The Gold Jacket

collingwood mini joffa ethan

The 10th season 2010 Premiership gold jacket will gladly spread epilepsy awareness and epilepsy first aid seizure awareness. With many thanks to the Epilepsy Foundation of Victoria.

anthgoldjacket_131
The Gold jacket after our big win against
The Pauperoos Etihad Stadium May 2009

Young Billy rarin to go.
The first time the jacket came out in 2009.
February at Victoria Park

At the 28 min mark of the 3rd Quarter against the West Coast Eagles Sat 31st May 2008 it was time to get to work and do some celebrating, The mighty magpies would go on and win by 100 Points.

It has been a while since the Gold Jacket
has been unvieled with such delight.
Friday May 23rd. MCG.
6 minutes - 4th quarter.

Joffa's Wooden Spoon (from 2005)

In a 2005 AFL game, Collingwood cheer squad leader Jeff Corfe - "Joffa"?title=- brought in an oversized wooden spoon into the ground at a game between his side Collingwood, and fellow wooden spoon contenders Carlton [1]. Joffa planned to bring this spoon out when it looked like Carlton were going to lose the match. Unfortunately, this plan backfired, and Carlton were comfortable winners (although they still did win the wooden spoon in 2005). In a 2006 AFL game against Carlton, Joffa again brought the oversized wooden spoon. This time Collingwood triumphed and walked out 44 point winners against the Blues, who won the wooden spoon for the second time in a row. The spoon was confiscated as Joffa took it out two minutes early.

Believe it or not this article made world wide news at the time. This was found on the Britain TV website

AT the MCG, 2002.
Unleashing the wooden spoon onto the Carlton cheersquad only 50 meters away! What a magical night that was. The spoon pictured became famous, it toured suberbs and ended up covered in autographs from colingwood people telling Carlton what to do with their wooden spoon, it is now the property of the collingwood football club in the archives section.

Pre season 2007 on the steps of Flinders St Station, was a beautiful moment!

Eddie's call to bring the unofficial cheersquad and official cheersquad together pre season 2001 indirectly bought about the birth of the gold jacket, From being a troublesome supporter pre 2001 with most games evicted before 3/4 time, To official cheersquad to gold wig to gold jacket, It was simply a wonderful time and a time to pull ones head in, It was time to give up the drink ( havn't touched the crap in 5 years ) very early in the gold jacket days it was decided if this thing was to work one would have to change, Any fights or over the fence evictions would have made sure the gold jacket had a very short history, The passion would stay the ' numbnut ' behaviour would have to go! Without sounding as though im pissing in ed's pocket, The fact is if ed was never president, If ed didn't call for all cheersquads to come together the gold jacket would never have happened, I believe we have created some nice history with the gold jacket, It's ability to spread collingwood love to all corners of Australia has been mind boggling, We've done this thing right, Testimony to that belief is that today many opposition supporters want to be photographed with the jacket, It has changed my life dramatically and i must add all for the better, i dont know how long it will last, i have a suspicion it will be around for a while, On a selfish note we've bought this thing this far, I want desperately for the gold jacket to see a collingwood premiership and i'd love to see young simon one day be the new owner of the gold jacket with the very same ethos as grandpa! Personally the greatest thing for me is the way the gold jacket has given me the oppertunity to be involved with many different charities!

The two Gold Jackets, pic on left is the original Gold Jacket as given by Eddie and was mainly used 2002-2004. To preserve the original Gold Jacket we introduced the Game Over Gold Jacket 2005 to current day (see pic above) The original Gold Jacket will be the one used when the Pies storm home to win the 2008 Premiership.

A gold tinsel wig was used to celebrate and acknowledge pending Collingwood victories in 2001 and early 2002, one evening whilst home watching the footy show, Eddie appeared in a glittery gold jacket doing some advert, the segment went no longer than maybe 15 seconds ( would be good to capture that footage now ).

I was gobsmacked as soon as I saw that gold glittery jacket I just wanted to have it; bugger the tinsel wig, I wanted the gold jacket to celebrate all Collingwood victories. I was nervous and apprehensive asking Eddie for the jacket and really didn't know how to go about it. In those early days we were in casual contact via email as I'm sure the Jock McHale medal idea was born before the wanting of the gold jacket. And of course I didnt want to abuse our friendship and Ed think that I was nothing but a scab!

Eddie suggested I pick up the gold jacket at Victoria Park during a training session and he would have it dry cleaned and ready to rumble. I grabbed the gold jacket from Lisa at Victoria Park (Eddies personal assistant at the time) and went searching for Eddie, who very kindly gave me five minutes after spotting me near the players race.

Lets not kid ourselves the gold jacket ain't as big as the historic moon landing, but never in my wildest dreams did I ever believe it would become as big as it has. I'm not sure what Eddie thought about the whole thing, as in terms of the interest it would create, not only right around Australia but in certain parts of the world as well.

It certainly changed me as a person in many ways, as it was now time to grow up a little, stop getting into strife at the footy and give something back in the name of fun and brotherhood. I also felt I was giving something back to a football club which had become my life, to a club which has given me some of the most wonderful and exciting times. I have no shame in saying that with all my heart, I love the Collingwood Football Club.

I have been accused of being many things due to the fame the Gold Jacket has bought me, another lesson in life it taught me, is not to worry too much about those who try to bring others down with false innuendo and lies. Away from the gold jacket and football, I'm a very quiet living person who has fallen deeply in love with the two most wonderful grand kids, a wonderful gift from God indeed.

Pic Above, The Gold Jacket made for the 2003 Grand Final by the Cricketers Arms Hotel, hangs up today ' framed ' inside the Cricketers Arms Hotel.

Of course it will, everything has a shelf life and the day will come to move on and create another idea, but the dream to bring out the jacket on Grand Final day with ten mins to go burns deep and you know what im tipping that within the next three years its going to happen! WOW the goose bumps on the neck grow and tingle with excitement, it will be a magical moment!

Thanks to everyone who has supported the gold jacket..this thing ain't just my ride..it's everyones!! and thanks to Ed for making it all happen.

Pic above: Me and Ange (In his snowmobile jumper), bonza bloke, just shooting the breeze on the set of Australia's greatest footy fan. I came 2nd last and Ange came stone motherless!!

Pic above: Not a happy camp! under the pump and losing.
Joffa ,Magpie Dan, Kevin and Denz.

Could this be the new version of the Gold Jacket 2008 and beyond style?
She's a beauty!

Dont worry i aint going strange and it aint a dress, it was a monks outfit with hood, it was ok'd by MCG groundstaff to bring in the 2006 Huge wooden spoon obtained by telephone during the week, as i strolled into the stadium i was stopped by 7 security guards and was told in no uncertain terms it could not come out until after the game, It came out at the 25 min mark and i was duly evicted, the spoon was legal in size as per MCC rulings! It's been life's greatest pleasure sticking it up the Carlton football club

Not only does it look quite silly but the talior in question couldn't even join the pooh stripes together evenly (on shoulders)
Well i spose it wont be long before he's wearing a gold top hat with a game over banner terrorising the terraces!

Crazy wonderful passionate days, The speeches, The chanting, The insane fun.Pre game grand final speeches live on tripple M

No doubting the fact the ability the gold jacket has of bringing people together,It was our way at the time to make sure we told everyone the pies were on the way back as an AFL power, After many years of copping it from opposition supporters it was now our turn to give it back, And boy didn't we do it beautifully, We did it our way, We did it the collingwood way.

We would congregate mid morning before the game at the cricketer's arm's a drop kick away from the MCG, We would come together in great numbers and meet in the beer garden, which eventually because of the ever increasing size of the magpie army had to be made bigger, It had become a place to be, Collingwood supporters from all over Australia would make it a point of call to join the merrriment and passion and of course, The brotherly love, On one ocassion the speech was delivered from the roof top with megaphone, It was like the pope delivering a mass at the vatican, wonderful times, wonderful memories, The speeches were bloody ordinary but no one cared, It was fun.

We even at one stage took the speech to South Australia for a prelim final at Football Park at the lakes function centre, That speech was a beauty, In the SA news rag the front sports page liftout was hell bent on giving it to us Vics, The theme of that speech that night was ' We are not Victorians we are Collingwood! the pies would go on to win a historic memorable finals victory without skipper Nathan Buckley.

In the Grand Final years of 2002 and 2003 the pre game speech was delivered live on radio tripple M, Sadly the pies fell short on the greatest stage yet again, With the 2003 Grand Final defeat having disasterous consequences, For the first time in my life i questioned Collingwood, 7pm Grand Final night red and teary eyed in the privacy of my bedroom, I had hated Collingwood, We were Grand Final losers again, The hearts were heavy, I was even imaginig a life without the pies, I was selfish and i was hurt, Our boys were gone at half time, Without a bloody whimper, We had done our part they didn't, They let us down beyond belief, 24 hours later the hurt had eased, i was sorry for doubting the love of my life, i had promised myself to never do that again, Next year we'd bouce back, The collingwood journey would continue, as it will until death!

Grand Final 2003 the Cricketers Arms had made a special gold jacket i suspect it was in thanks for what we had done to that establishment, We had put it on the map and most probably made the owner very rich, After the 2003 Grand Final the Gold Jacket was returned and framed and is now hanging up inside the Cricketer's Arm's hotel.

After a couple of year's collingwood supporter ' foxy ' became the speech writer giving the speeches new life and fun times, I recall prior to the 2002 grand final before the Tripple M gig, About 11 am, we did the speech outside the Cricketer's Arm's in side street with megaphone, For those who couldn't fit into the beer garden out back, the crowd was unbelievable, After 2003 the speeches at the Cricketer's Arm's had finished, It had become too time consuming, the crowd at the Cricketer's Arm's had changed it was time to move on, The gold jacket was very much instrumental for the wonderful pre game speeches at the Cricketer's Arms!

In the evening after the 2002 Grand Final about 7pm ed would call to chat and announce we'd bounce back hard in 2003, that's eddie, never looked upon ed as a superior and or President, but rather a collingwood friend a collingwood brother in arms!

Searched the internet for a pic of the Cricketers Arms Richmond, but could only find this one, things must of gone upmarket since the hurly burly speech days!

Four happy Magpies Ross,John Yours truly and Ian at the MCG after our round one victory over Freo.

Patrick Steineck from Sweden was stoked about seeing the Pies triumph over the Dockers in round one 2008.