Australian Football

Two-Way Traffic: Geelong ⇄ Richmond

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"Morning peak hour in Victoria" is perhaps the most succinct way to sum up the history of player movement between the Cats and the Tigers. Of the 32 players to have played V/AFL/W footy for both Geelong and Richmond, only nine have made the trip down the Princes Highway towards Kardinia Park. The rest all went from country to city.

One of those who left Geelong to continue his footballing career at Richmond was Gareth Andrews. It proved to be a successful move. Andrews crossed to the Tigers early in the 1974 season and by the end of September was a premiership player. It was fitting reward for Andrews, who had toiled away in 136 games for the Cats since 1965. Andrews and the Cats played finals in 1965, 1967, 1968 and 1969, but a narrow loss to Richmond in one of the great Grand Finals in 1967 was as close as he came to a flag.

While Andrews broke his premiership drought in 1974, it would be another 33 years before the Cats broke theirs. When they did, with a stunning 119-point obliteration of Port Adelaide in the 2007 Grand Final, Andrews was again part of the success, having returned to Geelong as vice-president in 1998.

Was Andrews able to use the lessons learned in his brief time as a player in a successful team at Richmond to help return Geelong to powerhouse status? "I'd like to think I did. When I joined Richmond the expectation of winning, and always winning, was palpable."

Andrews recalls almost with awe what a privilege it was to suddenly find himself playing at centre half-back alongside star defenders such as Francis Bourke, Barry Richardson and Dick Clay, then looking up to see the likes of Royce Hart stationed in the forward line.

While Andrews is very grateful for the chance to be part of a premiership team, that was not his motivation for leaving Geelong. At the beginning of 1973, Polly Farmer, who Andrews had played with in the 1960s, came on board as the Cats' coach. And while Andrews continued to get picked in Geelong's best 20, it was often as 19th or 20th man, meaning he didn't get onto the ground until late in the match.

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"I performed very well in quite a few of those games coming on late, but I'd find myself on the bench again the following Saturday."

Andrews, who was living in Richmond by this time, was also growing weary of the trip down the highway several times a week. He explored the possibility of joining the Tigers at the end of the 1973 but the Cats would not let him go. So Andrews knuckled down and continued to ply his trade at Geelong early in 1974.

Then, a couple of days after Geelong had been defeated by North Melbourne at Kardinia Park in mid-May, Andrews received a call from the Tigers to say he'd be running out in yellow and black the following weekend. Richmond and the Cats had brokered a deal through Tiger power-broker Graeme Richmond (who himself had grown up in Geelong) in a meeting in Werribee, roughly halfway between the two clubs' home grounds. The deal saw Rex Hunt (left), a Tiger premiership player in 1969 and 1973 go to Geelong.

Both players were happy with the trade, although Andrews, who later became good friends with Hunt, says "Rex reckons I've got his 1974 premiership medal!"

A premiership move

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Until 2017, Gareth Andrews was the only player to have crossed from Geelong to Richmond to win a flag. Josh Caddy (right) joined Andrews in that exclusive club in 2017, having commenced his AFL career at Gold Coast. Brad Ottens is the only player to have done the reverse. Ottens moved from the Tigers to Geelong in 2006, and was a member of all three of the Cats' successful 2007, 2009 and 2011 teams.

Earlier this year Caddy looked a big chance to become a dual premiership player at Richmond but he lost his place in the Tigers' line-up on the eve of the 2020 finals series, and seems unlikely to be selected in Saturday's Grand Final.

War and Percy

The figures in the table below, which show that many more players have gone from Geelong to Richmond, have been skewed to a degree by the circumstances of World War I. The Pivotonians were forced to sit out the 1916 season and, as a result, Alec Eason, Jim Kearney, Harry Marsham and Percy Martini (highlighted in green on the list below) all spent that season at Punt Road. Eason returned to Geelong in 1919 after serving in Australia's armed forces, while other three went back at Corio Oval in 1917 when the Pivotonians returned to the VFL fold.

"You look familiar..."

Gareth Andrews' move from Geelong to Richmond put him in rare company. While many players have switched clubs mid-season, with quite a few playing for their new club a week after their last game at their old club, Andrews is one of the few players to play for two different teams against the same club on consecutive weekends. Andrews played for Geelong against North Melbourne and against Kangaroos again for Richmond a week later.

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It was a strange feeling recalls, Andrews. "Not only did I play against the same team, I had the same opponent — Arnold Breidis!" For Andrews, the second game was a happier affair. His last game for the Cats was a loss but he kicked off his career at Richmond with a win.

"Missed it by that much!"

Taylor Hunt is one of the unluckier players to have been both a Cat and a Tiger. Hunt played 13 games for Geelong in 2011 but was not part of the Cats' finals campaign which culminated in a premiership that year. He switched to the Tigers in 2015 but played his last AFL match in July 2017, a couple of months before Richmond broke its 37-year premiership drought.

"Them's the breaks."

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Paul Sarah is another unlucky Cat cum Tiger. Like Andrews, Sarah made a mid-season move to Punt Road, six years after his former teammate. Sarah was all set to follow in Andrews' footsteps but a broken jaw sustained in the Second Semi-Final against his old side meant that he missed the Tigers record-breaking win over Collingwood in the 1980 Grand Final.

"Return ticket to Punt Road, please."

Apart from the players whose careers were impacted by the outbreak of war (see above), Graham Landy is the only player to go from Richmond to Geelong and back again. Landy played for the Cats from 1975 to 1978 before playing 120 games for Richmond from 1979 to 1986. He had one final season at Kardinia Park in 1987. Like Paul Sarah, Landy was at Tigerland in the 1980 premiership year but was not part of the winning Grand Final team.

This article originally appeared on Andrew Gigacz's Patreon site. To support his independent writing about football and other topics, please consider subscribing here .

Thanks very much to Gareth Andrews for giving me half an hour of his time to chat about his days at Geelong and Richmond. Gareth does great work in the area of men's health through the Life Again Foundation .

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