Round 1

The district level footy season lasts about 20 weeks, each week defined as a "round". Last weekend was the first round of play for the team that I am working with and the team that Erik is playing for. I wasn't really sure what to expect in terms of how many people would be there to watch and how the day would go, but I did know that there was a special "guest player" playing with our team in order to try to attract a large crowd on opening day. Anthony Koutoufides, affectionately known as "Kouta" by the locals, played for our side (teams are referred to as "sides" here) last week to the tune of what I'm guessing was a couple thousand dollars in his pocket for one game.

Kouta getting ready to play with the Moonee Valley FC

Kouta used to play in the AFL (equivalent of the NFL if we were taking American football and not footy), and had great success during his career, including being a few votes shy of winning the Brownlow Medal (the MVP of the league, essentially) in 2000. In totally non-footy related news, he won Australia's Dancing with the Stars in 2006! One of the guys on our team who follows the NFL first compared him to Tom Brady, but then decided he was more like an Eli Manning, not having quite the stature of Tom and his Under Armour and Stetson cologne ads, though Kouta did advertisements for both Nike and Adidas in the 90's. Either way, he's a big deal and LOTS of people came out to watch him play, which created a really fun and exciting atmosphere. Both teams (the senior team, or the 1's, and the reserve team, known as the 2's) beat the opponent by over 100 points, a big turn around from last year when apparently both teams lost to that same opponent by a combined 300+ points. Perhaps we should have tried to get Kouta for Round 2 as well, because we got flogged (commonly used Aussie word when a team loses badly of which the definition is: to beat harshly) in yesterday's game. Both teams lost by over 100 points, so the shoe was on the other foot, as they say. Apparently the team we played yesterday will be a top 5 team in the league (out of 14 teams), so there is no need to get discouraged yet. I'm not sure if I've mentioned this before or not, but the team I am working with won only 2 games last season, so I am certainly hoping for a better season this year!

Unfortunately I didn't capture the spectacularness of this rainbow, which was completely full and extremely bright over the CBD after a big storm came through this afternoon. Here is what remained of the rainbow when I left the gym.

I thought I'd share a few funny terminology things with you that come up with the footy guys. I often ask them how things went in practice. They are constantly correcting me because they call it training, not practice. Their shoes are not cleats (they have NO IDEA what cleats are), they are boots. In fact, Erik mentioned to the other sports trainer (my official term when working with this team) that he needed a band-aid because his cleats were rubbing, she had absolutely no idea what he was talking about. Game jerseys are not called jerseys but jumpers. We aren't exactly sure how that works because a jacket is also a jumper. A bruise or contusion (like when you get kneed in the thigh) is called a corky. In training, when they put on pennies (the different colored mesh things so that you know who is on each team), those are called bibs. Before the regular season started, we had 3 practice matches, not scrimmages (they had no clue what a scrimmage was). And I'm not taping their ankles, I'm strapping them. :)

Another amazing autumn sunset captured thanks to the iPhone.

In terms of life in general, I was back to work last week after two weeks off due to school holidays. School is year-round here and that was the first break, separating term 1 from term 2. I was fortunate to be called to work at the sports school right across the street from where we live, so it was a nice ease back into working in a place that I am familiar with already. Week 2 of the second term starts tomorrow, but it's a bit of an easier week because Wednesday is a public holiday for ANZAC Day, a day that marks the anniversary of the first major military action fought by Australian and New Zealand forces during the first World War. It will be nice to work for 2 days, have a day off, then work for 2 more days before another weekend rolls around!

I thought this cloud made it look like there had been an explosion over our 'hood!