Does anyone recall the actual day itself? I remember it was quite warm, worried it might help the Cowboys. I made sure I got to the stadium early just to experience the build up outside. I actually carried a small placard with “A night with my wife for a ticket to the GF.” That got a few laughs but didn’t go down too well with some fans particularly one woman. Looking back it was a dumb thing to do but just wanted to make fun of how important a day it was to many of us. I regret doing it now. A security guard took the placard saying it promoted scalping. I tried to explain it was simply an exchange of goods but he didn’t see the funny side (perhaps there wasn’t one). I wasn’t going to mention all this on this thread as it’s not a proud moment in my life of supporting our club but there it is. I’m not without my mistakes even during one of the best weeks of my life. Thankfully my wife didn’t know about it.
It was an incredibly stressful week. I was (am!) very superstitious when it comes to these things, so I made sure that I did the same things throughout the week. Same group of people at Trivia on Tuesday, same work schedule (I was a uni student doing shift work at the time), and most importantly, the same clothes and routine on game day. I had been going to games (incl finals) with the same group that season, and we had met at the same pub in Haymarket for the games at Homebush before getting the train out - we had won each time.
I remember my mate (would later be the best man at my wedding) turned up on GF day in a different jersey to the one he'd been wearing throughout the finals run. I lost my mind, utterly convinced that this act of treason had lost us the GF. Thankfully I was talked off the ledge and enjoyed the day.
Was a bit of a weird experience at the game. We'd had a group of 10-12 all sitting together for the previous three finals games, but we were all scattered across the stadium for the GF. I was sitting with another friend (a neutral), which didn't help my nerves at all. He couldn't see any way that we'd lose, and felt that reassuring me as much would help with the nerves. He was wrong.
Anyway, it obviously all worked out on the night. We caught up outside the ground, decided to get one of the event buses back to Balmain. Got held up around the Iron Cove Bridge, so the driver just let everyone out and we ran up the hill along Victoria Rd and down towards Balmain. Street parties everywhere, just amazing stuff. We ended up having a few beers on the street outside the Town Hall pub, and then ran back down to the leagues club (RIP) to see the players come out. Incredible night.
