Chapter Seven
On Saturday we play the Leech Forest Woodgrubs. Their football oval is in a little damp valley. It has plenty of grass, because the clouds get too tired to go over the mountains, and they rain right on top of the goal posts. Or that’s what the kid I’m playing on tells me.
‘And besides that,’ he adds, ‘we’re gunna smash ya!’
Like all the Leech Forest Woodgrubs, this kid is big, strong and pale – because Leech Forest is in the shade all year round. The Woodgrubs are also a team that trains all year round, and they’ve won nine games in a row. But, as Mitch says, we just have to do our diddliest-darndest best and the results will follow.
So when the ball bounces my way, I sprint after it as fast as I can, as does the Woodgrub that I’m on. And so does Tarkin Parkin, from the opposite direction – which puts him on a collision course with another Woodgrub, who is enormous.
Smack!
The two of them hit like colliding trains, except the Woodgrub train is like a massive interstate freight loaded with steel girders and the Tarkin train is like a little wind-up toy carrying toothpicks.
‘Ooof!’ says Tark, as he flies through the air.
‘Gotcha!’ says the big Woodgrub, who turns for the ball.
‘Too late!’ I cry, grabbing the footy and taking off.
‘I’m after you!’ growls the Woodgrub.
I kick just as I am tackled, the ball flying sideways. And when I eventually get up I see Tark handball to Harley who kicks to Tommy who kicks to Gerald who kicks to Maurice who kicks a goal.
‘Go Sharks!’ yells Mitch. ‘You got ’em on plurry toast now!’
The freight-train Woodgrub kid looks at me.
‘We don’t care about what’s on plurry toast,’ he says. ‘We care about what’s on the plurry scoreboard. And you’re twenty-three plurry goals behind.’
He’s right. And when the final bell goes, as the Woodgrubs don’t have a siren, we trudge off, losers for the twenty-second time in a row.
‘Guys,’ Mitch says. ‘I’m ding dang dong proud of you. You kept on trying right to the very last piddly second. That’s the good news.’
Rowdy Dowd turns to me. ‘Isn’t piddly a swearword? Because if it isn’t, my mum owes me about ten bucks from the Swearing Jar.’
‘And the bad news is,’ Mitch adds, ‘if we don’t win next week, Percy Peacock, our wonderful President, will take us out of the competition. We have to win. We MUST win. We CANNOT lose!’
‘And we need those jumpers fixed,’ I tell Harley. ‘And we have to have water for the oval,’ I tell Tark.
And I have to write a new team song, I tell myself.
‘One week, Sharks,’ Mitch says. ‘That’s all we’ve got.’
Chapter Eight
On Sunday morning I go to the beach, looking for inspiration for the new Sharks team song. I take a notepad, a pen, and a packet of jellybeans for energy. Then I sit on my favorite rock, look out to sea, and wait for an idea.
An hour later I haven’t thought of anything, except that perhaps I shouldn’t have eaten all the black jellybeans – but I did find a cuttlefish for Thunder Beak, our budgie, so no one can say I’ve wasted my time.
Then I carefully write ‘The Seaport Junior Sharks Team Song’. It’s the same title as the old song, but it’s a start. Then I remember seeing a real shark. Well, it turned out to be a dolphin, but it looked like a shark.
Suddenly, inspiration! I write:
We don’t think you oughta dog paddle in our water
Because we are the Seaport super Sharks!
I change dog paddle to swim, then I add,
We’ll take you to the cleaners
Because we are the neatest and the cleanest
Team on all the toast!
No, that’s not right, so I change neatest to quickest, cleanest to meanest, and toast to coast. Then I eat all the white jellybeans.
Next I write, We hunt the ball together. And lose in any weather.
I see a problem with that, so I change lose to win and add,
We’ll go on dates together!
Which might give people the wrong idea – so I alter that line to read,
We’ll stay mates forever.
And I simply finish off with …
We are the Seaport super Sharks!
Then I add The End, Written by Eddie Lyall Harold Atlas, finish the jellybeans, pick up the cuttlefish, and go home.
Job done!
Chapter Nine
At training on Tuesday I give a copy of my team song to Mitch, who will show it to President Peacock.
‘That’s great, Eddie,’ Mitch says. ‘We’ll sing it on Saturday after our big win.’
We don’t mention that if we don’t win, it will be the Sharks’ last game ever.
‘Harley and Tarkin are working on the jumpers and water problems,’ I add, seeing them arrive. ‘That still leaves us with the rabbit problem. And winning Saturday’s game.’
Mitch kneels to get a football out of a rabbit hole. He seems to have got used to wearing shoes and his golf cap.
‘We’re playing the Bully Valley Bull Ants.’ Mitch looks at me. ‘Who, as we know, won the premiership. Even if they used three players who were about twenty years old and weighed a hundred kilograms each.’
The Bull Ants are a scary team. We always take a blow-up pool shark as our mascot, but they bring a monster ant-farm full of meat-eating bull ants. If they lose, they leave them behind in the changing room, with the ant-farm gate open.
‘We can beat them,’ I say. ‘Because we have to.’
We train hard, the fourteen of us running, kicking, handballing, marking, bouncing and hitting the tackle bags until we’re exhausted. We’d like to sit down after we’ve finished, but the ground is too dusty. So we stand, listening to Mitch.
‘Thursday’s our last training before we play the Bull Ants,’ he says. ‘If it hasn’t rained, the umpire will say our ground’s too hard. If we don’t have new jumpers, the mums will go totally on the warpath. And if we don’t win on Saturday we’re gone. Forever.’ Mitch looks around. ‘Things are serious, Sharks. But let’s hang in there.’
Harley steps forward. ‘I’ll collect everyone’s jumpers on Thursday. The new ones will be ready for Saturday.’
‘The water will arrive on Thursday, too,’ says Tarkin. ‘Perhaps everyone should wear gumboots to training. And I can get rid of the rabbits as well.’
Mitch looks puzzled. I look puzzled, too. When I look around, I see that the entire team looks puzzled. I get the feeling not too many kids will turn up with their gumboots.
‘Well, bring on Thursday night!’ Mitch says. ‘I wouldn’t miss it for all the tiddly tea in China.’
Me neither.
And I don’t even like tiddly tea!
Chapter Ten
I spend ten minutes on Thursday looking for my gumboots. When I find them, there’s a mouse in one and a nasty-looking spider in the other, and they’re about six sizes too small. I leave them at home.
Harley’s rain dance hasn’t worked, and I don’t know how Tark could do any better. We haven’t seen a cloud for weeks. So I head off for training under a bright blue sky, wearing my runners. On the way I meet Harley, who is carrying her gumboots in a plastic bag.
‘If Tark says there’ll be water,’ she says, ‘there’ll be water. He’s got a plan.’
‘Which is?’ I ask.
‘No idea,’ says Harley. ‘I haven’t seen him all afternoon.’
‘That’s reassuring,’ I say. ‘Not.’
When we get to Shark Park, the first thing we do is scare a family of rabbits away from the boundary line.
Mitch asks Harley where Tarkin is.
‘Somewhere,’ she says. ‘Where are your gumboots, Mitch?’
Mitch looks at her. ‘I thought the beep gumboots thing was a beep joke.’
So did the rest of the team, as Harley is the only person to have brought a pair.
‘Let’s go,
Sharks!’ Mitch yells. ‘Because this Saturday is Crush-a-Bull-Ant day!’
We train well, although the dust gets in our eyes and we have to watch out for spiders that live in the cracks in the ground. And it’s hard to concentrate, as we keep looking for clouds – but there’s only one, and it’s tiny, like a cottonwool ball.
‘We’ve had it,’ says Tony Tan, looking upwards, ‘if we think that fluffy little thing’s gunna save us.’
Five minutes before training ends, Tark walks onto the ground. He’s muddy all over and his glasses are smeared. He uses two fingers like windscreen wipers. I see he has his gumboots on.
‘I couldn’t quite get things to work,’ he says. ‘But I’m confident we’ll have some H2O by Saturday morning.’
‘Who cares about H2O?’ says Trevor Twittletree, who isn’t that bright. ‘We need water.’
‘H2O is water,’ says Tark.
‘Are you digging a well, Tark?’ Mitch asks.
‘No,’ Tark replies. ‘I am not digging a well or drilling a bore.’
‘Well, you could’ve fooled me, mudman,’ says Mitch. ‘But good luck, anyway. Now, guys, give your jumpers to Harley for their mid-season makeover. Saturday is going to be a day to remember.’
It will be. And so, as usual, we shout as we leave, ‘Go, Sharks, go!’
Chapter Eleven
I’m the first to arrive at Shark Park on Saturday morning. A couple of rabbits run away and hide in the bushes by the creek. I glance up. The sky is clear and blue. I glance down at the ground. There are big weeds and little weeds, and the dirt is like grey rock. I definitely am not looking forward to any of those big Bull Ants smacking me down on that.
Mitch drives up in his old utility, and soon the whole team, except for Tarkin, arrives. Harley is carrying a bulging bag.
‘Line up, Sharks,’ Mitch says. ‘It’s jumper presentation time. First of all, thanks, Harley, for your work. Now, let’s see what you’ve got.’
We line up and Harley takes out one of our blue Sharks jumpers. On the front, instead of biting a person in a life ring in half, the shark is now happily munching on a round, bright yellow Smiley Face biscuit.
‘Food dye,’ says Harley proudly. ‘It’ll never, ever wash out.’
‘My … darn goodness!’ says Mitch. ‘Well, no one can say it’s too … er, violent.’
Harley turns the jumper around, showing us the back.
‘Wow,’ says Mitch. ‘That’s, um … a nice touch.’
On the back, our numbers are now right in the middle of another really big Smiley Face biscuit. Around us, the parents who hated our old jumpers are clapping.
‘It’s lovely!’ one mum calls out.
‘It’s delicious!’ says another.
‘It sends out a nice, friendly message!’ says someone’s grandma.
Well, perhaps this message might give the Bully Valley Bull Ants the idea that we’re really too gentle to batter into the ground. But I think that just might be wishful thinking, because here they come, running right at us.
‘We hate Smiley Face biscuits!’ their captain yells. ‘We’re gunna eat you alive! We’re gunna chew you up! We’re gunna spit you out! And stomp on the crumbs!’
I get angry. I get really angry. Harley did a great job with nothing but a biscuit for an idea and yellow food dye. I’m proud of the new Sharks jumper!
‘We’re still the mighty Sharks!’ I shout back. ‘Just because we eat Smiley Face biscuits doesn’t mean we’re not gunna crush you into the weeds! Because we are!’
‘Yeah!’ the rest of the Sharks yell. ‘Yeah!’
‘Yeah?’ the Bull Ants’ captain yells back. ‘Now we’re gunna kill you double!’
‘How’s that work?’ Mozzie Morris asks.
‘Ignore them, Mozzie,’ Mitch says. He looks around. ‘Where’s Tarkin? We can’t play with thirteen.’
‘There!’ I say. ‘He’s running out now.’
Tarkin looks like a muddy mummy who’s just crawled out of a very wet Egyptian tomb.
‘The water will arrive shortly,’ he says when he arrives. ‘No one can argue with the laws of gravity.’
I look up. The sky is blue. Harley gives Tarkin his new jumper.
‘You’d better be right, Tark,’ she says. ‘The umpire doesn’t look too happy with the oval as it is.’
The umpire’s trying to push a door key into the ground, like they do at the cricket to test the hardness of the pitch – but he’s just bent his key.
‘Oh, great,’ he says angrily. ‘Now I’m locked out of my house. This ground is a disgrace. It’s too dry to play on.’
‘Not for long,’ Tarkin says. ‘Look behind you.’
Chapter Twelve
I look where Tarkin is pointing and see water flowing down the bank from the Seaport Gardens and onto the oval.
‘I unblocked the drain from the Ornamental Lake,’ Tarkin says. ‘Then I dug a trench so the water can flow onto the ground. Simple, really.’
‘It’s got fish in it!’ someone shouts. ‘I can see fish!’
I can, too. And I can hear frogs.
‘There’s a tortoise!’ Norris yells.
‘It’s a turtle!’ one of the Bull Ants shouts back.
The water is flowing around my feet and slowly spreading. A rabbit pops out of its emergency exit and runs.
‘This is a disaster!’ shouts Percy Peacock, our President. ‘It’s an absolutely catastrophic catastrophe!’
‘No, it’s not,’ says Tarkin. ‘Half the water will sink into the oval and the rest will drain into the creek and fill the Seaport Wetlands.’ He takes a breath. ‘And now the cracks in the lake wall can be fixed, Mr Peacock. So the whole thing won’t collapse and flood your house.’
‘Really?’ says Percy Peacock. ‘Well, in that case, what a wonderful idea.’
We put the fish and frogs in the creek, wait half an hour for the water to soak into the ground, wait for Percy Peacock to sound the siren … then the game begins!
Chapter Thirteen
The ground is so slippery that the big Bull Ant boys skid, slip and spin out every time they run. But us Sharks, naturally, are at home in water, and so it suits us fine.
At half time the Sharks are six points ahead. We are also so muddy that Mitch can hardly tell us apart.
‘You’re going muddy great!’ he says to everyone. ‘You kids are just so muddy brave! Let’s get back out there and play like muddy mad men.’ He looks at Harley. ‘Mad people, I mean.’
We go back out and slither, slide and slog through twenty minutes of the muddiest game of football any of us have ever played. And we love it!
At three-quarter time we’re two goals ahead, but the mud is drying out.
‘The Bull Ants will do better this last quarter,’ Mitch tells us. ‘So we’re gunna have to muddy run, muddy pass, muddy tackle, and muddy help each other all the muddy time. Now, which one of you kids is Eddie?’
I put up my hand.
‘Right, Eddie,’ Mitch says. ‘You’re quick, you’ve got great balance, and you’re clever. I want you in the midfield to simply get the ball forward. Got it? Get it. Then kick it!’
I’m surprised but I’m happy! Me, in the midfield? Wow. I nod like a commando ready to give my next mission everything I’ve got.
‘I can do it, Mitch.’ I will not let the Sharks down.
‘Excellent!’ Mitch shakes a fist. ‘Right, Sharks. There’s only one word I have to say. Muddy win!’
That sounds like two words to me, but it doesn’t matter. I’m ready for this. Game on!
Chapter Fourteen
The ball is bounced and the Bull Ant ruckman hits it to the Bull Ant midfielder who kicks it forty metres towards goal. Their forwards swarm like ants possessed, black-and-red jumpers everywhere. All I can do is chase as a little Bull Ant handballs to a medium-sized Bull Ant who handballs to a big Bull Ant who handballs to a monstrous Bull Ant who kicks a goal.
The Sharks are just six points ahead.
&
nbsp; ‘Cor blimey!’ I hear Mitch yell. ‘That’s not muddy cricket!’
Mitch is right. It’s not cricket, and it doesn’t stop the Bull Ants from getting the footy out of the centre and running forward.
Boot!
The biggest Bull Ant on the field, who is heavier and taller than my dad, kicks. We watch the ball fly overhead, and keep on flying, as if it’s been fired from a bazooka. It spears straight through for a goal.
Two muddy white flags wave. The scores are level.
‘You Sharks are goin’ down!’ yells the red-headed Bull Ant kid I’m playing on. He turns to me. ‘It’s your last game, Fish Face. Make the most of it, Bickie Boy.’
I look around good old Shark Park and I see Mitch, my Shark mates, my new friends Tark and Harley, and when the ball is bounced I know I have to get it. I swoop like an eagle, but unfortunately a nasty-looking Bull Ant player kicks it to their end.
‘That’s how the cookie crumbles,’ the Bull Ant kid says to me. ‘Not so smiley now.’
I run. I put the accelerator down, the turbo charger on, and fire the afterburners. Sprint? I’m going so fast that I skid right past the ball and over the boundary line. But I bounce up, spin my wheels, and go again.
This time I pick the ball up with one hand. Ahead I see that there’s no one to pass it to, so I keep running. Then I bounce it on a nice big flat weed and wonder what to do next.
Get it up the ground, that’s what!
‘Run, Eddie!’ I hear Mitch yelling. ‘Run!’
I look for a free Shark player, but they’re all covered by Bull Ants, so I bounce on another weed, and decide I’m going all the way into goal. It’s up to me now – or at least it is until a Bull Ant player catches me, forcing me to handball wildly into the air.
But that’s okay! The ball falls into Tarkin’s hands. He kicks it the wrong way but luckily Harley marks it, takes a run-up and lets fly with the ugliest kick I’ve ever seen … a kick that sends the ball bouncing, spinning, sliding, rolling and dipping to stop right in the goal square.
Save our Sharks Page 2