The very first Easter Monday clash between Geelong and Hawthorn may have first taken place in 2010, but according to Geelong premiership captain Cameron Ling, the fierce rivalry between the two clubs can be traced back even further, back to 1989.
1989 was of course the year of what some argue was the greatest Grand Final every played. With the Cats going down by six points, it’s not the fondest of memories for Geelong supporters outside of Gary Ablett Snr’s nine goal, Norm Smith Medial winning performance, but it is undeniably, one of the most entertaining games every played, it’s mix of brutality and tension almost unrivalled.
According to Ling, then an eight year old Cats supporter in the old Great Southern Stand, it is where it all started.
“I was a Cats fan as a kid and I went to the 1989 Grand Final,” he told the To The Final Bell podcast this week.
“It's still one of the greatest games of footy ever despite the Cats not winning, it was just great to be there. I was eight years old; Gaz (Ablett) Senior has kicked nine, ‘we'll win one one day, the Hawks aren't that bad.’
“Fast forward two years. 1991, Second Semi Final, Hawthorn beat Geelong by two points at Waverley, Geelong then had to play West Coast in the most torrential rain in the preliminary final the following week, Hawthorn got to skip the week and go through, and Geelong lose the preliminary final to West Coast.
“Honestly it was almost flooded, Waverley, and Hawthorn ran all over the top of West Coast because they played in the slog. If we'd won that second semi, I still believed as a 10 year old kid that we would have beaten West Coast or Hawthorn, who had to come through the wet.”
Fast forward a decade and Ling is a part of an emerging Geelong powerhouse, a side that would eventually break the club’s 44 year premiership drought before famously hitting a brown and gold wall in the 2008 Grand Final, despite looking unbeatable throughout the season.
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Ling picks it up from there.
“Now I'm starting to not like Hawthorn and then it just went year after year, and then of course they became a really good team, the 2008 Grand Final, one of the most painful football days in both of our lives, and then every time from that it was, I just really want to beat this team, but also this club and it became deep.
“More than a game you could say.”
