Saint Wings His Way Home
The Age
Thursday February 22, 2001
Steven Lawrence was lying in his Brisbane bedroom last June listening on the radio to the Saints defeat Geelong in the game that immediately followed Tim Watson's resignation. As old-fashioned and incongruous as it sounds, the young Lion sprang up from his bed after the final siren and started cheering and singing the St Kilda theme song.
The thought that his behavior could be regarded as strange occurred to Lawrence, too. He asked himself: ``What am I doing? Here I am a Brisbane player (of six years) cheering for another club."
Not for the first time during the Saints' devastating year 2000. Eight rounds earlier while on the Gold Coast the tough defender had sat devastated with his father Barry as St Kilda went down by a point to the Western Bulldogs. And yet, despite Lawrence's obvious passion for the side his father captained during mid-1970s it has been a long and painful journey home.
According to Barry Lawrence - who, with Steven's mother, Margaret, has also moved back to Melbourne this year - it is a myth that he was forced to sit on the bench for Southport aged in his late 40s in order to secure his son a place at Brisbane. Certainly Southport had offered to list the man who so memorably held Peter Hudson in the 1971 grand final but it was not necessary. The AFL's favorable draft concessions handed to Brisbane led to the 17-year-old Lawrence, then a promising forward, being secured former coach Robert Walls.
He had trained with the Saints, along with the teenaged Fraser Gehrig, for a fortnight during pre-season but St Kilda was going through a coaching change at the time (with Stan Alves replacing Ken Sheldon) and the close-knit Lawrence family did not want to lose their youngest child to another state.
Barry, a reserves coach at North Melbourne under John Kennedy, had moved his family to Queensland when Steven was 12. Back then he'd had enough of football and the warmer climate was easier on an ageing body damaged by football. Leg injuries ended his VFL career in 1976 after 126 games for St Kilda, but Lawrence senior remains a strong contender for the Saints' team of the century to be named next month.
But Steven Lawrence kept the letter offering him a contract to join the Saints. In fact he had it framed. Having this week paid a deposit on a new home on the border of Beaumaris and Mentone, just five doors from where he grew up, Lawrence will hang it up once again.
All this blood being thicker than water stuff might sound a little corny if not for two key elements. One is that while Lawrence never saw his father play except for a couple of videos he virtually grew up at Moorabbin in his formative childhood years during the Trevor Barker era.
``Dad would be in the social club and me and a mate of mine, we had the run of the place," said the 24-year-old Lawrence. ``We'd run on to the ground after all the games and slide around in the mud ... Going back it seemed smaller, it was massive in those days. But the squash courts were still there and the massive pool table.
``I'm passionate about football like all my family and Brisbane was great but it wasn't like being in a footy town. Now I want to make another impact at St Kilda but I want to make it as me and not as the son of someone."
And there is a symbolism about the return of Lawrence as far as the magnetic Malcolm Blight is concerned. Not only has Barry Lawrence moved south but another team-of-the-century candidate in Kevin ``Cowboy" Neale moved back to Melbourne from Canberra this week, having lined up a job with Saints' sponsor Greg Westaway. Even Carl Ditterich told former teammates at a club reunion late last year that he was thinking of heading back to live in the city.
``I think it's a challenge for everyone to come back and be a part of this," said Lawrence junior. ``It could be the last lifeline St Kilda has. As far as the players, Malcolm knows where the club wants to go and he knows where he wants to take us. And we want to follow.
``I had an idea he was coming when I signed and I knew his reputation as a no-nonsense man which is what I need and what the club needs, too." Lawrence said Blight had not discussed with him the skeletons that might remain in his closet from Brisbane. Having endured two knee reconstructions in 1995 and 1996 and virtually missing two years of football, Lawrence came back and by 1999 had earned the title of Brisbane's most improved player as part of Leigh Matthews' reconstructed Lions' defence.
But last year the wheels fell off when Lawrence badly damaged his arm in a drunken fight at a party one regrettable Saturday night during the season. Fined by the club, he missed six weeks through injury, a period he says hurt him more than the two bouts of knee surgery.
``I reacted to something a bloke from outside the club said to me after too many beers," said Lawrence. ``It was a stupid thing to do and I only had myself to blame. But having to live with missing games and knowing I'd caused it was the worst. It was a wake-up call. You like a drink but there are times you've got to know when to stop."
Lawrence will not play until at least round one of the season proper. He has never undergone intensive pre-season training before Christmas over six years at Brisbane due to various injuries, so Blight ordered him to get fit on the track before undergoing surgery four weeks ago for an osteitis pubis condition.
``I don't care whether it's for the seniors or the seconds but I want to be right for the first round of footy," said Lawrence, who is seen by the Saints as a versatile tough-at-the-ball player whose preferred place is as an onballer. ``Malcolm wants us to be a tougher side and I'm happy to play up forward or back and I want to give a bit of grunt, too."
Football over these two generations has taken Barry Lawrence from his Tasmanian birthplace more than half-way up Australia's east coast and back now to Victoria. His elder son Dale, now 33, played for Melbourne's under 19s and reserves under Ray Jordon. According to Lawrence senior, Steven's elder brother was on the verge of senior selection when his interest in football waned.
So Barry Lawrence is looking forward next month to watching his youngest child receive a St Kilda guernsey bearing No.15 on the back. ``I've waited a long time for this," he said.
© 2001 The Age