One club represents new football, a keystone entity in the contentious reboot of Australia’s round ball game 21 years ago. It was a brand designed to bring together Melbourne’s sporting tribes. The reality was something different.
The other club can trace its roots back to the 1950s, and a proud history including four titles in the now defunct National Soccer League, intertwined with the pride and community of European post-war migration. The club has delivered many of Australia’s football’s most meaningful days. Or, as it seemed to some in recent decades, fading memories.
