Darren McLellan played his last game for Footscray United on the weekend just gone. I thought that I would put a few thoughts together about him. He’s had such an unbelievable influence and effect on the people he’s played with that when you are put on the spot it can be difficult to articulate just what you are thinking. With the benefit of 24 hours hindsight hopefully it’s a bit easier. When I first started training and playing with the seniors around 2005 as a 14-15 year old Nudge was probably in the prime of his career. He was the bloke who trained twice a week from start to finish and would bowl for 90 minutes solid, always off the same run up, always with the same effort. It was rare to get a ball down the leg side and I’m sure at one point that I didn’t get a hittable ball from him in 5 sessions. If he did spray one down leg then he would give himself a verbal spray and get down for a set of push ups. Every time he bowled to me it was a test, complete with probing off-stump lines and some verbals to go with it. Never did I learn so much about building and developing character while batting than facing Nudge. He literally made me a better batsman – I wasn’t going to get out to him no matter what (sadly, I got out to him many, many times). I remember the coach of the time pointing him out to me and telling me that he was the one to model yourself on – if you can train like Nudge then you’ll get the absolute best out of yourself. When you think about it, that’s so true. I think it would be reasonable to say that that Nudge was never the most talented cricketer going around – even by his own admission. But geez did he push himself to get the best results that he could. Even in his early 40s he would be the one pushing the slower blokes at the back of the packs to push up and run hard – believe me, I know, as I spent a lot of time at the back of those packs. The fact that he played 200 games of first XI cricket, and won fairly much every award there was to win along with 2 premierships and the respect of an entire club tells you all you need to know about his work ethic. Outside of playing/training hours, he has been in pretty much every role the club has. From junior coordinator to being administrator during one of the toughest periods in the clubs modern history Nudge was worn most hats with gusto. At every club there are certain blokes who can’t walk past things – who have to fix something if it’s broken and once they see something being done that can be done better, they put their hand up to do it. Instead of complaining and coming up with problems they’re someone that comes up with solutions, and they never really put their hand up for credit. Every club has probably a handful of these people that form the heart and soul of the place. The fact that he has retired but is staying on as first XI team manager gives a fair insight into his attitude. By the way, the equipment room being cleared out at the start of every cricket season for the last 10 years hasn’t happened magically! It makes him nervous to have a crowded gear room. On a more informal note, if you had much to do with him you will know that Nudge is one of the funniest team mates you could share a changing room with. Early on in my senior career I had to figure out what the terms “arse-hat” and “arse-clown” meant and was greeted with pearls such as “can you get me a drink Robbie, and see if they have a personality for you at the same time” while the learning of rhyming slang was mandatory if you wanted to understand a word he was saying. Every time I was knocked over I would cop “you can’t go to Rebel and buy experience off the shelf Robbie” and there were really no limits to what some would consider a pretty off-colour sense of humour. There are so many jokes that can’t even be shared in this forum they were just so bad. The word poke took on a whole new meaning, and his condom-camping joke makes you think pretty deeply as a 15 year old. On the same note, I think he considers himself to be a nickname man. A few highlights from my time included John “Citizen” Smith, Franky “Well-Hung” Hoang and the general name of Ralph Schumacher for anyone who had a brother. He approaches nick-names with a shotgun approach – for every 100 bad ones he fires out there will be a decent one in there somewhere (and believe me, he has let go of some stinkers). Another quirk was Darren’s bottomless gear bag. The bloke carried anything you could ever hope for in a cricket bag, including tapes of all descriptions, spike tools, chafe cream and multiple jumpers among others. It was always just a given that if you were looking for something that you could probably find one in Nudge’s bag. Pity he never found himself a sense of humour in there! And it also makes me wonder why he insists on participating in the fines circle completely naked every week. Surely he had a pair of pants in there. One interesting aspect was his attitude towards umpires. You could essentially break it down by saying that if he had the ball in his hand then everything should be LBW. Once he picked up the willow however the opposite was true. I reckon I saw Nudge get out 20 times LBW over the last 10 years and he was upset about every single one of them. Every single one! It probably didn’t help that he doesn’t take centre – we think he just stands roughly where the stumps are. The bloke probably bats on off stump. Stu tells us that even back when they opened the batting together he never took centre even on a brand new wicket. His other theory was that however many LBWs were given to the opposition team, the same amount should apply to us. He would be dark on any umpire that gave them two outs and us only one. It wasn’t fair. Perhaps this was a bit of “bowlers brain” showing itself. And god help the umpire if they had given him LBW... they would then be treated to 80 overs of Nudge muttering insults from mid-off under his breath (and some not so under his breath). Perhaps the most legendary part of all was his trademarked and patented ‘phantom’ move which he employed with subtlety and the sneakiness of a cat burglar at every social event ever. Nudge is not big into saying goodbyes and so tends to get up and leave once he’s had enough. No one ever notices he is gone until hours after he leaves, despite occasional attempts to actually keep track of his movements. He has become a master at it and several other club members have attempted similar moves over the past number of years, with varying success levels. Mind you, he has found it harder in recent years as he pushed towards mid-forties as he tends to fall asleep sitting up after a few beers these days. He develops a subtle facial droop and difficulty speaking after 4-5 cans which then develops to semi-consciousness and difficulty walking straight after a couple more. I’ll miss playing with you ‘Dee-four-ren’, and I know the rest of the boys feel the same. I’ll miss all the little things that you take for granted, like arriving at the ground early and chewing the fat while we wait for the ‘semi-reliables’ to show up. Or the knowing smile every time you almost sneak an off-cutter through the gap between bat and pad. We are glad you are sticking around and look forward to our shirts being pressed and washed every week; hanging on hooks ready for us when we get to the ground. You’re a United champion and I don’t use that expression lightly. Cheers “Swooper”
Posted on: Sun, 07 Dec 2014 08:08:23 +0000
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