JOEL Selwood was sitting with Mathew Stokes and Ryan Gamble on level two at the MCG, eating a Mars Bar, when his phone rang.
It was Kane Tenace, another teammate, calling from the players' race. "You'd better get down here quick," he said. In the middle, the umpire was about to bounce the ball to start the match.
The previous few minutes had been chaotic. Nathan Ablett, five-goal hero of the previous week, had completed both warm-ups, but his sore hip had tightened. He told club doctor Chris Bradshaw that he could not play. "I knew we could make a change," said Bradshaw, "but I wasn't sure by which siren."
AFL spokesman Patrick Keane said that changes were allowable even after teamsheets had been exchanged as long as the opposing club and the interchange steward were told before the first bounce, and a doctor's certificate provided later, insuring against exploitation of the rule.
"Hopefully we won't get a fine," said coach Mark Thompson. "Balmey (team manager Neil Balme) promised me we wouldn't. It was pretty crazy. It actually got me ready for the game, because I started coaching, yelling down the line five minutes before the game started."
Selwood, the third of four footballing brothers from Bendigo, had played the first two games of this, his first season, but had been rostered for a rest this week to preserve his novice's body.
He was named instead with Tenace and Charlie Gardiner as an emergency. Following its usual protocol, Geelong had played Tenace and Gardiner in the reserves on Saturday, but kept Selwood on ice. He had no expectations.
"My parents come down to all my games," he said, "but I told them not to worry about it."
Selwood had watched both warm-ups, and seen that Ablett was in a delicate state. "He was pretty ginger," he said. Now, suddenly, he was in the rooms with the fitness coach and another official, doing a hasty warm-up of his own.
"It was just a few stretches and some kicking," he said. "I'd just finished the Mars bar, so I had a bit of energy left."
On the field, Geelong was already a couple of goals to the good. Eight minutes into the match, Selwood appeared on the bench, in a pair of shorts so baggy they might have been borrowed from Tom Hawkins. After 15 minutes, he was on the ground. "A few of the guys said later they were surprised to see me out there," he said.
Selwood took his place in Geelong's midfield rotation and played an industrious part in what became an easy win for the Cats. "I'm not sure if he'd eaten a pie or not," said Thompson, "but we're probably thinking from the way he played there was not a pie sitting in his belly, just the chocolate."
Ripples from the pre-match drama spread over the match, and seemingly into the future. Thompson had planned to play Hawkins sparingly for, despite his rave notices, he is every bit as young as his baby face looks.
Now, though, he was needed. He was stood first by Ryan Ferguson, then by Nathan Carroll, who is anything but baby-faced. At first, Carroll tried to niggle Hawkins, until he realised that it would be about as profitable as niggling the Great Wall of China.
Hawkins kicked the first goal of the match, then three in a hurry in the second quarter. Incongruously, he was brought immediately to the bench, but the Geelong faithful applauded, for they understood the rhythms of the modern game and the fact that Hawkins was both the man of the moment and an investment in the future.
Besides, they were already six goals up. "The kids have got the place buzzing again," said an official later.
Bearing out Thompson's prediction, Hawkins faded in the second half, when he was not able to run or jump as he had in the first. It scarcely helped that Melbourne double and triple-teamed him.
Nonetheless, he made two fearful tackles on Melbourne players who somehow were oblivious to his 197-centimetre, 105-kilogram shadow.
Geelong, with little of last week's pizazz, kicked 1.10 with its last 11 scoring shots, but was playing a team with no scoring power at all. It made for tedious viewing.
Selwood was grateful simply for the game. At 18, he is wiser to the vagaries of the football world than most. He saw two older brothers spirited away to the extremities of the country, and spent two years himself battling knee injuries to earn this chance.
"I've been waiting a long time," he said. "I don't know how long it's going to last, so I'm going to enjoy every game."
Geelong's change room was effervescent. In one corner towered Hawkins, still in his guernsey an hour after the game, surrounded by country folk. Selwood said he had known Hawkins a little from their Vic Country days and on a tour of Ireland had roomed with Hawkins' friend and schoolmate Xavier Ellis, now of Hawthorn.
Now the world is their oyster. If it realises a pearl, the tale of Selwood's Mars Bar and Hawkins' first-half picnic will be recounted often from the annals.
