1984’s After the Siren Long Bomb

By DION HAYMAN

Darren Harris cast himself into South Adelaide folklore, sending the Panthers to the top of the ladder with a booming 60 metre goal after the siren to sink Port at Adelaide Oval in 1984.

The matchwinning kick was all the more astonishing because it underlined that even four-time Magarey Medallist Russell Ebert was fallible. Ebert, in his second year as the Magpies’ captain-coach, miskicked short across goal, where his pass was intercepted by a galloping Harris. The heroics of the 18-year-old Harris were even more remarkable given the winning goal was his third in the final 10 minutes of the match.

Harris had made his South debut the same day as its newly appointed captain-coach Graham Cornes, in the opening round of the 1983 season. But he didn’t play again until 1984. By the time of this first Sunday in June, he had just eight games under his belt, four of which were pre-season Escort Cup games.

He was summoned by Cornes to the goal mouth for the seventh round match against North at Prospect when he caught the eye with four goals. Harris backed that up with an eight-goal haul in a rare win against Sturt at Unley. Another four in a 90-point win against Torrens at Thebarton saw him with 16 in three games ahead of the clash between the third-placed Panthers and the top-ranked Magpies.

Harris joined John Schneebichler as South’s key forwards, while Cornes, who curiously began the day on the bench, eventually went to Dwayne Russell, who was Port’s most damaging forward. Even without the grandstand finish, the game was befitting of its billing. The Panthers led by seven, seven and six points at the changes but the Magpies appeared to have the game in their keeping, slamming on 4.3 without reply to take a 15-point lead at the 20-minute mark of the final term.

“Could be game, set, match,” screamed Ian Day after Russell booted his third goal. But within a minute, Paul Harradine found Harris in acres of space at half-forward. Off just five steps, he blasted the ball 50 metres to cut the lead back to nine points.

Harradine cut it to three, holding his nerve with a 45-metre kick from the left forward pocket after marking unattended. But this was Harris’s show and the teenager leapt high across a pack to flatten Martin Leslie. This time, he took six steps but his action and kick from right half-forward was methodical and true, giving South a stunning three-point lead.

With Port again challenged, Paul Belton coolly hit Stephen Clifford from 20 metres. The Magpie veteran’s third goal saw Port lead 17.13 to 17.9 after 28½ minutes. Ninety seconds later, the ball was out of bounds, still deep in the Magpies’ forward line. But Stuart Palmer and the Hewitt brothers dug it out. Shane Butler trapped Greg Anderson holding the ball on the wing. Darryl Hewitt ran the length of the ground, jamming a left snap onto his boot, only for Craig Ebert to outmark Ron Hateley adjacent to the right behind post at the river end. He took 10 seconds off the clock before being directed to kick to brother Russell who was loose up the line.

“Now watch Russell take a minute to kick the football,” predicted Ian Day in commentary. Yet, inexplicably, Ebert had the ball in his hands for just two seconds before wheeling onto his non-preferred left foot and angling a 45 degree kick toward a flat-footed Graeme Robertson at centre half-back.

“Graeme Robertson had taken off so I thought I’d better follow him,” Harris remembered. The ball ballooned slightly over Robertson’s head, Harris saw his chance and took off like an Olympic 100-metre runner. “For whatever reason, the legend Russell Ebert kicked it back toward the centre of the ground. Don’t know why.”

These were days when kicking across goal in defence was one of football’s cardinal sins. “You don’t go backwards, you don’t go across the ground in the backline. It was a bit of a floater on his left foot and it wasn’t directly at him and I was just in the right place at the right time. He just overkicked it a bit and it fell in my lap.”

It was his 12th mark and gave South one last chance, even if it was a long shot. Cornes casually walked past Harris offering encouragement. “You can kick it, you can do it,” he told Harris, knowing he was the only player on the ground who could.

Others weren’t as convinced. “Ian, that’s a huge kick, that’s a gigantic kick,” said Peter Marker. “He’ll have to kick that 60 metres and there are crowds streaming onto the ground.”

Harris dispensed with his mouthguard. The time clock showed 31½ minutes and as Harris took his fourth step toward goal, the siren confirmed this kick would be the last of the afternoon. “It was funny, the crowd was just that loud and all of a sudden it went dead silent as I was running in so I heard the siren pretty well and I just thought, ‘siren, bang, this is it, this is either going through or that’s it’.”

Searching for extra distance, Harris stretched his run-up to nine paces, launching a monster drop punt that beat the outstretched fingertips of Magpie defenders. “It’s going to be awfully close, I think he’s kicked it,” cried Day. “Oh what an unbelievable finish. That would be the most electrifying finish I have seen in 20 years of calling football.”

The Panthers, inspired by a best-afield performance from gun rover Mark Naley,  had snatched it 18.9 (117) to 17.13 (115) and Harris was just as shocked. “I just couldn’t believe that one, I’d kicked it that far and two, that it went straight. I didn’t even think of using a torpedo, it was always going to be a drop punt and I just got it sweet. It was not much different to hitting a good cover drive or a one wood down the middle of the fairway, I just hit it perfectly.”

Cornes, who was himself a hero on the same ground in a grand final 11 years earlier, celebrated with the verve he might have afforded himself that day, had he not been physically and emotionally drained by the occasion. Both arms raised in triumph, he ran to Harris who was dragged to the ground by an army of his team-mates in ecstasy. “He went ballistic,” Harris remembered. “They just piled on top of me.”

It was the zenith of South’s season. “There was great excitement to win after the siren,” Cornes recalled. “We all knew Darren was a big kick so I was pretty confident he’d kick it. After that game, we went top. I remember saying to the guys, ‘well done, we’ve gone to number one’. But then we probably got ahead of ourselves a little bit, maybe.”

South lost its next three games to Glenelg, West and Norwood and was ultimately beaten by the Redlegs in the elimination final, en route to their history-making premiership. Harris played 51 games in six seasons with North Melbourne where he was restricted by injury, often used as an undersized ruckman rather than a forward.

SOUTH      5.2   9.6    12.8    18.9      (117)

PORT         4.1   8.5    11.8    17.13    (115)

BEST – South: Naley, Schneebichler, Dewhirst, G. Hewitt, Christie, Hateley, Harris. Port: Russell, Clifford, Bradley, Leslie, Belton, Anderson.

SCORERS – South: Harris 6.1, Schneebichler 3.1, Hateley 3.0, Kappler 2.2, Harradine 2.1, Slattery, G. Brooksby 1.0. G. Hewitt, Naley 0.1, rushed 0.2. Port: Russell, Evans 3.3, Belton, Clifford 3.0, Knight 2.0, R. Ebert, Kinnear 1.1, Bradley 1.0, Mahney 0.2, rushed 0.3.

UMPIRES – Des Foster, Adrian Forster.

CROWD – 13,093 at Adelaide Oval.