Football Crazy

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Melbourne City Centre is only 135km away from Phillip Island but the last 15km through the city took as long as the rest of the journey up here. Most of Melbourne’s major roads have a tram system cutting through the middle of them and consequently they have this very strange rule that if you want to turn right you have to get into the left hand lane and wait for…. Well, wait until the person in front of you goes than then you just follow very closely behind and hope your not going to get splatted by a tram.
The city centre itself does not seem as appealing as either Sydney or Canberra. Once out of the main CBD there are some nice areas. The whole city doesn’t seem to fit together very well. Throughout the city there are several architecturally diverse buildings all vying for your attention yet none of them fit together into a cohesive city plan. Many of these areas also look incomplete. In March this year Melbourne hosted the Commonwealth games and I can’t quite make out whether they are either taking locations apart after their big showpiece event or they never actually finished them in time.

I have happened to get to Melbourne on the eve of football madness. For days now the media have been talking of nothing but this game and tonight in the Melbourne Cricket Ground it will take place. Australian Socceroos are playing an international friendly with Greece. Apparently Australia has the highest number of Greeks outside of Greece. Tonight more than 95,000 people will cram into the MCG to watch a game that the media are calling Australia’s biggest match in a decade.
The 95,000 that have tickets are dwarfed by the 1,000,000+ that are expected in the squares and parks of Melbourne where massive screens have been erected. As the day drew to a close most businesses shut down early to guarantee their staff a front row seat at whatever location they chose. It wasn’t long before a myriad of tourists and office workers were being replaced by the Greek and Oz football colours. Also growing in large numbers were the police. Most deciding to stick together in packs of 20+, obviously feeling grossly out numbered.

I had intended on booking a tour around the Fosters Brewery but on calling them have discovered that the tours are fully booked out for the next 5 days. Probably something to do with the free samples that are on offer.

Well the football has just finished and as expected it was a record turnout to support the Australian team. When Australia scored I was stood about midway between the stadium and the city centre. The cheer that came from the city center was far louder and drowned out the stadium and the half dozen helicopters hovering overhead.
In Federation Square the crowds had packed in tight and despite the obvious police presence you could probably of got away with anything right under their noses as they were all eyes front to the big screen. They did have one look out though who was in charge of spotting the Commander. When he headed in their direction they would all split up and look like they were actually doing something. They would soon re-group and continued watching the game though. Luckily Australia won 1-0. As the wave of people left Federation Square the surrounding city streets were engulfed. Motorists and trams stood no chance as tens of thousands of people poured over the roads. Despite the police trying to hold people back at crossings they were totally overpowered and seemed to give in and hold the cars back instead.

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