Marko is Filling in for this weeks Away Day Review.

So after a off season which felt like an eternity, the Army finally got together for Round 1 and the trek up the Hume Highway to Brookvale Oval – which I would soon find out is the worst Rugby League ground in Australia.

At 1pm, 10 hombres leave the Hellenic Club in Woden armed with little more then their club colours and 3 cases of beer. 5 Minutes into the trip it is realised that my famous mistake of not bringing a bottle opener for the Sharks trip last year has been repeated. In other words, we are screwed.

Not wanting to lose any time, we decide it’s best we hold off buying one until we reach our rest stop destination in Goulburn. So what to do until then? With 10 very intelligent blokes on the bus we were bound to come with up with a good solution. The steps of the bus? Nah too hard, plus only one person could reach them. Shirt? Well have you ever tried to remove tops off Corona’s and Pure Blondes with your shirt? You’ll get nowhere, plus end up with ripped clothing. Teeth? None of us are that brave. Edge of the roof on the bus? An idea so crazy it might even work… and it did! Ignore the fact that we will be travelling at 100+km/h, holding the bottle out the window and ripping it open off the roof is perfectly safe and VERY effective. What isn’t so effective is Ultra’s bright idea to pour excess beer out the window when someone sitting behind him (me) has his window open. The liquid will simply flow straight back into that unfortunate bloke sitting behind them. Another interesting fact I learnt is that window washers don’t accept beer as payment. Guess you can’t drink on the job though.

So after about an hour of travelling we reach our rest stop at Goulburn, and promptly hit Subway to get some much needed food into us. Kudos to Subway Goulburn, they did a great job feeding us.

Now back to the bottle opener crisis, after a discussion that went nowhere I decide to step up to the plate and see what I can find in this local servo. They had 1 type of bottle opener, a dodgy plastic Raiders one, which played an unrecognisable ‘That’s my Team’ every time you opened a bottle. $12.95 too, more then you’d expect but this device would make our lives a lot easier.

A bit later an event occurred which will probably go down as the funniest in Raiders Army history. Travelling along the Hume we come past a car with a group of girls that some of the Army members knew. An unnamed Army member then came up with the idea of something quite “inappropriate”. The idea itself was funny enough, but to gradually creep the bus up beside them only for them to witness this up against the windscreen at 110km/h sent everyone into stitches, the looks on those girls faces was priceless. So not surprisingly they try to speed clear of that sight. We didn’t let them get away so easily though and it took them 2 or 3 times before they finally managed to speed away from the bus. The Army member who knew them promptly received a phone call from one of the girls where they shared their disgust with him and he ensured her that he had nothing to do with it (NOT!)

So at 5:30 we finally reach our destination, ‘Brookvale Oval’. It is obviously called an oval because the ground doesn’t meet the criteria to be classified as a Stadium, and boy does that show. It is fairly ironic that a team in one of the richest areas of Sydney has such a shite ground.

We enter through the turnstiles, luckily for most the Army we pre-purchased our tickets to avoid missing out on a “sell out” crowd. So of course it was of some surprise to get there and see only family, friends and staff in the ground. Not long after entering an Army member who shall remain unnamed breaks our only bottle opener in half, then half again in an attempt to open his Pure Blonde. The bottle opener had a very short life and the “that’s my team” song would never be heard again, was just a shame it had to go out in such a crap place.

With no Premier League team to cheer on we were forced to keep occupied for a few hours, this time was generally spent catching up with our Sydney mates, chanting “Boring” at the game that was being played, and talking about how Brookvale oval looks like the home ground of a Bosnian Division 4 Soccer club. No joke, I reckon a combined Raiders Army with $1,000 in building supplies could knock up a better joint, in fact, the Raiders should offer to lease ACTEWAGL Park to Manly, it would be an improvement on their ground and boost the local economy.

Once we were bored with those activities, we focused our attention on the poor old Army member who was down on the hill with some good sorts. I’m sure he and those girls he was with would have been very impressed at a group of blokes directing chants like “My Space, My Space” at them. Anyway being a good sport he resisted the urge to beat the tripe out of a few of us which would have been well justified.

So 7:30 finally comes, and there is good support for Canberra. I gotta give credit to all the Raiders fans that turned out, we all knew winning at Brooky was a tough ask, yet you all forked out money to stand in a pathetic excuse for a ground to cheer our young chargers on. Immediately we begin chants taking the mickey out of the Manly ground. “My Garden Shed” is one song those upper class clowns will never forget. Now for those that don’t know the tune, I will share it with you right now.

“My Garden Shed
(Repeat)
Is Better then this
(Repeat)
My Garden Shed is better then this,
It has a door, and a window,
My Garden Shed is better then this”
Sing as many times as you want.

Not long into the match Colin Best marks a superb Raiders debut by spilling a ball on his own after trying to retrieve a kick. A benefit off the doubt decision sees Manly up 4-0. Minutes later Todd Carney grounds the ball in near identical fashion yet it is disallowed? From there things turn bad quickly, and what should have been a 4-4 score line quickly became 14-0 at Halftime.

Quick points after halftime were needed, and they came in the form of Marshall Chalk. Unfortunately straight after that the lights went out. Heres an idea Manly: How about you spend less money on Lyon’s contract and pay your stupid power bills. After 5 minutes of blackout we were away again, sadly our momentum had been clearly killed off by that extended delay. Only a few minutes later the lights went out again, but this time they decided to continue playing. Surely not? That’s right folks, a top flight game of Rugby League was being played with half the lights knocked out. To quote an Army member “I’ve seen better lighting at Monday OzTag at Kambah Oval”. Not much to say about the rest of the game, we fell apart and copped the biggest loss of the weekend. Despite this some moronic Manly fans would feel the need to throw beer cans at us because they couldn’t hack we were still laughing despite being 20 points down. But the less said about that the better…

Full time comes by and we leave that swamp, 2 points would have been nice, but instead we just leave with a random backpack, mistakenly picked up by an (again) unnamed Army member.

We realise we are low on petrol, so pull over at a servo, unfortunately all the petrol money was spent on the 3 beer cases so we each chip in to ensure we could return home.
The trip home really needed some cheering up, that came in the form of seeing Raiders board member Jim Murphy at the traffic lights. So we do the natural thing and cheer him on giving him a clap. His response – to lock his door? Surely he didn’t think we were going to carjack him did he? Anyway further up the road was Local Radio/Canberra Times writer Tim Gavel, he appreciates our attention, but him and the person he is travelling with turn down our offer of Sour Cream and Onion Chips, guess they aren’t fans of that flavour.

The rest of the trip home was a pretty quiet one, most of us were just plain exhausted.
After a long trip back we finally arrive in Canberra at 3am, I get off in Civic and immediately run into some Raiders fans celebrating St Patrick’s Day. They are as disappointed as me and still puzzled to why Zillman was left out.

The Raiders loss had been a real downer. However I must mention the fine 24-hour restaurant we attended at around 1:30am. I’m not sure of the exact location, but it is near Hungry Jacks, and is pretty much the only thing open in the area. At 1:30 am you don’t expect to get the best food, but this place was more than willing to cook up some fresh Chicken Schnitzel Burgers, although if you are buying one of these at 1:30 you don’t exactly want a ready made one.

So at the end of the day:
Bus fee + Beer: $50 a head
E-Ticket to Manly: $27
Food: $30
Returning home to God’s country and not spending a night in that hole of a city otherwise known as Sydney: Priceless

Next game is against the Storm at home, lets hope for a big showing to push the guys home.

Cya there,
Marko.

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