The end of an era

I was actually at Robert Harvey's third and fourth VFL games. Sitting in the Wormald Corporate Box at VFL Park. Actually, it was more of a partition than a box; it would be completely unrecognisable compared to the opulence offered in today's corporate facilties. I was pleased to receive a Moro chocolate bar.

Unfortunately, the chocolate bar is about all I can remember from those games, other than St Kilda hero Trevor Barker blanketing gun Hawthorn Full-Forward Jason Dunstall for three quarters. Dunstall had kicked three goals in the opening quarter as Hawthorn opened up a 20 point lead. Hawthorn would eventually win by 45 points, but Dunstall only had one more goal for the match. A young Robert Harvey kicked the first two goals of his career, but I can't remember them.

I didn't get to see St Kilda much in person when I was a kid. Until 1993, I attended Amateur Football every Saturday, so unless the game was early or late in the season, or not on a Saturday, I didn't go. However, I was there in 1992 on the Queens' Birthday, when St Kilda beat Collingwood. We were 11 points down half way through the last quarter, and I wanted to go home. That was the last time I ever actually wanted to leave a game early.

Later that year we beat Collingwood again in a final. In an extremely even year, Collingwood had finished equal 1st but 3rd on percentage, so played a knock-out final against the Saints. Again, I wasn't there, cheering on my beloved Brunswick to a E Section Premiership on the same day. The game marked an arrival to many a football fan's psyche about the man Darrell Baldock insisted on calling "Rodney" for six months before finally learning his name. He had 34 touches and was best on ground. Peter McKenna called the game for Channel 7 - one of the first of the football pundits to hop on the Harvey bandwagon.

Harvey had had three 40+ possession games in 1992, and would win his first St Kilda Best and Fairest. However, up until 1996, in my estimation, he always suffered in comparison to his on-ball teammate Nathan Burke. Burke almost won a Brownlow in 1996, with Burke, Harvey and Stewart Loewe sharing 54 Brownlow votes between them.

It was in 1997 that he exploded. I saw a few more games in person in 1997 - 6 in fact - and Harvey was at his best. In two matches at Football Park he had 83 possessions. His first three games against Port Adelaide would reap 113 possessions and 9 Brownlow Votes.

In the Grand Final he would collect 36 possessions and a goal with suspected broken ribs. He had 106 possessions during the finals series in 1997, but the finals performer tag has never stuck.

My favourite memories of Harvey are varied. The Qualifying Final against Adelaide in 2005, which I call "The Harvey Game". His 250th, when a massively undermanned and inexperienced St Kilda side beat Richmond, who had been a win away from a Grand Final the year before, and Harvey was best on ground.

It has all been said about Harvey, so I won't go on. To say he is the greatest Saint is fairly accurate. You could certainly argue others. Only Baldock and Barker are held in the same regard by St Kilda supporters.

It was another memory from a Richmond game that I'll leave you with. Last year, Robert Harvey played his 350th game in Perth against West Coast. The Saints had a tremendous win, but most Saints supporters weren't at the game, and not many more saw the game as it was not on free-to-air television.

So we had the opportunity to pay tribute to the man the next week against Richmond, in his 351st game. Harvey would collect 28 possessions and a Brownlow vote, but towards the end of the game he sprinted across the length of the half-forward line to make a spoil right in front of where my mother and I have sat for eight years, on the flank, Spencer St side of Telstra Dome.

Now, with the current trend of rotations and interchanges, it was Harvey's turn to head for the bench, straight after the spoil, and Harvey knew it. After picking himself up from the ground he began to sprint to the bench on the other side of the ground.

I was the first person to realise he was going off, probably for the remainder of the game. So I stood up and began to applaud him as he ran towards the bench; his familiar hair bouncing in the artificial sunlight. Slowly, but surely, I was joined by everyone in our section, which we like to feel is a poor imitation of the Moorabbin's famous animal enclosure. After he had left the field and we re-took our seats, my mum confessed to having a lump in my throat. I did too.

I cried when Stewart Loewe retired. Nearly a year later when Nathan Burke called it a day I didn't cry, partly because we had won by 80 points, partly because I had been concussed playing football earlier in the day. But I know I will be crying when Harvey walks off the field for the last time. Probably after we are knocked out of the finals at some stage, but hopefully, after Harvey holds aloft the premiership cup after his 384th and final game. I can dream, can't I?