Sydney--Day 3: Rugby

By chance, I had found out before I left that the National Rugby League playoffs were in full swing in Australia, and one of the Preliminary Finals (i.e. the semifinal) was taking place at ANZ Stadium in Sydney on Saturday the weekend that I was going to be there. Even though I knew close to nothing about rugby (my only experience is from watching "Invictus"), I wasn't going to pass up the chance to see a big-time rugby match in the country that's famous for it. I bought up a cheap ticket for the Saturday night match between the St. George Illawarra Dragons and the Wests Tigers. The winner would advance to the NRL Finals

The NRL is of the same stature in Sydney that the NFL is in America--it's absolutely huge. Sydney itself has something like nine NRL teams, so each area of the city has its own club. A lot of people have been cheering for the same team for decades based on where they had grown up or had moved to--it's really part of the lifeblood of Sydney, just like how the Sox are inseparable from Boston. The Sydney Roosters had won the previous day's Preliminary Final, so an all-Sydney final was guaranteed--much to the delight of the city's rugby fans.

I decided it would be more fun if I chose my own team to support. I went into Rebel Sport and made my decision: I had a good time traveling on the Illawarra line the previous day, so the Dragons it would be. I bought a red and white St. George Illawarra beanie cap as my birthday present for myself. Later, I used the hostel's molasses-slow internet connection to spend 15 minutes on Wikipedia learning as much as I could about the rules of the game.

I have to admit that I was sort of apprehensive about going to the match--the stadium promised to be packed, and thoughts of rampant football hooliganism were running through my mind. I needn't have worried, for several reasons. First, let's compare sporting events in Sydney and DC. On the way to a Nationals game in DC (maybe 20,000 total people, on a good day), WMATA might add one or two more six-car "special" trains to Anacostia, and let people crush on at L'Enfant Plaza. In Sydney, public transportation to and from the match is INCLUDED with your ticket (!!) and trains were running every seven minutes from Central Station direct to Olympic Park Station for ANZ Stadium. My train car was nearly empty. The raspy-voiced train conductor ended all of his announcements with "Go the Bunnies," in refence to another NRL team, the South Sydney Rabbitohs.

When I got to ANZ Stadium, the Rabbitohs were crushing the Canberra Raiders in pre-match Toyota Cup action. I started to realize that this is really Australia's unifying sport...people from all walks of life seemed to be here: families with kids dressed up with Tiger or Dragon hats, business-type people, veteran supporters with binoculars and earpieces connected to radio broadcasts of the game, all decked out in equal numbers with black and gold Tigers or red and white Dragons jerseys. The entire bottom deck of the stadium was completely full: total attendance, 71,712.

The players came out, and people went crazy and started waving giant flags. Flames shot out of canisters placed on the field. First the Tigers players came out, and the south-side of the stadium erupted in cheers and song. Then, the Dragons elicited a similar response from the north side of the stadium. It's been a long time since I've been to a sporting even with that sort of excitement in the air.

Rugby is the ideal spectator sport. It's fast-paced, and there's always something happening with few breaks in the action. There was a good mix of scoring and defensive portions of the game. And there's tackling. Bone-crushing tackling, with no pads. My Wikipedia research had given me some idea of what was going on (it's much more like American football than I thought, and not at all like Australian rules football, which is something else entirely). At first, I put on my Dragons hat and clapped whenever those supporters did, but after about fifteen minutes I was starting to be able to react to the action on my own.

It ended up being a close and exciting game. Wests and St. George traded four-point scores (called "tries") and two-point conversions, and it was 12-12 heading into the final 10 minutes. With seven minutes left, Dragons five-eighth Jamie Soward kicked a one-point goal, making it 13-12. Despite a last second Tigers run, the Dragons won it by that one point. The crowd erupted into a fever pitch with red flags waving and people singing "As the Saints Go Marching In." The guy in front of me, a Dragons supporter who had been talking to me out of nerves for the last ten minutes of the game (I covered up my lack of knowledge about rugby by basically just agreeing with whatever he said), gave a yell, jumped up out of his seat and gave me a hearty handshake. He seemed close to tears. He had been following the Dragons for 31 years, and they had made it to the Finals.

Now, after a Natonals game, WMATA might set up some random yellow barriers at Navy Yard station. give one or two employees reflective vests and flashlights, and tell them to keep repeating "keep on movin' down!" At Olympic Park Stadium, there were not only frequent trains directly back to Central Station and clear, audible announcements, but dozens of CityRail employees and police officers working real crowd control systems to make sure things moved smoothly. I had a seat all the way to Central--in DC, I'd be crammed in a Green Line train like a sardine, with my face shoved into the sweaty armpit of a large man wearing a Vinny Castilla jersey.

The Dragons ended up winning the Finals the next weekend. I thought about the guy sitting in front of me, and how happy he must have been. Go the Dragons!