Collingwood.....

Malthouse and the Magpies recruiting

Mick Malthouse the coach of Collingwood Magpies gets wind of potential young recruit who lives in <st1:country-region w:st="[/IMG]<ST1<img" src="images/smilies/tongue.gif" border="0" alt="" title="Tongue" smilieid="653" class="inlineimg">Iraq</st1:country-region>.
Manager catch a plane to the troubled <st1:country-region w:st="on">Iraq</st1:country-region> capital <st1><st1>Baghdad</st1></st1> and track the young boy down.

They risk life and limb dodging car bombs, bullets and grenades but finally find him and convince him to come to <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1>Australia</st1></st1:country-region>

The boy does a full pre-season, plays all the practice matches and gets picked on the bench in the seniors for the first game of the year.

Ten minutes into the first quarter, Nathan Buckley goes down with a severe knee injury. Malthouse turns to the boy and says "This is it son, go to the centre half forward and show us what you can do."

The boy proceeds to play the greatest debut game in AFL history. He kicks 9 goals, takes mark of the year, and kicks the winning goal after the siren from outside 50.

The Magpies chair him off the ground and give him three cheers back in the rooms. Malthouse tells the team what the boy from <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1>Iraq </st1></st1:country-region>has been through and he is a model lesson for all.

Malthouse then pulls the boy aside and says "Go into my office son , ring your Mother and tell her what you did today."

He proceeds to do so. "Mum", he says down the phone, "Guess what I did today?"

"I don't care what you did today." His Mother replies. "I tell you what happened here today", she goes on. "Your Dad was stabbed and robbed, our house was torched, our car blown up, your sister was attacked and your brother was abducted."

"Gee" says the boy. "I feel a bit responsible for what happened."
The Mother replies "So you should be, if it wasn't for you we would never have shifted to Collingwood."

Pete