Moorabbin City v Hamlyn Rangers 1982

The footage above is from the Metropolitan League Division Four game at Victory Park between Moorabbin City and Hamlyn Rangers in 1982. The game was played on Saturday June 19, with Moorabbin winning 3-2, to do the double over Rangers after winning 3-1 in Geelong on the opening day of the season.

Moorabbin City folded at the end of 1998, while Hamlyn Rangers are now known as Geelong Rangers. The league was won by the now defunct Caulfield City, with South Oakleigh runner's-up and Sandringham City in third. Moorabbin City would finish eighth, while Rangers wound up twelfth of fourteen.

Sandringham City's team included former Socceroos Jimmy Mackay and Jimmy Armstrong. There were three Geelong teams in the division, with Rangers competing in local derbies with Geelong and North Geelong. For a full look at the season check out OzFootball here. Drago Krajina of North Geelong won the League Best and Fairest Award.

Moorabbin's Matchday programme made a couple of appearances early in the season before going into recess, so there was no issue for this game. There was a special edition produced for Presentation Night, which can be found here.

I got to play with some of those first team players a decade later when they'd dropped down to the thirds, including goalscorer Trevor Bishop who once slammed one in from near halfway on the back pitch at Bailey Reserve. Tony Wynton, Gary Carlisle, Steve Martin, Tony Morgan, Peter Crawford, Steve Thomas, Mick O'Neill, Dave O'Gara and Brian Barlow were the others still playing for the thirds at times during the 1990's. Steve Thomas would often back up in the thirds on a Sunday after playing seniors or reserves on a Saturday, I wonder if that still happens anywhere?

Moorabbin's Best and Fairest votes for this game were 3 for Paul Tierney, the eventual winner. John Rigby picked up the 2, and Steve Gregory got the single vote. Gregory would win the Metropolitan League Division Four Best and Fairest Award the following season.

THAT Goal

Searching Youtube for early Socceroos footage, I stumbled across a great channel which contains classic 1960's through to 1980's British football games, including full episodes of The Big Match and Match of the Day.

One episode is well worth a look for Aussie fans, and it's The Big Match from December 1974. The video is incorrectly labelled as December 12 1979.

I'm old enough to recall having seen a few episodes of The Big Match as a kid in the late 1970's, though the usual late Saturday night timeslot was way beyond my bedtime. The theme tune is a cracker, and in this year's opening you get a few glimpses of cheeky future Socceroos manager Terry Venables.

The featured game is Tottenham Hotspur v West Ham United from White Hart Lane on December 29, 1973. Two of the Spurs players, Martin Peters and Martin Chivers, would later play a few games for Frankston City in the Victorian State League. Winger Ralph Coates had a spell with St George in the NSL after leaving Spurs and before joining Leyton Orient in 1979.

The episode is full of highlights. There's the grim Northern English backdrop as Oldham Athletic host Watford in the Third Division. There's Coventry City visiting The Dell to meet Southampton. There's Muhammad Ali telling us he's had enough of Brian Clough. There's Poland eliminating England from World Cup qualification in a game which surely has the record for most missed sitters. There's Sunderland manager Bob Stokoe running amok. There's Franz Beckenbauer and Uli Hoeness!

Then, at 47:20 is THE goal from Jimmy Mackay against South Korea in Hong Kong that put Australia through to the 1974 World Cup. It is in glorious colour and what a strike it was. I'm not sure why this colour version hasn't been shown on tv over the years nearly enough. Most times I've seen the goal it has been a black and white version that was so dark you wondered if the game was played under training ground lights.

What a goal! What a player!