You Win Some----You Lose Some



I have two vivid memories of playing in finals-one successful and one not so. The not so successful came in one of the many seasons I played under Bill Crisp. We had finished top of the ladder and were red hot favourites for the title. Finals day dawned and Crispo came down with a wog that had him throwing up every other hour. I'm not sure whether we had a reserve or whether Crispo deemed him not good enough to play. Anyway, Bill elected to play himself with the plan being that we would win the first 3 rubbers. Well, one of us lost so that Crispo had to get 6 points or so to claim the pennant. Bill was a sorry sight as he took the court in 2 sweaters, tracksuit pants, a towel wrapped around his neck and a beanie over his head. There's no need for me to elaborate further, but I reckon that was the closest he ever came to a pennant.

Incidentally, it can't have been me who lost, because I remained on speaking terms with him until he passed on. We used to meet in the Victory every few months or so, and he could still knock back more than the odd ale.

My other memory was of playing with Barry Blumke, Peter Creevy and Vince Grisaffi in a final against Capalaba. It finished about 1.30am with all matches going to 5. When it got to 8-8 in the fifth in Barry's match, they were leading 2 rubbers to 1 and by 2 points overall. All the Capalaba guy needed to do was call for a short game and the title was theirs. Incredibly he called a long game. Barry won 10-8 and we were tied. We had to replay the whole final the following week. I think even Peter went into strict training- no grog except for morning, afternoon and evening. The Capalaba mob must have celebrated early, because we all had easy 3-0 wins in the replay and the matches were all over by 10pm.

Kev. Mahoney.