No clearer in the wheel of time

[Dale61]

http://vfl.footballvic.com.au/_content/document/00047230-src.pdf

Two decades on, controversy still surrounds the third quarter of
the 1986 Grand Final.

Williamstown and Coburg were great adversaries during the 1980s, squaring off in the 1986, 1988 and 1989 Grand Finals.

It was an entertaining era of the then VFA. Captain-coaches were the norm rather than the exception, and these positions were generally filled by outrageously colourful characters.

And in 1986, there was nobody more colourful than Coburg captain-coach Phil Cleary and his Williamstown counterpart Terry Wheeler. VFA Grand Finals had a history of being explosive affairs, where the unexpected could normally be expected.

The first half of the ’86 Grand Final saw the teams separated by just four points, but served little notice as to what was about to unfold in the third quarter.

Tony Pastore, a subsequent Williamstown captain and VFL life member, was causing Coburg untold grief in defence. Cleary remembers just after half time that Pastore had drifted down between half back and wing in pursuit of the ball.

It happened that Cleary was also in the vicinity. An opportunity presented itself, Cleary recalled, to apply a bone-rattling shirtfront, which he hoped would put Pastore off his game.

“The ball was alive and I ran in and gave him a hard sort of bump. I think I bounced off Pastore and there was a little altercation,” Cleary recalled.

Within a matter of seconds, Pastore’s teammate Rick Slevison introduced himself to Cleary. It was, in the vernacular of the time, a nice how-do-you-do.

For Cleary, it was little more than a show of strength, and not so much as a jumper punch was thrown. Wheeler also happened to be in the area. While he regarded Cleary as a “player of limited, very limited ability”, he was mindful of how inspirational he could be to his team.

After Williamstown had lost the previous year’s Grand Final by six points, Wheeler viewed 1986 as the club’s opportunity to set things right.

“In my position, I was prepared to pull out all stops. The first half, as you would expect, was very tight,” Wheeler recalled. “With the aid of the breeze in the third quarter, I felt this was the time we had to stamp our authority on the game. Our attention at half time was to give the next 30 minutes everything we had.

“This was manifested by Phil stirring the pot right on the boundary line, right in front of the Williamstown crowd. If you were going to stir the pot, this was the worst place to do it.”

It was at that point that Wheeler entered the equation, along with field umpire Jeff Ryan.

“Phil was pushing and shoving Rick Slevison after shirt fronting Tony Pastore. One thing about Phil – he was never elegant,” Wheeler said. “His arms, his elbows, his knees, his legs, everything was fraying around. I saw him deck Slevison.”

According to Cleary, Wheeler blurted out: “Aren’t you going to report him, aren’t you going to send him off?” In those days, a send-off rule existed, whereby a player would be banished to the ‘sin bin’ for 15 minutes.

An incredulous Cleary inquired why, and was told for unduly rough play.

“I thought it was absurd – I had done nothing,” exclaimed Cleary. “I was stunned.”

While theatrics were part and parcel of his game, Cleary decided against putting on a show. He retired to the boundary, conscious that he still had to coach his team, which at that point trailed by 11 points.

“I thought if I played up, it might have reverberated on the team, and might have been a bad example.”

Cleary has no doubt that his unscheduled exit gave Williamstown a massive physiological advantage.

“Everything they touched turned to gold,” he said.

Williamstown kicked 8.2 to 1.3 for the third quarter to head into the last change with a 45-point lead.

“I’m not for a minute saying I was the key player. It wasn’t like Nathan Buckley in his prime being taken off, or a champion key forward like a Hird or a Lloyd being taken off,” Cleary said.

“But my significance to the team was physiological. We had played them twice and beaten them, and I played well against Williamstown and had more than matched it with Wheeler.

“Wheeler and I had a presence on the ground, but he was a blustering kind of captain-coach. I had his measure. He wasn’t going to try anything with me out there. I was well and truly his match.

“So they got a massive physiological boost for the next 15 minutes. I watched unable to do anything.”

When Cleary returned, Coburg got its second wind. They pumped home 8.5 to 3.3 and at one stage edged to within 13 points of Williamstown.

Did this incident prove the difference in the match?

Cleary said Coburg regained its composure, and he was able to get a fair bit of the ball once he came back on the field.

The question of whether Wheeler pressured the umpire into sending off Cleary still lingers today. Cleary claims a boundary umpire who attended the Coburg wake said the umpires’ advisor had instructed the men in white to jump on Cleary or Wheeler if they played up.

“I think Jeff Ryan over-reacted and when Wheeler was calling out ‘report him, send him off’,” said Cleary.

Not surprisingly, Wheeler has a different read on the situation, although he doesn’t deny suggesting that Cleary be sent from the field.

“I thought 15 minutes without Phil on the field would be a big help to us,” said Wheeler. “I called on the ump to report him, and blow me down if he not only reported him, but sent him off."

“I don’t think Phil has ever forgiven me.”

Wheeler said by the time Cleary returned to the ground, Williamstown had opened up a premiership-winning lead. He fully expected Coburg to mount one last challenge, which it did.

“The clock perhaps saved us. They were running hard. You think what influence a captain-coach has on a team, and in a Grand Final, I think they can have a heap of influence.

“Phil not being on the ground for that 15 minutes in the third quarter was to our advantage.”

However, Wheeler said the incident had to be put into its proper context, sending out a clear message to his old foe.

“Phil, please don’t get any visions of grandeur that you would have turned the result around, because you know you would not have.”

No doubt, the two different versions of the famous 1986 Grand Final will get plenty of air time this round, when Wheeler and Cleary are guests of Williamstown, who host the Coburg Tigers.