by Moana Hope
9
A hundred for the Sharks
BEFORE I COULD start my new footy career as a Collingwood player, I had the rest of the 2016 VWFL season to play out with the St Kilda Sharks. Under the coaching of former North Melbourne and Melbourne player Shaun Smith, a highflying forward in his day, I had really enjoyed the first half of our VWFL campaign.
Unlike in my previous two seasons with the Sharks, we now had plenty of depth in our forward line, and I received great support from a number of players, including Jasmine Garner, who was later drafted by Collingwood, and Phoebe McWilliams, who will play for Greater Western Sydney in the national league. Still, I was happy to be the star of the show when I could, like the day I kicked ten goals against Bendigo. I was pretty chuffed after that match when Phoebe was quoted in a local newspaper saying that the goal I kicked off the ground while wrestling my opponent was one of the best she had seen.
‘I’ve never played with anyone like her,’ Phoebe added. ‘She has that X factor … she can make nothing into something.’ I also liked this line from journalist Paul Amy near the end of the story. ‘When “Mo’’ Hope is “on’’ for the Sharks, the opposition has no hope.’
I played my 200th VWFL game in late April. In quite a coincidence, it was against my old club the Falcons. I kicked three goals but we lost by seventeen points after conceding the first forty points of the game. Then my form improved to the point that I kicked sixteen goals against Knox one afternoon in the middle of the season, then backed that up by booting eleven against Cranbourne. I was just so in the zone during those two games. I literally felt like I had the ball on a string. Those big hauls set me on course to become the first player to top 100 goals in a VWFL season.
The second time we played Knox and Cranbourne I kicked ten goals in both matches, which took my season’s tally to ninety-nine in seventeen games. The next week heaps of my family members hired a minibus and travelled down to Seaford on the Mornington Peninsula to see me try to kick that 100th goal in our final home-and-away match of the season. Having my family there pretty much doubled our usual crowd. It was very funny.
I took a mark early, but fell heavily in the process and subsequently missed the set shot. That miss was partly due to being shaken up by the fall and partly due to nerves. Seeing so many members of my family behind the goals made me much more jittery than usual. I desperately wanted to put on a good show for them.
At the twelve-minute mark of the first quarter, I took a mark on the edge of the goal square. My Seaford opponent, Michelle Goodwin, slipped over, so I quickly played on and put my kick right through the middle. I raised my arms in delight as a feeling of relief coursed through my body. My teammates went crazy. They ran from all over the field, and even from the interchange bench, to congratulate me. Then a pile of my brothers and cousins streamed onto the field. They gave me heaps of high-fives and pats on the back before celebrating the occasion with an impromptu rendition of the Haka.
Performing the Haka has always been a big thing for our family. We perform it for any big family occasion, like a funeral, a birthday or even Christmas. My mum was adamant that we all needed to learn the Haka and other traditional dances to keep in touch with our Maori roots. She taught us the moves and bought everyone the right kits to wear. At one stage, she actually brought some of my brothers and nephews together to form a Maori dance group, which performed at functions around Melbourne So seeing the boys performing the Haka out on the footy field in my honour was really special. I think it held up the game for five minutes or so, but no one seemed to care.
A video of my 100th goal and the Haka was later shown on Australian Story, and another version later found its way onto The Age website. You can still find the second video, which has commentary on the game, if you google it. The commentary never fails to make me smile. ‘There’s a kick to the top of the square and Moana Hope’s taken it!’ the commentator yells. ‘Plays on, ONE HUNDRED! And they’re running onto the ground, they’re jumping the fence. Moana Hope, one hundred goals.’ Then, when the Haka starts, the commentator isn’t sure what’s going on. ‘I’ve never seen anything like this,’ he says. ‘Incredible.’
I ended up kicking five goals all up that day and we won by eighty-three points. I copped a massive drink-bottle shower from all the girls after we sang our victory song: ‘Oh when the Sharks go charging in!’ I later gave the match ball to Susan Alberti. It was a small way to say thanks for all the support she had given me along the way. Sue later recounted how I came to give her the ball and what the gesture meant:
Mo came to my apartment to give me the ball that she kicked her hundredth goal with. I didn’t know she was coming. I had just sent her an SMS about something, but she didn’t answer, which surprised me. Next minute the doorbell goes and it’s Mo. She had the ball up the back of her t-shirt. She said, ‘We can’t repay you for all the support you’ve given to us. The only way I can say thank you is to give you something that means the most to me, and that’s that football I used to kick my hundredth goal.’ It was so special. I started crying. That was the most beautiful thing—all the money in the world wouldn’t have made me as happy as that football made me. It took my breath away.
I said, ‘You really knew how to hide that ball.’ She replied, ‘When you grow up in Glenroy, you have to know how to do that. Otherwise the other kids will pinch your ball!’
I’ve since had it put in a glass case and it’s in my office. I look at that football and it brings a smile to my face. By the way, I’m going to give it back to her one day. When the time is right, when I know she has a place for it to go, I’ll present it back to her. It belongs to her and her family, not to me. But I’m happy to treasure it for now.
The win over Seaford ensured we finished the home-and-away season in second place on the ladder, behind only the Falcons. We thought we were a good chance to win the premiership, which would have been the Sharks’ first Division 1 flag since 1999, but the Falcons destroyed us in the second semi-final at the Box Hill Oval. We didn’t score in the first three quarters, and we ended up losing 17.11 (113) to 1.1 (7). I hardly touched the ball that afternoon. It was very, very disappointing. We thought we were a decent chance to bounce back in the preliminary final against Melbourne University at North Port Oval, but although I managed to kick two goals, we had another shocker and lost by forty points. It was a sad way to end what had been a great season.
10
Six for the Dogs
THE YEAR 2016 had already been massive for me before the last Western Bulldogs versus Melbourne exhibition game in early September. I had been selected as one of Collingwood’s marquee players for the new national women’s league and I had become the first player to kick a century of goals in the VWFL. So my last chance to represent the Dogs against the Dees was the icing on the cake.
The lead-up to the game was huge because the Monday night of that week was when the episode of Australian Story that featured me and Susan Alberti went to air. I think around a million people watched it, and my phone hardly stopped buzzing all night with people letting me know how much they enjoyed the show. In the following days, people started stopping me in the street and telling me their stories about playing women’s footy. Old ladies stopped me, young women stopped me, and my social media accounts were flooded with thousands of new followers. It seemed like people just couldn’t get enough of my story. I had so many requests to do radio, television, newspaper and website interviews. In a way it was quite overwhelming, but on the other hand I was thinking, People actually like me, and they don’t care how I look.
People really seemed to warm to the parts of the Australian Story episode that featured Vinny. A lot of people couldn’t believe that I am able to have so much fun with her, that I feel like I can basically ignore her disability when we’re together. I think people also respected that I don’t look after her because I have to, I do it because I want to.
I ended up going to the Melbourne City Mission and meeting a little ol
d Italian lady who had seen me on the TV program. She wanted to have her photo taken with me. ‘You’re my biggest inspiration,’ she told me. Then she told me her story, of being the full-time carer for her disabled daughter. She also cares for three other family members.
‘I quit work years ago and I’m a full-time carer for all four by myself,’ she told me. And I was just like, ‘You’re my inspiration.’ So I asked her if I could get a photo with her, and that put a big smile on her face. I still can’t believe that my story can provide inspiration to people like her.
The last women’s exhibition game between the Bulldogs and Demons was a big deal because there were no men’s AFL matches that weekend. The media really pumped up the game all week, and a crowd of more than 6000 turned up at the Whitten Oval on a Saturday night to see it. The size of the crowd stunned all of us who played in that game. After all, this was not a curtain-raiser to a men’s match. All those people travelled to the Whitten Oval just to watch women’s footy. As we would later find out, there were many, many more people watching the match from the comfort of their lounge rooms.
I was so much calmer before my last game for the Dogs. I didn’t need any Xanax before training or prior to our now-customary pre-match gathering at an inner-city hotel. I felt really at ease. And they way people were around me, I felt like the star of the show. When our bus arrived at the Whitten Oval, I was interviewed by Channel Seven for their coverage. Afterwards I was like, That was nice. It means they care. They didn’t pick the talented feminine girl behind me. That’s pretty cool.
Thousands of people were already at the ground by the time we ran out for our first warm-up. I could hear young girls screaming my name. I felt a million dollars. Then I went back into the change rooms and did a massive warm-up and said to myself, Fuck, I’m ready to give this a red-hot go. I want to smash it.
When the game started I approached it like I did when I was a little kid running around against the boys. I just let instinct take over. I went out and played the game I loved and got lost in the moment, and it all worked out.
My opponent on the field that day was 37-year-old Cecilia McIntosh, a tough and rugged defender who came to footy after winning a silver medal in javelin at the 2002 Commonwealth Games and then competing in the bobsled at the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver. Cecilia, who played for Melbourne University in the VWFL, is a lot shorter than me but she had given me a good deal of grief when we had played on each other in the past. I always found her to be the type of player I call a ‘dirty defender’. This is the type of defender who gets away with things behind play that put you off your game. The umpires never seemed to catch these sorts of moments in the middle of the act. But that was in the VWFL, where we only had two umpires. On this night we had three AFL-standard umpires, so nobody could get away with even half the stuff that went on in games that were not better overseen.
A few minutes into the first quarter, Cecilia hit me in the head and straightaway the umpires awarded me a free kick. I was like, Thank God, finally. It hasn’t happened all year but it happens now. I missed the set shot, but that didn’t dent my confidence. We were up and going. I kicked another behind, and then late in the second quarter, with us leading by two points, I marked a nice pass from Kaitlyn Ashmore in the right pocket. I was on a tough angle but I went back and put my shot straight through the middle.
‘Plenty of hope from there,’ the people at home heard Channel Seven commentator Basil Zempilas say on the telecast. ‘Good goal.’
Late in the third quarter I still had only one goal to my name, but I soon changed that with one of the favourite pieces of play in my career. A long kick came into our forward line, to a contest between me and Cecilia. As we wrestled about 25 metres out, the ball floated over our heads, so we both quickly doubled back in pursuit of it. Cecilia got back there first. She picked the ball up in the goal square and could have just run it through for a behind, but instead she decided to try to run it out of the Demons’ backline. I ran towards her, corralling her near the behind post, so she changed direction, slipped over, then got up and took off again. I gritted my teeth and put in a few quick steps. Once I was within reach of her I lunged forward, wrapped my arms around her, and stripped the ball from her grasp. The Bulldogs supporters went wild as the umpire awarded me a free kick for holding the ball just 10 metres out from goal. That tackle was one of the sweetest things I have done in my life.
I went back and calmly kicked the ball straight over Cecilia’s head and through for a goal. I punched the air and jumped into the arms of a few of my teammates. We were fifteen points up and I felt ready to tear the game apart. Two minutes later another long kick came into our forward line. This time the Melbourne defenders had pushed up the ground, leaving me on my own out the back. The kick landed a couple of metres away from me, but I managed to pick it up cleanly. By now I was in the left pocket, not far from the boundary line. I glanced up at the big sticks as Cecilia closed in to within a couple of metres of me. A thought flashed through my head—my instinct game. I kicked these goals every day at the oval with my brothers. Why not now? I placed the ball across my boot and sent a banana kick towards the goals. The crowd roared as it went through, and I ran around the boundary line waving my finger in the air. I’m sure I could see both Dogs and Demons supporters going nuts. I had time to take in the moment and think, This is one of the best moments of my life.
About ninety seconds later, the ball surged into our forward line yet again. Our courageous captain, Stephanie Ciocci, cleaned up Cecilia with a brilliant bump, which cleared a path for me to grab the ball and snap another goal. And my purple patch wasn’t over yet. Steph soon won the ball again and belted it forward. The kick looked like it was going to go through for a behind, but it suddenly dropped short and I marked it on my chest about 8 metres from goal. With only a few seconds remaining until three-quarter time, I put my kick right through the middle. My head was spinning as I walked to our huddle. All my teammates were getting around me. I had kicked four goals in the space of five minutes and now had five for the match.
We were up thirty-three points at the last change, and we were never going to lose from there. So the last quarter was such a sweet time. I was able to cap off an amazing night by slotting a 50-metre goal on the run just two minutes before the final siren sounded. I really felt like a superhero at that moment. I just felt like I could do absolutely anything. Lift up the Rialto Towers and carry them a couple of blocks down the street? No worries!
I could not possibly have been happier than I was at the end of the game. The Hampson–Hardeman Cup was being presented for the last time today, as there were to be no more exhibition games. We were getting to take it home, and I had played a key role in the victory. AFL Commission chairman Mike Fitzpatrick came onto the ground to do the presentations and he awarded me the best-on-ground medal. He then directed me towards the microphone. I looked at the crowd and simply said, ‘Thanks everybody for coming out. We appreciate it.’ Then I walked back to my teammates for another round of hugs and backslapping.
Soon they let all the spectators come down onto the ground and I had hundreds of people crowding around asking me for autographs and to pose for photos with them. I had only signed a few of them when a lady from the Bulldogs told me to leave the field. I told her to get stuffed. This was my chance to give back to the people who had come to watch me. I stood there until I had signed every autograph or posed for a photo with everyone who wanted one. It was a time to savour. I had never felt so good, so accepted, so respected.
Gillon McLachlan walked over and gave me a big hug while I was still out on the ground. I love Gill. He’s so lovely. He’s been nothing but a gentlemen to me. Susan Alberti also came over and gave me a huge hug. We shared a really special moment. I’m sure she would have loved for me to play for the Bulldogs in the AFLW, but I know that she remains right behind me.
In the days after the game, I had so much interaction with footy fans on social media, while I was walk
ing down the street, just about anywhere. So many of them said the same thing: that they planned on watching five or ten minutes of the game but couldn’t turn it off because it was so entertaining and ended up watching the whole thing. So many people told me how they were going nuts when I was kicking my goals. It was extraordinary. A lot of people told me that they found our game more entertaining than the men’s footy, because there was less congestion around the ball and very little kicking backwards. I would tell them all to get on board with the women’s league in 2017.
‘It’ll be bigger than the men’s one day!’ I’d say.
The TV viewer numbers were amazing. On the AFL website they made special mention of this:
Saturday night’s All-Stars women’s game between the Western Bulldogs and Melbourne delivered bumper television ratings, with an average of 746,000 viewers (metro and regional) tuning in nationally.
The exhibition match, which was broadcast live by Channel Seven, peaked at 1.05 million viewers and won its timeslot across all key demographics in Melbourne, where it averaged 387,000 viewers.
It was the largest overall average audience in Melbourne of any game during the 2016 home and away season.
The previous best was the St Kilda–Geelong match in round 14, which drew an average audience of 347,000 viewers, while the Essendon—Richmond Dreamtime at the ‘G clash in round 10 nabbed an average of 331,000.
The highly entertaining clash showcased the best women’s talent ahead of next year’s inaugural national women’s league.
Bulldogs forward Moana Hope, who will don the Collingwood guernsey next year, starred with six goals.
AFL chief executive Gillon McLachlan said the higher than expected figures reflected the growing interest in the women’s game.