UMPS’ WORD

Umpire’s Corner Round 14, 2012
On Thin IceAfter the rousing reception received (that’s some great alliteration right there), Cam’s season review will continue in coming weeks. It was disappointing however, to read last week’s column which was penned solely by Macca. Never before has there been so little interest in an Umpire’s Corner, and Macca’s pathetic efforts clearly indicate that his co-scribe deserves a significant pay increase. From University Oval to ManilaLast Saturday was a perfect day for football. The sun was shining, the birds were singing, and some of our lighter-skinned umpires were even seen to be applying liberal amounts of sunscreen to escape the UV Rays. There were no excuses for Tom Moloney, who arrived at his game wearing what can only be described as a ‘man-scarf’, perfectly knotted and arranged. Not sure whether that fits within the VAFAUA’s ‘match-day attire’ policy?
Poker Night FundraiserWill be held on August 4th. Still plenty of spots available for what should be a great night of poker. Speak to AD or Cam if you’re interested.
Optimistic we’ve all heard stories of umpires officiating in significant milestone matches being afforded the opportunity to select their preferred panels. In recognition of their outstanding service over a number of years the coaching panel are always happy to assist in making these days as memorable as possible. However, we’ve never heard of an umpire asking to select a panel because a match happens to fall on their birthday. Sorry Ben Nicholson, when the number of years you’re turning is actually more than the amount of games you’ve umpired you’re probably going to be out of luck. Happy 18th anyway!
Fundraising Raffle Once again, we are holding a raffle as part of our fundraising activities. Only 100 tickets will be sold, at a bargain price of $50 each. First (and only) prize is a ‘bar voucher’ to the tune of $2500, with the rest going to the Association. See Grant, Cam or Schwabbie for tickets. We can organise for the cost of your ticket(s) to come straight out of your monthly pay.Coalition UmpireSeems to gaining a bit of popularity this one. It was mentioned last week that field umpire Shane McNamara was called Tony Abbott by a few PEGS supporters a few weeks ago and last weekend copped the same from the Williamstown supporters. Hopefully he get some parliamentary privileges when they hand out the grand finals at the end of the year Long walk
We’d all like to wish Peter Teasdale well as he heads off to tackle the Kokoda Track. He’ll miss only two games and will be fit and primed ready to go for the finals. If we have a wet and slushy finals series he’ll be well and truly acclimatised.Harris Family ButchersDon’t forget our sponsors who always do a sensational job in supplying our barby meat at our functions and meetings. Go down and visit them at 73 Mackie Road East Bentleigh and they’ll look after you. Personal Mortgage ManagersFor all your buying and selling needs in the real estate world, enlist the help of long-time sponsor  Anthony Damen who will certainly do the right thing for you.WebsiteDon’t forget to check the website regularly just to keep up to date with what’s going on. Go to http://vafaua.asn.au

Umpire’s Corner Round 13, 2012
Social Notes: A couple of pretty successful social events were held recently. We held the Annual Trivia Night, professionally run by our coach Tony Hales. Highlight of the night was no doubt Peter James for his singing and dancing “skills”. Well done to organiser Greg Rolfe’s table who took home first prize.The day after we had the annual PUMPS (past Umpires) and Life Members lunch with this year’s guest speaker being Peter Howe of the AFL’s coaching panel. A great day had by all and the stories got bigger as the day went on. 
LookalikesThis line was directed at field umpire Shane McNamara last weekend after he failed to pay a free kick to one team, “I’m not voting for you Tony Abbott”. Shane, you been wearing those Speedos again? Harris Family ButchersDon’t forget our sponsors who once again did a sensational job in supplying our barby meat at the last VAFAUA meeting. Go down and visit them at 73 Mackie Road East Bentleigh and they’ll look after you. Personal Mortgage ManagersFor all your buying and selling needs in the real estate world, enlist the help of long-time sponsor  Anthony Damen who will certainly do the right thing for you.Representative GameWell done to all the guys who represented us last Sunday at Sportscover Arena when the VAFA under 19s took on (and lost to) the VCFL under 19s. In the field we had Sean Scully junior and Ben Lavale, the Bevan brothers, Luke & Mitchell on the boundary and Pat Dwyer with the flags. Well done to all!!
Annual DinnerThe 2012 VAFAUA Pre Finals Dinner is coming around very quickly and will be held on Monday 27 August in the Members Dining Room at the MCG.Our dinner is a great celebration of the year in umpiring. There are a few awards, some great videos, and tremendous opportunities to reflect on another great season in the VAFA. It is an event not to be missed.We are pleased to announce that Luke Ball from the Collingwood Football Club will be our guest Speaker.
If you wish to reserve a table, please contact Russell Davidson with the names of each of the guests making up that table.We encourage as many of our friends from the clubs to attend as well.WebsiteDon’t forget to check the website regularly just to keep up to date with what’s going on. Go to http://vafaua.asn.au

Cam’s Mid Season Review Part 2

Apologies to all if this seems a little rushed. I’ve just been making the most of school holidays by cleaning up at the Crown Casino poker tables with AD and Stokesy (note, the VAFAUA encourages responsible gambling).After the unparalleled success of last week’s assessment of some of our more prominent umpires, I’m pleased to bring you (once again with zero input from Macca) the latest in my highly researched and unimpeachable (Google it) analysis of the VAFAUA’s finest. Well, sort of.
Russell ‘Not Again?’ Davidson- After six consecutive Premier Grand Final appointments, experts are beginning to suggest that there may be a pattern emerging. Further investigations must ensue, but for now the only logical conclusion one can draw is that Rusty is in possession of some inflammatory photographs of Benny Goodman or Tony Hales. Or both.
Matthew ‘Opportunity’ Pryor- Shares a name with a law of the game that players still don’t seem to understand. For this reason, is considered a big chance to feature late in September. Seems far too polite and mature for his age, so if you have any dirt on him please let me know.
Grant ‘Six Thirty’ Wardrop- Not sure if the coaches have noticed this one, but the old-timer is renowned for arriving at training after the warm-up laps have been completed, and is thus (at last count) approximately 12.4km more unfit than I am. Can’t give an exact figure because Chucky seems to vary the length of the track depending on his mood.
Ryan ‘Wild Man’ Robertson- Had the dubious honour last week of performing what Rowdy dubbed ‘the dumbest thing he’d seen in umpiring’. A fairly harsh call by the Senior Coach (it was just a positioning error) who clearly wasn’t around when a former goal umpire decided to air his dirty laundry regarding his grand final appointment….on Facebook….the night before the game.
David ‘Jetsetter’ Lepair- The reigning Premier B GF officiator is clearly pretty comfortable with this year’s competition, and has decided to head off to Europe for six weeks. We’re not sure whether Dave is getting in some high-altitude training, or whether he’s just getting drunk, but he’ll no doubt have an influence on the final positionings at the end of the year.
Sean ‘Junior’ Scully Jr- Enjoys his first representative game this weekend. A well-deserved honour for the injury prone member of the VAFAUA Royal Family. If he can stay fit, should have a big finish to the year.
‘Pistol’ Peter….anyone seen this bloke lately?
Thanks from Simmo
Anthony Simpson would like to thank all who were involved in helping him celebrate the milestone of 400 games last Saturday. In particular the Prahran Assumption and Old Paradians Football Clubs. To his partners on the day, Tony Hope and his brother Peter along with the  rest of the panel, they made the day memorable. The Simpson family support was also there as usual  on the day. And later on a great night was had by all.Soft
Yes, goal umpires, we bagged you a few weeks ago when some of you couldn’t handle the wet conditions. Well we take it all back. A couple of Sundays ago at Sportscover Arena the three field umpires donned orange shirts to celebrate Multicultural Round, but they were LONG-SLEEVED!!!  Interesting look.
 Social EventsA couple of pretty successful social events were held last weekend. On Saturday night we held the Annual Trivia Night, professionally run by our coach Tony Hales. Highlight of the night was no doubt Peter James for his singing and dancing “skills”. Well done to organiser Greg Rolfe’s table who took home first prize.
On Sunday we had the annual PUMPS (past Umpires) and Life Members lunch with this year’s guest speaker being Peter Howe of the AFL’s coaching panel. A great day had by all and the stories got bigger as the day went on. 
LookalikesThis line was directed at field umpire Shane McNamara last weekend after he failed to pay a free kick to one team, “I’m not voting for you Tony Abbott”. Shane, you been wearing those Speedos again? 
Harris Family ButchersDon’t forget our sponsors who once again did a sensational job in supplying our barby meat at the last VAFAUA meeting. Go down and visit them at 73 Mackie Road East Bentleigh and they’ll look after you. 
WebsiteDon’t forget to check the website regularly just to keep up to date with what’s going on. Go to http://vafaua.asn.au
23.6.12
Big 300s
We see a couple of our umpires hitting the 300 game mark this weekend so a big congratulations to both of them.
The first one is goal umpire Craig Arnol.
Craig picked up the flags and joined the VAFAUA in 2000 straight after retiring from a stellar 13 year career playing for UHS/VU.
His first highlight was being promoted to A grade after umpiring only 11 games and doing the game with his mentor back then Bernie Jephson. (Did they do fitness training together? Ed.)
As for grand finals, the highlights have been umpiring the D1 senior GF, C reserves GF before watching the best GF he has ever seen when St.Bedes/Mentone Tigers & AJAX played a ripper of a game. Also last year he umpiried his first A reserves GF after 12 seasons of trying to get a game on the last Sunday of the year for the VAFA. Also this year marks his 25th year involved in the VAFA.
Today he’ll  be umpiring his 300th at Melbourne University when Uni Blues take on Old Trinity in a game where there’s a lot at stake.
Well done Arnie, great milestone and have a memorable day.
The other one is a bit of a legend around the place who we don’t see as much of these days.
Jamie Gunn will clock up game 300 if he umpires two Club XVIII this weekend (and he probably will). Gunny has reached the milestone fairly quickly after doubling up and from time to time even tripling up on some weekends.Gunny’s a man always willing to put his hand up and help out, whether it be pre-season games, running the water in state games or whatever else is required. This former rugby league player and Bulleen/Templestowe player loves his footy and especially his VAFA footy. We’re sure we’ll see Gunny gracing the wings of Sportscover Arena come finals time. Great milestone to you too, Gunny.
WebsiteDon’t forget to check the website regularly just to keep up to date with what’s going on. Go to http://vafaua.asn.au

Cam- It’s fantastic to be back in Melbourneand back to the VAFA after a few weeks in China. A big thanks to Macca for looking after the column for the first couple of weeks, and to the coaching panel for appointing me to the first two games in Premier C. A draw and a 2-pointer in the first two weeks….not sure I want to move back up the grades!   
"Wow, those two are hot!”   A member of the VAFAUA executive received a text from his much better half last Saturday afternoon who had been watching a friend play at Beaumaris. It read along the lines of ‘I spent the afternoon perving at the two field umpires…..Joe (Hartwig) and some other young guy’. Further investigation revealed that Hoops also had that game (let’s assume he’s the "young guy"). Sadly the third umpire didn’t rate a mention. ‘Droppy’ must be on the wrong side of 40…..   
Family Football (continued): Following up a story from two weeks ago where we listed all the family members on our list, as expected we missed a few, so major apologies to the following. Father and son Ray (goal) and Frank (field) Stokes, and of course father and son field umpires David and Tom Windlow. With this year’s influx of new young boundary and goal umpires we’re sure to have missed a few more so feel free to let us know. We do however note the Meadows’, the Adams’ the Quinlivens, the Bevans, the Booths, the Powers, the Andersons, the Logozzos, and the Locandros. Fantastic to see such a huge family involvement within our ranks. 
Milestone: Another one this week as Andrew Hartnett notches up 50 VAFA games. Andrew joined us from Yarra Valley OB a few years ago and is yet another example of a club person succeeding with the transition to the whistle. 
Umpire Appreciation Day: Once again Umpire Appreciation Day was acknowledged by the Williamstown CYMS Football Club last week. The day was also acknowledged throughout all VAFA sections and we as a group appreciated it. Hopefully we can keep the respect going. Website Don’t forget to check the website regularly just to keep up to date with what’s going on.