Blonde Hawthorn

It's traditional during bye week for AFL clubs to name their teams of the decade or century, ultimate premiership teams, halls of fame and the like. Such teams are announced with great fanfare and a whiff of controversy, always at Crown and always with a portrait by the same guy. Are there no other function rooms or artists in Melbourne?

The first of my representative teams comes with no dinner, no Steve Quartermain as MC, no official portrait; just a can of cheap bleach...it's the best team of blondes to play for Hawthorn.

Anita Loos’ 1925 novel "Gentlemen Prefer Blondes", later a film starring Marilyn Monroe, may have helped popularise the, perhaps spurious, notion that blondes are more desirable than brunettes, but something got lost in the translation at Hawthorn where it seems to mean that Gentlemen Prefer Being Blonde.


There's something about a bright clear day at the MCG where the sun highlights not just the gold stripes on our jumper and the fans' outfits, but picks out the highlights in the hair of a Hawthorn blonde. The Hawks have a long, proud tradition of blondes, possibly only rivalled by St.Kilda. From the golden haired backline of the mid 70s, via Dermie, Crawf and right through to today.


Much is made of the recent recruitment policy of left-footers, but in the mid 90s, it appeared that blonde hair was the basis of our recruitment policy. And if it didn’t come naturally, then the players simply shampooed with peroxide. 


The word "blond" is first known in in English in 1481 (14 + 8 + 1 = 23…spooky) and derives from Old French word “blund” or “blont”, meaning ‘a colour midway between golden and light chestnut’ – in other words a colour between brown and gold...a Hawthorn colour.


The colour itself is characterized by low levels of the dark pigment 'eumelanin', and while there are different blonde hues, platinum, sandy, strawberry etc, the predominant characteristic is a variant of yellow and it sits on the colour wheel between yellow and light brown. What to conclude other than it's a Hawthorn hue.


And here's the team...

Backs: Brian Douge    Ryan Schoenmakers   Andy Collins


Half Backs: Ian Bremner   Peter Knights   Bohdan Jaworski


Centre: Chris Whittman   Sam Mitchell   Kevin Ablett


Half Forward: Peter Curran   Dermott Brereton   Paul Hudson


Forward: Michael Osbourne   Gary Ablett Snr   Daniel Chick

Followers: Richard Walter   Peter Crimmins (c)   Shane Crawford (vc)

Interchange from: Russell Morris,  Rick Ladson,  Rayden Tallis,  Michael McCarthy,  Simon Crawshay    Matthew Robran, Justin Crawford 

Coach: Allan Jeans

Peter Crimmins - captain of the blondes

Crimmo might have begun it all - those of us who saw him play will instantly picture his little blonde bob bouncing up and down as he ran after the ball. There may have been Hawthorn blondes before him, but he set the new template. Surely giving Sam Mitchell Crimmo's famous no. 5 was based as much on Mitch's hair as it was on his style of play.


Crimmo is joined on the ball by Crawf, an obvious choice, and Richard Walter who gets first ruck ahead of Crawshay, though Crawshay was much funnier to watch, and one of our forgotten great No. 23's.



Gary Ablett Snr - well he's blonde, he played for Hawthorn and he was a reasonable full forward



Gary Ablett leads our forward line. Sure he didn't pay many games for Hawthorn, but he did play some and he did have blonde, if wispy, hair. And as it turned out, he was a pretty good full forward. So he's an obvious pick. We obviously didn't need him as no sooner did we let him go than we made eight of the next nine Grand Finals, but still, he would have been handy.

Dermott Brereton - blonde bombshell

Dermie is the centrepoint of the half-forward line and possibly sported the greatest permed blonde mullett known to human history. He is joined by Curran and Huddo, both great, both blonde, even if Huddo's wasn't entirely natural.

 

Daniel 'Hot blonde' Chick

"Chicky babe" - along with Rayden Tallis epitomised the surfie blonde look of the mid 90s.

Peter Knights is one of the great Hawthorn blondes, possibly the greatest 'natural' blonde player of all time: natural in talent and hue. He formed the centrepoint of the great blonde backline of the 70s with Douge,  Bremner, Jaworski and de Wolde (who was sort of blonde) - most of whom made it into the team above.


Andy Collins is an obvious addition from our great 80-90s lineup and Ryan 'The Cobbler' Schoenmakers gets in because we needed a tall, blonde backman, and he might just turn out to be one of our greats...based on the style and grace depicted below, there's no doubt he will.