What a week for the Ardmona Football Club!
Brendan Fevola turned up and the Cats sold sausages and beers till the cows came home – or longer, because the cows come home early at this time of year – but the scoreboard took a step backwards from the promising signs shown in recent weeks.
While Fevola was at the Ardmona Recreation Reserve on Saturday, he didn’t pull on the Cats guernsey due to lingering soreness from playing two games in two days across two states a week earlier.
MORE: Ardmona Cats round 11 | Ardmona Cats round 10
But he was only too happy to chat and pose for pics with the locals as the footy team went down 0.1 (1) to Merrigum 38.26 (254).
‘‘Good on the footy club,” Fevola told the Shepparton News at half-time.
“These boys come out every week. They’re not necessarily winning games - they’re pretty much getting blown out - but for them to keep showing up is great.
‘‘Footy’s not always about winning, as long as they’re enjoying themselves.’’
Picture: Shepparton News
As upbeat as ‘Fev’ was about the event, the result was disappointing after Ardmona managed to kick four goals in round 11 following eight scoring shots the previous week.
The Cats’ percentage took another hit, dropping from 2.75% to 2.54% and the ‘points against’ column is getting dangerously close to 3000, currently showing 2873 scores going the wrong way.
With an away game against 11th-placed Murchison-Toolamba this week defence will be a priority, but Fevola was keen to point out that country football isn’t defined by wins and losses, but about the community that surrounds the club.
‘‘Country footy is the heartland of footy. I’ve played up here; I know how important footy is to towns,” he said.
‘‘To keep these little clubs going, you need the supporters to rock up. It doesn’t matter if they don’t win every week as long as they get some support.
‘‘I lost my love of footy and then I came back down to Yarrawonga. I love footy again now and country footy brought that back to me.”