Geelong and me

The Hawks Insiders reveal their true feelings about Geelong ahead of another big Easter Monday clash

Apr 09, 2023

Subscribe to Hawks Insiders for match recaps, exclusive pods, player ratings, and all the news through Hawthorn-tinted glasses.

The Hawks Insiders have taken to the therapy couch to unlock their inner feelings as they prepare for the big one at the MCG on Monday.

Simon Morawetz

Our rivalry with Geelong is a complicated one for me because my brother is a Cats fan. I’m too young to remember the late 80s; my footy consciousness started in the early 90s, when I was happy for my brother that his team kept making the Grand Final. I was happy for him in 2007. I was sitting next to him in 2008, and he was happy for me.

Things turned for me in the years after, when they went on that hideous 11-game winning run, finding ever more cruel and inventive ways to pip us at the post. I grew to hate their joy, and the first bars of their bloody theme song. I wasn’t happy for them in 2022.

All that transpired served to make the 2013 Prelim the best moment of my footy life, Grand Final wins included. In the winning moment, the pain of those 11 losses disappeared, replaced by the satisfying knowledge that they would trade them all for the two wins that bookended them. My brother was sitting next to me that night, too.

I know the rivalry has genuinely grabbed me now because when their time finally comes - and it does look like it’s coming - I’m going to enjoy watching them sink. May we capitalise on it: there is nothing quite like a win over Geelong.

Danny Prins

I’m not sure if this is controversial for Hawks fans or not, but the pinnacle of Hawthorn/Geelong rivalry for me was the ‘08 Grand Final. I was there with my Uncle, in standing room behind the Hawthorn cheer squad, and to this day it is the greatest game I have ever had the privilege of attending.

The Hawks came into the match as underdogs and being present to witness the most unlike and incredible win in a game the Cats thought they had in the bag, is a memory I will never forget. Obviously we don’t need to discuss what came next but that match had so much significance to me and my Hawthorn fandom.

It created the modern day rivalry, and from that game came contest, after contest, after contest. Most of which the Hawks were on the wrong end of. But the when push came to shove, when the rubber hit the road, the Hawks won the games that mattered, and the 2008 Grand Final was the peak of that for this Hawks fan.

Oh and the Preliminary Final in 2013 was a decent day at the footy too.

Andrew Weiss

It really has been a wonderful rivalry - and for the modern era Hawks fan, obviously ranks right up there with the hatred of the Swans in recent times.

Not withstanding the Bombers and Blues of the 80s, or North in the years before that, it has truly been one of our - and the AFL’s great contests and storylines.

As my Hawthorn fandom developed through the 90’s, Geelong provided me with some of my finest ‘footy with your mates’ memories. I was at Kardinia Park in 1995 when we won by five points, there in 1996 when we won by two points, there in 1997 when we won by six points and there in 1999 when we won by two points.

From dawn to dark, down at Kardinia Park.

We all know about what happened in 2008, we know of the Kennett Curse, of the years of heartache, pain and the good times as well.

And when I think about the hatred for the Cats, I simply choose to remember what happened in big games when it really mattered.

Yes they beat us in the 2011 Qualifying Final en route to winning the flag.

But we beat them in the 1989 big dance, pulled off a heist on the final day of 2008, beat them in the 2013 and 2014 finals series’ ahead of more silverware in those years. In fact our record in finals against them in the past 50 years is 6-2. When it matters most.

One of the toughest things I have ever had to do as a Hawks supporter was watch the 2022 Grand Final knowing that either Buddy and his Swans or Smith and his Cats would come out victors. And while it was hard to imagine how bad it could feel, Smith winning Norm took those feelings to new uncharted depths.

Now that we have reluctantly become accustomed to Geelong winning flags - I still take solace in the fact that in the modern day rivalry, they have not been able to go back-to-back - let alone back-to-back-to-back. And they never will, for that is reserved for special clubs - for immortals.

As for Round 4 2023, the realist in me has us losing comfortably. But until then, the dream of steamrolling them evokes all the right kind of feels.

Ashley Browne

Geelong?

It’s complicated.

Wearing my AFL media industry professional hat, Geelong is actually a terrific club.

The Cats are courteous, friendly and uber-professional to deal with. Nothing is too much trouble for them.

I had cause to work closely with them through the finals and especially the Grand Final last week and they gave me access to everyone I needed to speak to. They were ultra-relaxed, which might be a key to how well they performed well throughout September.

And it will pain Hawk fans to hear this, but the Cats players are exceptionally good to talk to, especially Tom Hawkins and Patrick Dangerfield. It might help that they are a bit more relatable to this 50-something journalist. Joel Selwood was the same.

I suspect I would find easier to talk to the Geelong players than the Hawks.

On the Monday of Grand Final week I had a brilliant chat in an interchange dug-out with Mitch Duncan. We were standing on the ground when we started talking but then light rain began to fall and he insisted we move somewhere dry.

The Guthrie brothers are great fellas. And (sorry, Daz) Isaac Smith remains a good bloke despite the change of colours. Tom Atkins’ dad is an old journo mate, so Tom was easy to speak to.

And Chris Scott is a journalist’s dream. Insightful on the record and a great hang to talk footy with away from the microphone.

For all those reasons, I was happy enough to see them win the flag last year.

But this is not the Cats Insiders, so let’s put the brown-and-gold beanie back on. And writing as a Hawthorn supporter, the rivalry is still real.

And mainly due to the supporters. By and large, they are an unusually entitled lot. They go to the footy, especially at Kardinia Park, expecting a performance, not a contest.

A Geelong supporting colleague (one of the few reasonable ones) describes those who sit near him at home games as “happy clappers”.

There are Geelong supporters in my world who I only hear from when the Cats beat the Hawks. When it goes the other way? Radio silence.

One time more recently, after a Geelong win over Hawthorn, a Cats fan sent me a long Facebook DM crowing over the superiority of Geelong’s list management when compared to that of the Hawks. That he was probably correct made it all the more irksome.

But it is why I’m looking forward to Monday. It’s the first Easter Monday for several years when I’m not on deadline. I’ll be in the stands and not the press box.

And will be an interesting afternoon. All the pressure will be on the Cats. No matter how much they win by - one goal or 10 goals - the commentary will be that they only beat the lowly Hawks. Geelong supporters will be none the wiser about whether the premiership defence is back on track.

A realistic win for the Hawks on Monday will be a competitive performance, in which the signs of progress are evident. One that perhaps has most Cats fans squirming in their seats for part of the afternoon, a bit less smug than usual.

But if the Hawks were to spring the upset? My god, that would make it one of the great days at the footy, flags aside.

I might even have a snarky Facebook DM sitting and waiting in the Notes app on my phone. Just in case.

Darren Levin

I hate Geelong. There, I said it. The other Insiders may have a more measured take (cough Ash cough), but the pain of the Kennett Curse — which actually turned out to be a three Premiership blessing after Shaun Burgoyne did what he did in 2013 — washed away any warm feelings I may’ve had for them following their hoodoo breaking triumph in 2007. (Truth be told I was even cheering on their toe poke victory against the Saints a couple years later — or, more accurately, I was barracking against the Saints.)

I sat through each of those 11 losses. Jimmy Bartel’s point in 2009. The Tom Hawkins goal that still haunts my dreams. The smugness of the post 2008 pact, their fans, and that team. Paul Chapman and Stevie J had two of the most punchable faces in footy, and I loved nothing more than Chappie watching on stunned from the sidelines as we rolled them in the 2013 prelim. I even took a photo of his pronounced melon off the telecast and posted it on Facebook just to annoy my Geelong supporting ‘mates’.

Since then I’ve celebrated their finals chokes almost as much as Hawthorn wins, and have enjoyed the odd victory in the years since. Who could forget those pair of close victories in 2018? The Roughhead snapped point and that O’Meara sealer 19 rounds later.

Last year, I celebrated the Mitch Lewis goal so hard I almost knocked my glasses off my face and into level one.

My Geelong hatred went positively nuclear when Isaac Smith decided to jump ship in 2020. I felt it was the ultimate sign of disrespect from a player who would’ve probably had a career in country footy had it not been for Hawthorn drafting him in 2010.

My position on both Geelong and Smith has slightly softened — the fact I’m even mentioning him by name shows the therapy is working. Joel Selwood’s wonderful gesture to a fan with Down syndrome after the Cats’ victory really made me feel bad for all those years of calling him Duckwood, but all that minor goodwill was erased again when they pipped us for pick seven in the Jack Bowes salary trump trade.

Come Easter Monday I won’t be thinking about Smith or Selwood or the fact Tuohy, Hawkins, Guthrie and Danger are reportedly nice guys.

I’ll be triggered by those blue and white stripes and that godawful team song that speaks to the arrogance with which this club has conducted itself over the past 164 years. The greatest team off all? LOL, as if!

Follow Hawks Insiders on Twitter and Facebook.