Many years ago, fresh from a long stint in England and way too wet behind the ears to deal with a man like Denis Pagan, I contacted the then-Carlton coach with a view to writing a book about him and his club. Denis was open to the idea. “Let’s try and get this off the ground son,” he told me. The next day, if you don’t mind, one of his players was sacked after turning up to training in a shambolic, ecstasy-addled state. “Sorry son,” Pagan said. “Let’s park that book idea.”
History is written by the victors. But footy is mostly about losing. It’s about 17 clubs trudging off disappointed each season. It’s about being cut, left out, shopped around and pensioned off. For the most part, no one’s making documentaries about footy’s losers. There’s no feature length film being released about West Coast’s 2022 and 2023 seasons, as fascinating as that would be. When you win a flag, however, you get to tell your own story. And when you’re as big a club as Collingwood, and you have a digital media team releasing slicker content than the host broadcasters, you get to tell your story in cinemas.
