Saturday past I was lucky enough to experience not only an AFL Grand Final live at the MCG but also attend the Official North Melbourne Grand Final Breakfast. I say "lucky" because my father-in-law won the tickets but, as he is currently visiting in Ireland, he was unable to make it!
It was an early start - 5.30am to be exact! I picked Az up at 6am and then we drove into the city. We dropped off the work van and started walking to Melbourne Olympic Park where the breakfast was being held. Halfway down King Street, Az found $20 so we hopped in a cab instead.
We arrived at the Breakfast at 7am and were seated immediately. It wasn't too exciting as Official Breakfasts go - lots of politicians, a few old players, 6 Olympians and some entertainers. The food was pretty disappointing, but the beer was free. It finished up around 10-ish, so we headed home to take off our suits and put something more casual on.
By 1pm we were back in the city. We had a quick beer at the Royal Hotel near the MCG before heading to the stadium for the pre-game entertainment. The pre-game stuff was pretty boring but the atmosphere was (as they say in the classics) electric! We were sitting at the Geelong end which was pretty wild as they were the defending champions.
The first ball was bounced at 2.30pm sharp and what an amazing game. I've been to AFL games before, but this was very different. For starters, the crowd totalled 100 012 big! The noise from the cheering was thunderous! The play was hard and very fast! And for the first hour there wasn't much seperating the two sides.
At half time Geelong were up, but only just. I'm not sure what was said in the change rooms, but the Hawthorn side that emerged for the second half were a different team. They chased harder, tackled better and kicked straighter than their opponents. Slowly they pulled away from the favoured Cats.
In the end the Hawks won by 26 points (11.23.89 to 18.7.115), their first Grand Final in 17 years. Melbourne is still celebrating!
