Fans come to their grand final teams in different ways

Lockdown gloom to break on Saturday night for the Melbourne and Bulldogs faithful.

Alistair Pitts outside his Melbourne Demons-themed East Brighton home with his children, Jemima, Heidi, Monty and Cllem. Picture: Aaron Francis

Diehard Demons fan Alistair Pitts came to the team via the traditional route of family, albeit eventually.

His grandfather attended the MCG for Melbourne’s grand final wins in the 50s, and his dad was there for the team’s last flag in 1964. At 48, Pitts has never seen a flag.

“I barracked for Hawthorn until I was seven or eight,” the East Brighton father of four says. “My best mate at primary school went for the Hawks. Dad eventually swayed me over to the red and the blue. It was a subtle but concerted campaign.”

“I frequently joked with him over the years that it has cost me nine premierships, but I also say it’s been a much more character-building experience.”

Across town Toni Tripunoski came to his team via an entirely different route. Tripunoski has a one-seat shop in Footscray’s main drag, Barkly St. He’s cut hair in Melbourne’s inner west for the past 30 years since fleeing communist Yugoslavia.

“On my first day in my first job my boss says to me ‘Toni, what’s your team?’,” the 53 year-old ­recalls. “I say ‘What team? Soccer?’ I didn’t know what he was talking about. He says ‘You’ve got to have a footy team if you want to be a barber, if you want to live in Melbourne’.”

Forget hair oil, footy is the great lubricant in a barber shop.

“It’s so often the starting point of conversation,” says Tripunoski, since that day a Bulldogs supporter. “I’ve never had two people in my shop have a serious argument when it’s the topic. It’s what I love about footy and Melbourne.”

Ahead of Saturday’s grand final showdown, attempting to define the typical footy team supporter is a doomed proposition, no matter what code. People choose their colours for too many reasons.

Toni Tripunoski in his Footscray barbers shop. Picture: Aaron Francis

But some well-worn cliches prevail for the teams contesting this grand final. The Western Bulldogs, for decades known simply as Footscray, are a team of scrappy scraggers, much like their wrong-side-of-the-tracks supporter base, traditional wisdom says.

And Melbourne, the game’s founding team back in 1859, is supported by establishment blue bloods and captains of industry.

“I think Melbourne supporters are the most stereotyped in the country,” Pitts said. “There’s probably some truth in it – off to Mt Buller in their Range Rovers instead of going to the footy – and other gems like that.

“But I meet Melbourne supporters from all walks of life, and whenever I do I feel an enormous sense of connection through our decades of shared disappointment and suffering.”

“There’s an embrace in our club both for players and supporters coming from all cultures. It is what I love about Melbourne, the club and the city itself.”

While Pitt’s team has no geographic base, Tripunoski’s shop is in the centre of the western suburbs team. The club’s Western Oval is a little further down Barkly St, home to scores of shops selling Vietnamese and other Asian foodstuffs. A good smattering of ­African outlets dot the street. It’s a concentrated version of the city’s rich cultural melting pot.

“When I first came here, we were immigrants coming into ­society,” Tripunoski says. “But the generation today – Vietnamese, African, whatever – they are ­already part of society.”

He says footy is often the conversation currency of his multicultural clientele.

“But it was better back in the 90s when customers were all part of the one conversation, rather than staring at their phones,” he says.

Both men have been deeply affected by the Covid-19 pandemic and the lockdown that has tried, and failed, to control it.

The most recent restrictions across greater Melbourne have left Tripunoski’s shop closed for weeks, and he says he is really feeling it.

“It’s honestly not so much the money, though that’s part of it, with rent and utilities. It’s that I can’t do what I love to do, which is open this place and be with my customers,” he says.

“But when I open up again, I worry about whether I’m going to be made to police who is and who isn’t vaccinated.

“I’ve been struggling to be honest. So watching the grand final on Saturday night with my daughters will be a good break from that. We’ll be yelling for the Dogs, but what I’d give to open on Monday and talk about the game with my regulars.”

Pitts says Covid-19 had seen new challenges for him and his family. His wife Sarah is an immunisation nurse, and has never been busier, he says. Both have been dealing with home schooling four kids.

“I work in both community health settings and private practice dealing with addiction and general mental health, and over the last 18 months since this pandemic started there has simply been a huge increase in volume in my work.

“I’m really worried about the young people. They simply aren’t getting what they need in terms of social interaction.”

Pitts has ensured there will be another generation of Demons fans, winning the loyalty of his four children Jemima, 13, Clem 11, Monty 9 and Heidi, 6, through tried and tested parental techniques.

“There was a period when they were very young when it wasn’t the joy of winning that was bringing them back to the games the next week, it was the gravy train of hot chips and jam doughnuts,” he says.

The Pitts will be glued to the telly riding every bump and kick on Saturday night, along with a huge Melbourne television audience that will include not only the 100,000 who won’t be at the MCG, but the entire captive city still in lockdown restrictions and under curfew past 9pm.

The family has painted its front gate in Melbourne colours in anticipation of the grand final clash.

“I haven’t contemplated what I will do if we lose, but if we win it will stay for the duration of our reign as premiers, which will be at least a year and hopefully longer,” Pitts says.