How Fitzroy greats have reconnected with the Brisbane Lions

For over two decades, Fitzroy great Richard Osborne did not feel like he had a football home.

As a former captain and member of the Lions’ team of the century, Osborne should not have felt lost, but, like many in the Fitzroy community after the harrowing events of 1996, it took time to reconnect.

Fitzroy great Richard Osborne has reconnected with the Brisbane Lions.Credit: Justin McManus

“I think for a period there, I don’t know what other players felt, when the merger occurred it was almost like we didn’t have a club,” Osborne said this week.

It was not until he received a call out of the blue in 2019 that Osborne regained a sense of football belonging: he was to be inducted into the Brisbane Lions’ hall of fame, in recognition of his 11 seasons, 187 games and 411 goals in the red, blue and gold.

Richard Osborne.Credit: Justin McManus.

“That really reconnected my interest in the club,” Osborne, who played 283 games for Fitzroy, Sydney, the Western Bulldogs (formerly known as Footscray) and Collingwood, said.

“That night, I was inducted into the hall of fame it made me feel I did have a club again.

“It’s great they’ve made the grand final. I played for the Swans as well, but I’ll definitely be on the Lions bandwagon this weekend.”

Osborne’s story is not uncommon among old Fitzroy people, even those who embraced the shotgun merger with the then Brisbane Bears in 1996. Some supported other teams. Others turned their back on the AFL entirely, angry their club was being shipped north to another state.

Like Osborne, Paul Roos had left before the foundation club’s demise in the league’s centenary season.

Roos is a believer in the merger, even if his allegiances this week are with Sydney, where he is a former player, a drought-breaking premiership coach, and holds close ties with former coaching partner John Longmire. He has known Nick Blakey since the Swan was a baby, through his friendship with his father and former Fitzroy teammate John Blakey.

Paul Roos, pictured here playing for Fitzroy in 1993, is a backer of the Brisbane Lions merger.Credit: Ray Kennedy

Though he never played for Brisbane, Roos feels a connection to the new entity. When they saluted for their historic first flag in 2001, Roos was stopped by jubilant Fitzroy fans.

“I remember walking back to the hotel that night, I got more congratulations that night than I did for any of the best games I had played for Fitzroy,” Roos, a five-time best and fairest winner, said.

“If I take away my more recent Sydney and Melbourne hats, there’s a really strong connection. I’m really proud of the 269 games I played, all the stuff that I did.

“My main history playing is with the Fitzroy footy club, which is now Brisbane. The connection is clouded a little bit when you go through your career and go to other clubs – it’s just different.”

Laurie Serafini was an early convert. As a member of the merged club’s inaugural board, he had to be. Though he compared Fitzroy’s demise to losing a family member, he saw life after death.

“Brisbane Lions wasn’t a bad option, the other option was the graveyard,” Serafini said. “Is it ideal? No, but three premierships healed the wounds.”

A director from 1997-2010, Serafini remains a committed Lion. He rarely misses a game, either live at the ground or on TV.

He catches up often with former teammates. Last week, he was with a group including Michael Conlan, Scott Clayton and Garry Wilson cheering on the Lions to their narrow victory over Geelong. This week, he will be at the grand final with his wife and two daughters, neither of whom were born during his 146-game career in the 1970s and 80s.

David Leydon is a supporter with Fitzroy in his blood. His parents met as 16-year-olds at a Fitzroy game at Brunswick Street Oval. His father took long-service leave in 1991 to help run Fitzroy’s tin rattle, which raised $800,000 only for more debt to emerge afterwards. Leydon answered phones at night from the call centre in the old VFL House at Jolimont. He is president of the Fitzroy Football Club, which plays in the VAFA.

Leydon remained a Lions member after the merger but “it didn’t feel the same for a while”. That he had a young son naive to the ugly politics helped keep him interested. He enjoyed the 2001-02 flags, but 2003 stood out after the Lions wore the FFC monogram on a heritage guernsey for a game in Melbourne.

“The moment at the end of the game when you saw Michael Voss and Jonathan Brown pointing at the FFC with the fist raised, that was magnificent,” Leydon said. “I almost get a tear in the eye thinking about it now. It got me. I’m 100 per cent totally back and invested.”

But not all have. Colin Hobbs, along with Elaine Findlay – the first woman on the board of an AFL club – and president Dyson Hore-Lacy, was one of the three Fitzroy directors negotiating the merger with the league.

The club favoured a merger with North Melbourne, to become the North Fitzroy Kangaroos, as it retained the Fitzroy name. Hobbs, who played 64 games from 1966-71, could accept the removal of the Lions moniker, as the club had been also known as the Maroons and Gorillas, and Fitzroy’s Brunswick Street Oval is in the suburb of North Fitzroy.

The anger from the foiled merger may have subsided, but these days Hobbs and his wife and their adult children are Melbourne supporters.

David Leydon with Kevin “Bulldog” Murray.

“No animosity, just no interest,” Hobbs said. “I haven’t embraced them. I’ve always said if people can see Fitzroy in Brisbane, good luck to them. In some ways, I envy them.”

Under chairman Andrew Wellington, the Brisbane Lions have made a concerted effort to acknowledge their Fitzroy roots.

When the Lions play in Melbourne, Wellington often watches Fitzroy play in the Amateurs. Coach Chris Fagan took them for training before their 2018 C-grade grand final. The Lions also run a coaching workshop with the VAFA club. This year, the Lions hit 10,000 Victoria-based members for the first time. Win or lose, the Lions will have their fan day at Brunswick Street Oval on Sunday, a valuable fundraiser for a grassroots football club.

“We’re conscious we want to honour that part of the club’s heritage,” Wellington said. “There’s an obvious benefit which manifested itself last Saturday night when you heard the noise for us.

“Our players commented how they felt supported when they got that momentum in the second half. It benefits us to have strong support in Melbourne.”

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