Garfield’s Mal McKenna will this weekend live every local boy’s dream when he plays his 300th senior game. 84958 Picture: RUSSELL BENNETT
By RUSSELL BENNETT
GARFIELD Star Mal McKenna will take to the field this week against Nar Nar Goon for his 300th game – the culmination of years of hard work and dedication to his beloved side, but also the cap on the worst 12 months of his life.
McKenna, Garfield’s longtime spearhead, was dropped for the Stars’ grand final against Neerim South last year.
Garfield went on to win after coach Brent Eastwell made the hard call to drop McKenna and switch to a hard-running style of play.
McKenna, 35, said he still hasn’t spoken to Eastwell about it.
“It’s probably the hardest thing I’ve ever gone through,” he said.
“I didn’t stick around to find out why I wasn’t playing. Brent just told me that I wasn’t.”
Missing out on last year’s premiership was just part of a heartbreaking 12 months for McKenna.
Just weeks after the decider, his father John ‘Bodge’ was diagnosed with cancer. He passed away on Easter Monday this year.
The past year has made McKenna a stronger person and given him perspective on what’s most important in life.
But missing out on the flag still stings.
Eastwell, for his part, makes no apologies for making the tough call and leaving his great mate McKenna out – calling the decision “a no-brainer”.
“Mal’s missing out on the side came down to matchups and wasn’t even about youth versus experience,” he said.
“Mal would have been very disappointed in missing out but Neerim South had given us a touch-up the week before and we had to adjust and play a running side to beat them.”
McKenna’s role in the side had changed gradually since Garfield’s ill-fated 2003 West Gippsland premiership quest, when Warragul used the Stars’ forward line predictability against them.
The move to bring McKenna out of the deep forward line paid immediate dividends with Garfield going on to claim the 2004 flag.
McKenna, a former interleague representative who has kicked 100 goals in a season, still sees himself as a big forward line target but carries the mantra: “If it helps the team when I sacrifice my game, I’ll do it”.
While he admits a 2011 premiership medal would have provided the fairytale finish to his decorated career, McKenna relishes his current role with the Stars as a mentor to the side’s young forwards.
By his own admission, he’s having a “consistent, if not brilliant” season but one of his career highlights came earlier this year, playing alongside his step-son for the Stars’ reserves side.
McKenna is confident of a strong finish to this, his final season and yearns for one last taste of finals football.
It would be a far cry from his junior days – debuting as a diminutive 10-year-old in Garfield’s under-15s.
“It was the scariest thing I’ve ever done,” he said.
“I was up against guys already shaving and going through puberty!”
McKenna was so small as a teenager, he even filled out the paperwork to become a jockey.
But when a growth spurt hit, he started to live out his childhood dream of playing for the Stars.
“I always wanted to play 300 games for the Garfield Football Club,” he said.
“All young kids in Garfield did.
“We wanted to emulate club legends like Murray Payne and John Barnes.
“It was the done thing at the time and we all wanted to stay with Garfield throughout our careers.”
When McKenna takes to the field against the Goon this weekend, he’ll do it with thoughts of his aunty, Judy Bishop, in mind.
She was one of Garfield’s key committee members in the side’s fledgling days in the EDFL – when the Stars switched from West Gippsland and, in McKenna’s words, “had to start all over again”.
Times were tough, but Ms Bishop’s unwavering commitment to the Stars remained.
The green and gold flowed through her veins, just as it does in Big Mal’s.
