Episode 78 - School soccer in Victoria in the 1950s and 60s

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Another week, another episode. Ian's semi-incapacitated, but able to do the show via Zoom - but could this be the end? Then the clean-up, usual shoutout to Mark Boric and Greg Stock. Oh, and the problems with trying to fill in upload forms online for both Blogger and YouTube. Ian's being chasing up leads at the Footscray Historical Society. Tony Persoglia has updated and fixed the 1980s Victorian State League page. 

Then to Adam Muyt's continued research on Dutch-Australian soccer, which has taken him into the Snowy Mountains and the Snowy Hydro Project - this leads to a discussion of "dreaming trails", and the way in which in dissipating or declining culture might continue in the dispersal of its personnel across the years. For example, what happens when the soccer playing migrants working on Snowy Hydro move on at the project's conclusion? Do they take the game with them? Where do they end up?

We finish the segment with Paul talking about his early stage's of reading of George Megalogenis' The Football Solution... let's see if Paul actually finishes it at any point of time so he can talk about it on the show.

After the break, Ian talks about his next seam of research at Footscray Historical Society, which takes him into the condition of school soccer in Melbourne in the 1950s and 60s - seen through the lens of Footscray Technical School yearbooks. We look at the research possibilities opened up by this; what the yearbooks looked like and what kind of they contained; the demographic changes revealed by the yearbooks; soccer's positioning within this school with other sports; and the influence of the institutional push by Victorian soccer bodies to get into schools and improve coaching, including hiring a director of coaching from overseas (which turns out to be Len Young).

(stick around for some dissection of competing contemporary views of the battle for schoolboy hearts and minds)

Ian talks about calling former Socceroo Ted Smith, who played in this competition in his youth. Hakoah's absorption of Swinburne's junior teams, and did this happen more often?

Also, a bit related to this issue of competing for resources, that Collingwood Football Club tried to secure the lease of Northcote Football Club's ground, to maintain it for Australian rules, in the event that Northcote folded. Then then familiar story of fighting of for grounds, and trying to woo future generations (especially of migrants), instead of current generations already wedded to their sport. 

Then 100 Years Ago Today we start off in Portland in western Victoria, where the crew of the Cupid will provide an example of the English game of soccer football; then to the Celebes and Macassar, and Singapore and Malay where soccer rules, where our correspondent observes the sporting practices of the locals; the interstate Australian Rules tournament for railwaymen sees the New South Wales is using soccer tactics; still in Adelaide, a meeting for a soccer practice match; an Adelaide commentator on Australian rules notes the lack of quality in his sport in Queensland and New South Wales, where the existence of rugby and soccer players means that there's not enough quality for Australian rules representative sides - also a show of literary fairness obscuring probably really unfair attitudes towards non-Aussie Rules football codes; and in Newcastle, the season is about to begin, with suspicious transfers between clubs - is it down to professionalism or shifting district boundaries?