The Game
By Rod Johnston
Thump … that hurt! I spat out the dirt as I dragged myself to my feet again. I had brought him down, but he still got the ball out along the back line. The five-eighth flicked to the inside centre, and on to the outside centre. No need to send the ball any further to their wing … the centres had neatly side-stepped our entire back line and had scored yet another try. That must be thirty something to nil. We were being slaughtered … but no surprise. Our opposition were the school elite, the A Grade rugby league team. And worse still, they were the best team in the Brisbane high school competition. Later in the season, they would go on the take the Brisbane premiership at Lang Park (oops … I mean Suncorp Stadium, as it is now called). In contrast, we were just the B Grade team, the guys who were not good enough to play A Grade. But still, we played for fun.
This game was a “friendly”, a chance for both teams to get in some mid-season practice. But this was no ordinary footy game. It was open warfare, and were losing … badly. We knew we would, but we played anyway.
Most of the A Grade team were OK. We had known many of them since Year 9. But others were the bullies from our own Year 12 class … those thugs who had spent too much time beating up other kids and not enough time studying. Now they were repeating Year 12. They were older, bigger and stronger than us mere mortals, and they made school life very precarious for anyone who would not suck up to them.
Stop dreaming … here they come again. Tackle low and … thump … that hurt again!
This was suburban Brisbane of the sixties, a middle-class suburb on the northern fringe of the city with its burgeoning population of baby-boomer kids crowding into the local high school. Although still less than ten years old, the high school already boasted a population well over 1,200, drawn from half a dozen feeder primary schools. School life was raw, rough and riotous … never dull.
Look out! The kick went deep into our backline. Our fullback fumbled it and they were all over him. Another scrum. Well, that’s a joke. My mate and I both played in the forwards … second row. As we packed down, we both understood well the futility of this exercise. The collective weight of their pack was at least 50% greater than ours. There was no chance that we could push them back, even if our hooker was lucky enough to claim possession. Out came the ball, their half back flicked it to blind, and their wing crossed for yet another try.
Despite the bullying, senior school life was pretty good. Most of all, I enjoyed the comradeship of good mates. Some lined up here beside me now in this B Grade team. They too were suffering the targeted onslaught from opposition bullies, determined to pursue vendettas that could not be fought quite so easily in the classroom. This was their opportunity to bring us to heel, to make us kowtow to their superiority. But not so. We had been apprehensive going into the game, fully aware of the scores that were to be settled. But buoyed by the solidarity of our collective resolve and by a camaraderie in the true Aussie spirit, none of us buckled. We just kept playing … fronting up tackle after tackle after tackle.
Thump … more pain!
But school life is not all football. There is (believe it or not) study too. Despite absolutely appalling classroom discipline (ha ha … that’s a joke), a few of us actually managed to scrape through our Year 12 finals with a university matriculation.
Thump … get back to the important things in life … surviving the brutality of this slaughter. Too late, another opposition try.
This was the year of my first steady girlfriend … twelve months of happiness that transcended that turbulent Year 12 and lasted into next year of work and part time university. I was smitten. But all good things eventually end, and finally we parted … still friends, but both wiser for the experience and ready to move on. I was growing up.
Thump … Hey, that one wasn’t so bad! The ball went loose, and our team managed to grab it. Although we still could not cross the line, we were now playing better than anyone had expected. There was one particularly unfortunate Year 12 classmate who was subjected to excessive bullying. Although this poor boy was not particularly likeable, he did not deserve the excesses heaped on him by the “cool” group. To befriend him would be social suicide, but … to our credit … that is exactly what my friends did. He was never a close mate, but at least in our company he was safe. I met him briefly a few years later … just an ordinary guy who seemed to have survived a horrendous Year 12 without too much personality damage.
Thump … thump … thump. And so it dragged on. We never did score, but at least we fronted up and played the game to the best of our ability.
At last … the final whistle … and it was over. The score … oh, never mind, that is best forgotten. But we had achieved something more important. As we limped off the field, we could hold our heads high. We had stood up to the bullies, against the odds, and we had survived. That football game was well over fifty years ago, but the lessons of that game and of Year 12 remain. Be loyal to your friends, be passionate in sharing your love, and show generosity and compassion to those who are less fortunate than ourselves. And transcending all these, don’t be cowed by the bullies.
During the five decades since, I have been very fortunate to travel widely and to see many things in all corners of the earth – wealth and poverty, cruelty and kindness, sympathy and apathy. These lead me to reflect on both personal values and on those of our country.
Australia is enmeshed in a football match, one in which the stakes are the very survival of our independence and our way of life. We are (by far) the weaker team. We face some formidable opposition … the bullies of the world … those large countries who dominate world affairs … the superpowers. We have no choice but to play the game, and we must play by the rules. But we must never be bullied into abandoning what we know to be right.
We must defend a fair go for our weaker Pacific neighbours. Thump … that hurt! … The Chinese place embargos on our barley, beef and wine, because we dare to publicly help our neighbours.
We must be the promoter of international peace. Thump …. that hurt again! … The Americans demand that we dispatch armed forces to invade yet another country on their behalf, even though there is no threat to us or to our way of life.
We must never succumb to the commercial pressures of greed and exploitation that conspire to rob us of our independence. Thump … the most painful of all! … Corporations and politicians threaten us with lower living standards if we baulk at sacrificing our natural resources to foreign investors.
We are now approaching the full-time whistle and the game is reaching its climax.
So, just when will we stand up to these bullies?
