Does an insect have a heart? The early evolution of Melbourne City FC

I am still trying to process what I experienced at Melbourne City’s first home game at AAMI Park last Sunday afternoon.

Days later, as I’m typing this, the only word I can up with to describe what I saw is pupa.

I wasn’t watching Melbourne Heart FC and I wasn’t watching Melbourne City FC. I was watching Melbourne Pupa FC.

A pupa is the stage of an insect’s life when it undergoes the transformation from larva to imago. For example, when a caterpillar (larva) turns into a butterfly (imago) the pupal stage is known as a chrysalis.

AAMI Park, which already has a larva like appearance, felt like a big pupa last Sunday. The stadium filled like it never did for a Heart game. In among the red and white, splotches of sky blue appeared. Some Heart fans had already changed to imago sky blue of Melbourne City for the occasion, other fans turned up in larval red and white, some turned up without colours because they didn’t know what to wear, others just turned up to see an exotic Spanish star attraction temporarily injected into the pupa in the hope that they too will become part of the imago.

The buzz was certainly working with 10,000 members attracted to the new entity like bees to honey.

In the merchandise stalls only the imago sky blue colours were available, the red and white away strip noticeably absent. This was football club evolution by Machiavellian corporate design not by Darwinian natural selection.

On the field I watched a team trying to shed their deserved reputation as perennial underachievers. At times on Sunday I had a sense of deja vu as I was watched a John van ‘t Schip managed team have plenty of the ball but struggle to break down a stubborn, well-organised visiting team.

Even though they have bolstered their midfield, the team can’t be considered serious contenders for the title as the squad is bereft of actual left and right backs. A striker with a proven goal-scoring record also needs to be signed. With Manchester City’s much talked about scouting network and resources, there is no excuse this can’t be achieved. The jury is still out on JVS but a verdict will be delivered soon enough.

On the terraces, the active group called Yarraside were no more, replaced by a bigger group of Melburnians. New City chants were attempted, old Heart chants were sung. But it was the Heart chants that sounded loudest much to the annoyance of a small element in the new active group who wanted nothing to do with the old Heart chants and almost nothing to do with the capo as they tried to pretend they were at a Manchester City game by the Yarra.

The Melburnians capo was also new. Gone were the fresh-faced Yarraside capos of yore. Sporting a massive beard last seen since the days of Ned Kelly, the new capo looked more at home with a chainsaw in the Tasmanian forest than a megaphone on a football terrace. After a difficult first day I was surprised he hadn’t belted out “such is life, such is life, such is life” to the confused, conflicted fans around him.

No surprise then that the Melburnians are in a big pupa stage as they try to work out who or what they really are and also work out what sort of team they are supposed to be independently and actively supporting.

I suppose the same applies to most of the football fans that turned up last Sunday.

And if you think the older fans are confused, spare a thought for the youngest fans of the club.

Last month, Melbourne City conducted a tiny tots training session at their Latrobe University training base. A friend of mine took his four-year-old son to the session. Seeing I had nothing better to do, I rocked up to say hello to him and his wife and also check out the new lick of paint on the Heart facilities. At the end of the session, I witnessed what could only be described as a very strange, impromptu focus group.

Ticker, the Melbourne Heart mascot, appeared out of the blue, not in red and white, but in the new white Melbourne City home jersey.

“TICKER!”

The small group, three and four-year-olds, yelled.

“No, this is not Ticker. It’s his brother Bluey,” a supervising adult responded.

“Where’s Ticker?” an incredulous child asked. He must have liked Ticker. Being a small child he would be hard pressed to name that many people, but Ticker was important; the goofy-looking, ginger-haired Melbourne Heart mascot had made an indelible impression on his young formative mind.

“Ticker has gone away. We have Bluey now. Say hello to Bluey.”

“But I want Ticker.”

“But Ticker has gone away. You can be friends with Bluey.”

Melbourne Heart has gone away but can I be friends with Melbourne City? You know, as in real mates.

Maybe, but I will have to wait until I see what they are really like as Melbourne City FC and not as Melbourne Pupa FC.

Feature photo: Pupa of Male Cecropia Moth courtesy of Megan McCarty