4 October, 2014, Peter Crimmins Medal, Crown Casino, Melbourne, Australia
... To another guy I was very fortunate to spend a lot of time with just prior to his death was Yabby Jeans, who was also a great ornament to this footy club. In preparation for this finals series, Peter Dickson produced a copy of the 89 Grand Final, and we showed our players, and the moment they walked out of the room they wanted to play right then.
Yabby was just a real master. In the latter years of his life when he was real crook, a lot of our players and coaches got a chance to go down to the nursing home to spend some time with him, he was in a nursing home - I think there were fifty -five in the nursing home and there were only two males, so he loved the company of the players and the coaches - he just wanted to talk footy, he didn’t really get it out of the women, too often, talking footy for a long time, so he loved it when the players came down there. I can remember sitting there, watching a Richmond-Melbourne game, it had nothing to do with hawthorn, I just sat with him for two and half, three hours, the duration of the whole game. [tearing]
It was a beautiful afternoon, it had nothing to do with Hawthorn, but it was just great to sit there for that length of time, and listen to the footy gospel of Allan Jeans. Without a doubt, he and Kanga and the two most influential people that have probably ever existed in this footy club, and just like Kanga, we salute him for the contribution he’s made to our great club.
...And then I was fortunate enough to take the premiership cup with me for the last twenty four hours. And I travelled down to Geelong last night, I hadn’t seen my parents there, they’re elderly now, [cheers at Geelong reference] ... yeah the Cats were none too happy seeing me in their district, but I got across the West Gate, it’s about five o’clock yesterday afternoon, and there was a fair amount of traffic, and I happened to come across this car that had Hawthorn stickers all over the back of it, and streamers and scarves and that sticking out of it, and I had the cup sitting down on the floor of my car, so I’ll pick up this cup and show this bloke the cup.
I knew he’d be pretty excited but I didn’t expect to cause an accident and have him nearly drive off the West Gate. He got himself in a bit of trouble with the traffic because he nearly veered off his lane, and then up the rear end of the car in front of him, and I kept on shooting forward in my lane. I could see him anxiously trying to weave in and out of the traffic trying to catch up with me, and I could also sense that he was really pissed off, because he was the only one in the car, and he wanted so much to be able to ring his mates and say, ‘you wouldn’t believe it, Clarko’s in the car next door with the cup!’ ...