Essendon Football Club Champion Jobe Watson has just announced his retirement from football at the end of this season. Bunyip resident ROMAN KULKEWYCZ recalls meeting with the champion some 30 years ago.
About 30 years ago, when I was reporting on football for the Gippsland Times newspaper in Sale, I was lucky enough to be an invited guest of former Essendon champion ruckman and now Essendon board member Don McKenzie to an Essendon vs Hawthorn match at Waverley.
My six-year-old son Mathew was also invited to come with me.
The invitation included admission, a meal with the Essendon champion and entrance to the Essendon change rooms before and after the game to meet the players.
Tickets were available to a limited number of supporters to get into the change rooms after the game where there was always a large media throng and Essendon personnel to jostle with to gain an audience with their favourite Essendon champion – the change rooms were crawling with people.
To be able to get into the change rooms prior to a game was a definite “no no”. Being a guest of Don McKenzie that day, the red tape was cut, and Mathew and I were granted exclusive permission to go into the change rooms before the game.
We were led through many corridors and down into the underground Bombers change rooms.
The place was eerily empty when we first arrived, but gradually stars such as Paul Salmon, Tim Watson, Garry O’Donnel, Alan Ezard, Mark Harvey, Darren Bewick, Derrick Kickett and Simon Madden pushed their way through the swing doors of the change rooms to be met by Mathew with his autograph book asking for their signatures.
Tim Watson walked in with his six-year-old son Jobe.
Mathew asked Tim for his autograph, and after Tim had signed it, Jobe said to his father “Dad, I want to sign the book, too” but Tim said that it was only for footballers’ autographs.
I said to Tim that it would be OK for Jobe to give us his autograph, too.
Generally when footballers sign an autograph they put their jumper number under their signature. As Jobe was not a footballer, he wrote the number six under his name, representing his age.
