up disappointed when the Dockers gave up a big lead and lost the match.

Thirty-five years earlier, Dad had taken me to Kardinia Park to see my first live AFL game, and although Geelong beat Carlton that day, it was a hugely memorable occasion as Dad talked his way into the Carlton change rooms after the match so I could get autographs from all my favourite players. Even coach David Parkin, grumpy as all hell after a big loss, scrawled his name for me in my Footy Record.

Those are the moments that live in a child’s memory, and I’m pleased that Zoe and I have been able to give Fletcher a few of those as well, meeting his Dockers heroes at training and standing in the guard of honour as they ran out onto Marvel Stadium to play against the Bulldogs last year. Premierships are great, but those special occasions never leave you.

Carlton hasn’t made the grand final since 1999, when they lost to North Melbourne, but from finishing sixth I never expected them to get that far, so losing wasn’t the blow it otherwise could have been. It helped that the Blues defeated arch-rivals Essendon in one of the all-time great preliminary finals the week before, which was almost better than winning the grand final would have been.

When Carlton last won the premiership, in 1995, I was 14 years old and was at the peak of my footy-following. It was a great year for the Blues and I remember it fondly. It was also the year Fremantle debuted in the AFL. I remember finding out what the new Fremantle team would be called from watching The Footy Show – little did I know that three decades later, I would have a son obsessed with the Dockers and would myself view them firmly as my second team. Fletcher’s passion is so infectious that he has essentially converted Zoe into a full Dockers fan - watching the team play every week with Fletcher has become a highlight of her week .

I can’t go that far myself, but boy did I want them to win today. For Fletcher, and for football. As a former cricket journalist, I’m always barracking for the story, and while Chris Fagan’s three-peat is a great yarn, nothing hits like a big, drought-breaking win. But mostly I wanted Fletcher to experience what it’s like to win a grand final. I know all too well it can be a very long time between opportunities.

With four minutes to play it felt like they almost had it, but I was still worried. This Brisbane Lions team has been there, done that, and nothing can compare to grand final experience. It all came crashing down so quickly. I wish Wharfie Time had been put away for the day, a distraction the Dockers didn’t need at that critical time. But the Lions earned the win in those dying stages. Good on them. Philosophical.

Sometimes, some teams need the experience of losing a grand final to win one. It was true of this very Brisbane side, and I hope it’s true of Fremantle. They should be a contender for years to come. But for now, what can you say to a nine-year-old in this situation? Turns out, not much needs to be said. By bedtime, he had moved on – still disappointed, of course, but lacking the perspective of years of heartache. That’s the innocence of a young footy fan. And after the ugly bottle-throwing scenes at the Hawthorn-Brisbane game last week, it’s refreshing to realise that he understands better than many adults that it’s just a game.

Still, I hope he doesn’t get too philosophical about his footy yet. I hope his passion lives on for many years.

For me, I’ll enter 2027 hoping that one of the longest ongoing premiership droughts is broken – either Carlton’s 31 years or Fremantle’s 32 years. At least nobody in the family barracks for St Kilda.