FRIDAY PUB CHAT

Silver screen legend of ’80s

DAMO: Billy, it’s retro round and the Cats have stitched you up a treat! What’s going on in this photo mate?

BILLY: The silver curtain, what’s going on there? Gee that doesn’t look too good. Who’s that little cute, innocent, country boy? I can’t believe that’s me.

DAMO: The hoops looked good then, though.

BILLY: They did. I was a bit skinnier then, let me tell you. I had a bit more hair and I was skinnier.

DAMO: I’m not sure about those shorts though, Billy.

BILLY: Ha ha, they were the shorts back then, cocko. They just gave you the shorts, you just put them on and didn’t even think about how they looked. It’s changed a lot, hasn’t it footy?

DAMO: You would have had a full-time job as well, I assume?

BILLY: Yeah, I was working at the State Bank in Belmont and you’d work from 9am-4.30pm and then jump in the car and go down to training.

DAMO: One of my colleagues here remembers the days when he could jump over the fence at the final siren and run on the ground to try to give you a pat on the back before you got off the ground.

BILLY: Yep, and you certainly wouldn’t go to the beach for cool-downs. You’d have a couple of beers, a sausage in bread and then work out where you were going to go that night. And then you’d have a few more on Sunday. Actually, I remember when I first started in ‘86, you’d have drinks after the game with the opposition and the umpires.

DAMO: Did you finish up before it started getting too serious?

BILLY: I finished up ‘97, so it started to get a bit more serious then when you didn’t really have full-time work, you were spending more time at the club and things like that. But even in the early days, there was a coach for the seniors, a coach for the seconds

and maybe one other — that’s it.

DAMO: Did you see comments Jasper Pittard made this week that Gaz Senior and Plugger wouldn’t be as good in the modern game because you have to chase and put on pressure and that sort of thing?

BILLY: Yeah, look, I think Gary Ablett and Tony Lockett would have been superstars whenever they played. They’d adjust, Ablett would certainly have been able to adjust. When he came down to Geelong he played halfforward and wing those first few years.

DAMO: What did you make of the Cats on the weekend mate, another disappointing showing?

BILLY: I started watching them and then I had to turn it off. I get frustrated watching them so I turned it off for a while. Of course, you come back but I just can’t work out what’s happened to the boys. It’s frustrating to watch and I reckon they’re stumped a bit, too, why they were good for so long and now they’ve dropped off. Hopefully back at home, you bring the heat and you fire up on Saturday night.