The eight types of parents you meet at junior sport

You can find them every weekend across Melbourne, from the dad at war with the coach, to the sidelines gossip posse and the team manager who takes on the thankless role nobody else wants. These are the parents of junior sport.

Meet some of the people you find at junior sports games

The winter sports season is underway and children everywhere are being loaded into people movers by parents whose weekends used to be very different.

Here are eight sideline characters you are likely to meet at junior sport.

ONE-MAN CHEERSQUAD

It’s great to get into the spirit and cheer on your team, but not the entire time and not at 150 decibels.

This parent, who is either profoundly deaf or wants everyone else to be, doesn’t care he’s the only one making noise.

Likely to even yell congratulations for an efficient throw back to the centre circle or a guzzle of Powerade at half time, not a second of play escapes his loud but positive appraisal and forceful applause.

When he’s not at junior sport, he’s probably wandering the streets, cheering on neighbours who are whipper snipping their nature strips.

How the anti coach view themselves, and how everybody else views them.

ANTI COACH

Like a psych patient who believes he’s Napoleon, this parent apparently believes they are the one true coach.

This often brings them into conflict with the real coach, whose game plans and priorities are ignored by the anti-coach’s spout of misinformation.

Often seen screaming instructions from near the shed and even daring to call unauthorised interchanges, the anti-coach even treads dangerously close to the halftime huddle and whispers corrupting commands into the ears of players who aren’t sure who to listen to.

The anti-coach is usually someone who used to be the coach and is having trouble not being the coach anymore.

GOSS SQUAD

While the kids trade tackles on the field, this clique of nosy parents stand around a pentagram on the grassy sideline to trade in salacious gossip.

Whose marriage is on the rocks? Which teachers at the local school are coupled with which? Which parents are anti-vaxxers? Which have had cosmetic surgery?

By the final siren they collect their secrets and pile into their SUVs where they retrospectively feign interest in the sports match, while keeping their eyes and ears peeled for more local goss to bring to the group next week, like a big cat hauling prey back to the pack.

The sausage tsar takes no notice of weather conditions.

SAUSAGE TSAR

An enterprising parent whose involvement in Rotary or philanthropic bent means the sport arena is never without the lingering aroma of slowly burning onion and undercooked snags.

With their clean record on food poisoning seemingly always under threat, the Tsar of sausages is either behind the barbecue or wandering the crowd with a charity pack of oversized Freddos even if it’s flooding with rain.

The weekend would be blander without them and their Esky full of soft drink cans.

PACKHORSE MANAGER

Now in her third season of regretting the decision to volunteer as team manager, this stressed parent rolls from mess to mess cleaning up after the failings of others.

Disputes about jumper clashes, legal threats over rolled ankles and parents getting banned for language that would get you court-martialled in the navy are all part of her weekend.

The thankless role is only recognised when the manager finally moves on when her child gets too old for the league and someone useless takes over.

Some light security is needed in case the brawler shows his face again.

BRAWLER

Wearing a string of stadium bans like a badge of honour, and also wearing a flannel shirt and shades, the brawler doesn’t care how many laws or noses need to get broken so he can live vicariously through his kid.

While the child probably prefers chemistry and doesn’t care about the match, their brawler dad is ready to contest every foul call or sideline rhetoric with his knuckles.

Rumours abound that he spent time on the inside for stabbing a teenage umpire, and a photo of his mug hangs on the wall of every sports venue admin office from Frankston to Werribee.

SNAIL

A slow-moving creature that carries its whole home wherever it goes.

Nothing more adequately describes the parents who set up on a grassy mound on the other side of the field with what seems to be a whole Ray’s Outdoors catalogue worth of gear.

Fold-up chairs, an Esky and Thermos are just the start.

A tent to guard from the wind, a miniature Weber that likely violates the rules of the establishment, a radio and foot rests are all in tow.

Early to arrive and the last to leave, the lethargic snails are always up for a chat and will offer up a sushi roll if you venture into their far-off realm.

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The ghost — a melancholy spectre that appears only in Round One and the grand final.

GHOST

This parent’s name is on the contact list and their kid is registered to play, but nobody’s seen them since Round One.

Despite forking our for a uniform and registration fee, the ghost family has little interest in actually attending games.

That’s until the end of the season when the ghost kid makes a chilling apparition in the grand final if their team makes it that far, and shares in the spoils of victory at the barbecue afterwards if they win.

Their brand new playing gear doesn’t go unnoticed.