Expecting to fly

The Hawks have imploded, and how.  No way out of this now.  They are in freefall and there is NO bottom. 

With two minutes to go in the game against the Saints two weeks ago they were in complete control.  A fantastic passage of play had seen Cyril involved all the way down the ground. He’d received, passed and received again some 40 metres out, straight in front, for him a bread and butter shot.  

This IS the sealer, 13 points up, and the dream is really alive.  Finals football in 2010 is now a certainty for the Hawks.  What a year.  This will be one of the greatest wins in the club’ s history, and certainly the greatest since Grand Final Day 2008.  

But something has happened, something eerily reminiscent of Dallas in November 1963.  Docklands has its own Texas School Book Depository, its own grassy knoll.  As Cyril runs in to kick he quickly looks to his left,  and, as if terrified by what he has just seen,  lets the ball leave his boot in despair. 

It’s a goal, but there is an umpire on the boundary line holding an orange flag.  Is that Lee Harvey Oswald I see?

The goal doesn’t count and St.Kilda have a free kick 50 metres down the ground. They get the ball to Riewoldt within range, but he kicks a behind.  Hawthorn lead by a goal with 90 seconds to go and have possession, but there is complete chaos everywhere.  Campbell Brown, bloodied on the bench, is screaming, terrified. He knows.  The game is gone.  And it is.

With 26 seconds left to go, there is a ball-up near the St.Kilda goal.  The Hawks, in total panic,  leave goal-side open and McEvoy kicks one. Scores level, siren goes, the unlosable is lost, and so is Hawthorn’s psyche. 

Grant Birchall it turns out is the offender, interchange infringement, stupid cunt!! Went over the line before he should. The Hawks try to cover it up, but simply put, they imlode.  And there is now no coming back.

An unwinnable game against the Power in Adelaide next week, and following that, the Swans in Sydney.  Can’t win that either.  Campbell Brown has broken Del Santo’s nose.  He gets two for that, out for both those.

Then Cyril inexplicably goes bananas against the Power, gets two reduced to one, but, even more inexplicably the Hawks appeal, and he gets the full two.  He’s out for the Melbourne game as well.  It’s like somebody (in Geelong maybe) has pointed the bone. Brent Guerra gets two from the Sydney game and it’s deckchairs all around. 

This is Titanic and she’s really going down. I can’t watch!!