A true leader: Saints' skipper Nick Riewoldt leads his team on to the ground for another game.
THE SLATTERY MEDIA GROUP
It’s 12 o’clock on a Saturday, the regular crowd shuffles in. There’s an old man sitting next to me complaining about the mid-strength tins. Out on the cropped grass of the footy field, beneath a hulking stadium of concrete, glass and steel, one player cuts a solitary figure. He wears a tracksuit; he’s tall, platinum haired and utterly focused. He bounces the football, looks to the white goal posts at one end, then back down at the ground. His lips appear to move. Then abruptly he turns and runs from one end of the centre square to the other at full pace. He pulls up like a 747, his body leaning back. And repeats. The pattern continues for more than an hour.
I don’t remember exactly when this was, or even which year of his decade-long playing career. But this is the moment I decided I wanted to interview St Kilda captain Nick Riewoldt. There is much to admire and discuss about his professional sporting career as one of the AFL’s most fêted players. But there are others of his skill and stature. Few, however, are as openly emotional on the field or have the interior dimension hinted at by this curious routine undertaken before every match.
“Players’ preparation doesn’t just start a couple of hours before the game,” Riewoldt says. “For me it starts pretty much as soon as the game the previous week is over. You start thinking about your opponent and areas to improve on. I like getting out on the ground and visualising different things and just basically getting a bit of a sweat up, getting the body going.”
This and the plain and simple fact that every single game day can’t come soon enough for Riewoldt: “The day before the game is, for me, a sick sort of feeling,” he says. “I’m like ‘Jeez, I wish it would just hurry up’, EVERY week. I hate this feeling but you tell yourself that it’s good, this is part of the preparation and it’s part of what I have to go through to perform.”
Riewoldt, 27, has a couple more days until that whistle sounds again, and he looks relaxed enough. He has opted to host today’s rare in-depth interview at his local café in Coventry Street, South Melbourne, and to all outward appearances this is just two six-foot-plus guys (Riewoldt’s 193 centimetres) wedged into a window seat having a coffee and a chat. He’s dressed casually in a mauve cotton T-shirt, fitted black jeans and, in a nod to sartorial styling, a mohair scarf that he leaves draped around his neck.
But with the hubbub of a “normal” life all around us – a crying baby, a hissing coffee machine, the clatter of laughter and cutlery – I realise that this is a brief excursion for Riewoldt. And not just because his manager, Ricky Nixon, keeps reminding me that Nick’s time is precious and that I’ll get “20 minutes, max”.
In August, Riewoldt is a tourist here, in this place you and I live. And he stands out as one. With biceps that can swell, with a small movement, to the size and veiny roundness of a newborn baby’s head; with his twitching right foot, feeling for turf under the café stool. And with his slate-blue eyes that scan Coventry Street as if in expectation of a speared pass from teammates Lenny Hayes or Adam Schneider. My first question is simply, how much headspace does he have for thoughts other than football? Like, this interview?
“Everything you do that’s extracurricular is usually football-related anyway, so it’s pretty much all footy,” Riewoldt says. “Some of the guys are doing courses in business or something like that. It gives them a bit of a distraction. But especially at this time of year, when you know you’re going to be part of finals, this is the business time of the year for us.”
Riewoldt dabbles in business, too. He part-owns two successful hotels – Waterside on the corner of Flinders and King streets in the city, and the Brighton Hotel in Bay Street, Brighton – but makes no attempt to convince me of a life outside footy; he “potters” around at them from time to time to “learn stuff”. The Saints’ blond bombshell drops nothing of the kind when he admits he exists almost entirely inside the game – physically and mentally – and happily for the moment.
“I believe you need to be right into it and you need to live it every day to really have that motivation to be successful,” the five-time club best-and-fairest winner says. “If you just rock up to footy and you can distinguish between this and your life too easily, perhaps there’s a care factor that isn’t at the level it should be. I think it’s important to have that level of edginess to be successful. Even lying in bed at night I think a lot about things that might happen or maybe things that have happened in the past, all relating to football. It does occupy a lot of my thoughts, anyway.”
Captain courageous: Nick Riewoldt is the heart and soul of St Kilda Football Club.
THE SLATTERY MEDIA GROUP
Especially this week. In their last game, a mere handful of days before this interview, the Saints were comprehensively bollocked by the Bombers in what was probably the upset of the season. Riewoldt winces at my query of how much the last game colours the days that follow it, but then finds a positive spin.
“That’s the best and worst thing about footy, I suppose,” he muses. “You get an opportunity every week to go out there and either atone or back up what you did the previous week. It really does dictate your state of mind and your general happiness. Especially the first few days after the game.”
And atone the Saints did, triumphant in their next two, suggesting this season may not be the bilateral contest between Collingwood and Geelong that it has seemed destined for. The Bombers, on the other hand, went on to lose their following two games by a total of 170 points.
Footy is indeed a cruel mistress, but there is no mistaking the “best and worst thing” about her. The best is winning a premiership, which is a topic that talk naturally gravitates towards with Riewoldt, because the goal looms so large in his life. “I suppose the last thing you want is that ultimate victory to just really seal the bond with your teammates and to make sure you’ve always got those excuses to keep catching up.” Without one, Riewoldt looks forward to one day having a family of his own and hopes that it may “compensate for anything else that might be missing, like a premiership”.
But the worst-case scenario in footy is “not a career without a premiership, it’s a career cut short by injury”. The most famous of injuries to Nick Riewoldt occurred in round one of 2005. Footy fans will not need to be reminded. A few key words for the rest of us; St Kilda versus Brisbane Lions, Riewoldt’s first game as captain, Mal Michael and Chris Scott shaping up for hit after smashing hit on Riewoldt’s shattered collarbone, a pain-stricken Riewoldt clutching at it in agony before being spirited off the ground. And then, the moment that, whether he likes it or not, was probably the defining one of his career; a distraught Riewoldt sitting at the interchange bench, tears streaming down his face. Any regrets?
“Nah, not really,” he says, crumpling his brow and pausing a moment. It turns out this is an unemotional topic. The hatchet has long since been buried with Mal Michael, who he “shook the hand of” just days ago when they bumped into each other at South Melbourne Market.
“Regretting it’s not going to do me any good. At that stage I didn’t know what the result was going to be. I certainly didn’t think it would become what it has. I’m passionate about my team and my teammates and I think that’s what really came out there. The people that criticise me for that and take the occasional potshots are the people that have probably got more issues with themselves than they do with me.”
This is a very Riewoldt statement. His approach to questions that stray from what we both agree to deem “footyspeak” – the blokey, guarded and, let’s face it, bullshit rhetoric deployed by most players when speaking to the media – is structured as follows: Question / Pause, consider / Trim any reactive thoughts that are unproductive / Dump all negative emotions / Think only of what’s needed to “move forward” / Mention “the boys” / Say “obviously” or “fantastic” at least once / Stop talking. Does he sometimes wish he could dispense with the footyspeak and just talk freely?
“Absolutely. There are times when you’d love to be able to say what you thought about different people, but you just can’t,” Riewoldt explains, pointing to the example of Jason Akermanis. There is clearly sympathy for the fallen star. I argue that he’s an extreme example, but Riewoldt sticks to his guns. “It’s just whether you want to put yourself in a position to receive that sort of criticism all the time. I think personally it would get pretty tiring and distracting as well.”
The 2005 incident lives on for Riewoldt in two ways. St Kilda supporters hold the moment dear as a sign of his passion and loyalty – they consider him Saint, not faint-hearted – and rival supporters still give him stick for being a sook. Riewoldt returns the vitriol today, singling out Collingwood fans, who are the most unsavoury, in his opinion. They’re also, according to Riewoldt, rather worked up at the moment, with a grand final that is all but theirs to lose, in many people’s opinion. “They’re out of control. I don’t know what the prerequisite is to be a Collingwood supporter but … clearly it’s … ” Low intellect? I offer, helpfully. “Yeah, something like that. But you know, as a player, you can’t go down the street. If a Collingwood supporter sees you, they’ll let you know about it. I’ll get ‘f--- you’, ‘poofter’, ‘cry baby’ … They are just right off. I won’t respond if I’m by myself, but if I’m with dad, he will. And my brother, he’s worse. They can’t help themselves.”
Off the field, like most champion players, Riewoldt gets attention, “90 per cent of it from f---wits”. On the field there’s even more scrutiny; he remains one of the games most physically targeted players. In his comeback game this year against the Brisbane Lions, he was singled out for softening up. It was a ploy that infuriated St Kilda coach Ross Lyon, who sounded this warning after the round-15 game: “He will continue to be targeted but, like all champions he will continue to deliver. The message is – don’t unsettle champions.”
It is said that you inherit your parents’ madness, and in the Riewoldt family’s case, it was not a short fuse – his spray at the Pies is one of only two statements that could be construed as negative in the entire interview. Their madness is Aussie rules. Nick, born in Hobart, grew up in a footy-mad house. He lived in Tasmania until he was nine, then the family moved to the Gold Coast, where he remained until he was drafted at 18.
“Weekends were dominated by footy, really,” Riewoldt recalls. “My sister played in the youngest age group, my brother played after that and I played after him. Mum and dad were involved in the club. Footy was always something I did because I loved it but I never really had the aspiration to go on and be an AFL footballer. Especially growing up in Queensland, which, back then – 10, 15 years ago – was football obscurity, really.”
The young Riewoldt played several sports and excelled at cricket. The decisive factor in terms of which he pursued proved to be purely circumstantial. “I was probably better at cricket in those early years. But when I got closer to the potential of being drafted, I had to make a decision between the two sports, and footy won out pretty easy in the end. It’s not a hard decision when all your mates are off to the beach on the Gold Coast and you’re spending two 30-plus degree days standing out on a field of a weekend. It’s a pretty tough spot to play cricket!”
Riewoldt was drafted by St Kilda in 2000. Five years later, he was captain. He considers the homesickness he suffered relocating interstate so young and “missing out on all my best mates’ 18ths and 21sts” the highest price he’s had to pay to live his dream. But given his surname, there must have been a sense of inevitability.
“Yeah, the family’s always had a rich history in football linked more with Tasmania. Jack’s dad and my dad and their brothers all played. Dad’s the smallest of four, Chris – Jacks’ dad – is really big and the other two guys are really solidly built as well.”
On the topic of Riewoldt family physique, I suggest that his is quite different to 21-year-old cousin Jack’s – the “other” Riewoldt from Richmond who has made his fourth season the breakthrough one.
“Jack’s a bit big … ,” Riewoldt begins to say “bigger”, then scales back his estimation, adding a subtle dig, “… stockier. He’s a bit stockier than I am. He’s got me height-wise as well, a lot of people think I’ve got him covered, but he’s taller by about a centimetre. He was round for dinner last night and we had a measuring competition and he got up.”
This is, in fact, the fourth mention of Jack Riewoldt, admittedly at my behest, but the subject is a fond one for Nick. You get a sense that he revels in the company of another elite Riewoldt as much as he sparks off the competition that underlies their dynamic All topics, you see, result in one or the other, “getting up”. Height, media attention – “I’ll see my name on Fox Sports, then I’ll turn it up and realise it’s Jack. It’s all been him this year!” – and marking are discussed today.
Nick and Jack’s aerial supremacy of the game is official. Jack has set the benchmark in 2010 for contested marks, while Nick took the most marks, full stop, at season’s end in 2004 (pulling down a record 256) and in 2009, averaging 9.7 per game. At the time of writing, Jack also leads the Coleman Medal for most goals in a season. The last time the two Riewoldts went shoulder to shoulder in a marking contest was not in a game but three years ago at a family Boxing Day lunch.
“It didn’t end too well … One of us got hurt, put it that way,” Riewoldt says, grinning. “One of us almost missed the whole footy season. It wasn’t fiery, it was just an accident but the competitive juices get flowing and, yeah, I came off second best.”
All chest-beating aside, the two are close and the tender note in Riewoldt’s voice as he tells of Jack, the young boy, who’d hang around “with a footy in his hand the whole time”, is heart warming.
“But I think now he’s forging a really strong career for himself, and no one’s happier than our grandparents now they’ve got two boys to watch on the weekend. If one doesn’t do so well, there’s always the other one.”
If there is admiration in his voice as Riewoldt appraises his cousin’s feats this season, this is not to be mistaken for awe. No matter how silky the passage of play, how improbable the dribbled goal, or how powerful and straight the 70-metre drop punt that sails through post-high, it’s all within his own perceived capabilities.
“You can still watch other games and other players and admire what they do. But for me, there is always still that element of ‘I can do that’,” Riewoldt says. “There are some absolute athletic freaks, and some players are clearly more skilful than others but because you are so close to it, there’s always the thought ‘I’m going to do something like that this weekend’.”
“To be honest, I just don’t want footy to finish, I don’t even want to think about it. If I could play as long Harves (Robert Harvey, St Kilda stalwart) did, I’d be rapt. I don’t want to stop playing, I don’t want to stop training. At the moment, footy’s my job and it’s what I’m devoting all of my attention to.”
AFTER THE GAME
So with this devoted, champion player and his comments in my mind, I thought I’d settle them down to one profound impression – as well as the place Nick Riewoldt holds in the AFL – on an early-morning run along the streets and boulevards of St Kilda. The champion description is not opinion. It’s fact. NAB Rising Star Award 2002, All-Australian four times, All-Australian captain 2009, the list does go on.
But, unlike Gary Ablett or Chris Judd, Riewoldt is not best described by his accolades. I kept coming back to one word: loyalty. In a world where talk is cheap, where off-field antics are cheaper and offers from the Gold Coast are expensive, Riewoldt’s loyalty to his club and to his teammates verges on quaint. Consider that you work for a major company whose goal is to compete for a Nobel Prize. A rival company with the same goal offers you three times your salary. Who, in this day and age of economic uncertainty, would refuse the offer?
Riewoldt would. He says: “Loyalty still has its part; at least half of the boys (St Kilda players) have been offered more to go elsewhere. And that’s just the nature of footy with its expansion. Deep down, they all probably know that they’re going to be well paid to do what we love doing. To go somewhere else, you might get a little bit more money but what might you lose?”
With a final paragraph composed, and only 100-metres to go on the run, I see a guy in Essendon Football Club kit holding a coffee walking towards me. It is Mark McVeigh, one of Essendon’s senior players. Out of breath and barely able to speak, I manage to express that I’d like his on-field impressions of Riewoldt.
“His athleticism and fitness is at the highest possible level,” McVeigh said, unperturbed by this chance, sweaty encounter. “He’s so quick to a contest and when he gets there, it’s his courage that stands out to me. He shows no fear. He’s an emotional guy, but he’s not soft, I can tell you that. He’s far from it.”
Roo’s Regulars
South Melbourne Market
“I cook a fair bit and get all my ingredients fresh from the market.”
The George Hotel, South Melbourne
“I go there for trivia most weeks with a few mates. I don’t mind the music, entertainment questions. We’ve got a gun, Terry, in the team. He knows the most ridiculous stuff.”
The Waterside Hotel & Hotel Brighton
“I’m a co-owner of these places, so I spend a bit of time pottering about and just learning a bit of business.”
The big screen at home
“I’ve just got through the True Blood series. I love the Jason Stackhouse character, he’s so good. Also Band of Brothers.”