In the heart of Sydney’s inner-west, at the Parramatta Road end of Norton Street in Leichhardt, is an institution of Sydney football. Bar Sport is dripping in football – Sydney FC fans stickers decorate the fire-engine red espresso machine, the walls are covered with Socceroos and Italy memorabilia, and on the counter Alessandro Del Piero’s autobiography sits alongside a doorstop, collectors’ edition of Gazzetta Dello Sport. On the wall closest to the coffee machine is an enormous blackboard with Serie A fixtures and scores; opposite is a large television which broadcasts games from around the world.
The owner, Joe Napoliello, is a mad Juventus fan and a life member of APIA Leichhardt, but Bar Sport is home to football people of all sorts: ex-professional players, fans of overseas clubs, A-League supporters, parents of junior players coming through the state leagues. Balmain Tigers coach Joe Di Giulio has his morning coffee here with the same group of friends. “Every morning for the last 20 years,” he says with a grin, “It’s good here, because we talk politics and sports. It’s exactly the same, maybe just the chairs have changed!”
In the past fortnight, a few new posters have appeared at Bar Sport, advertising Tuesday night’s FFA Cup match between Balmain Tigers’ and Melbourne Victory. The game will be held just down the road at Leichhardt Oval. Inside the cafe, tickets have been available for sale behind the counter, and the excitement in the area has been steadily growing. “It’s constant now,” says Di Giulio, who has quickly become hot property.
The challenge facing Balmain Tigers is enormous – this is the lowest ranked club in the FFA Cup final 32 against the defending A-League champions. Victory have thousands of members, unparalleled corporate support and three A-League titles to their name. They have arguably the best striker in the country, Besart Berisha, as well as Archie Thompson, one of Australia’s all-time leading goal-scorers.
Balmain Tigers are a small, community club run on the sweat of a few volunteers. “Look we don’t have great players,” says Di Giulio. “We got a bunch of players who are pretty much the same, we don’t have a great scorer. We’ve got a few players who can score, a good hardworking midfield and a good defence, so we’re pretty balanced.” Probably their most experienced player at this level is goalkeeper Anthony Costa, who played in last season’s FFA Cup match for Sydney United against Sydney FC, but three of Balmain’s starting XI are ineligible for selection for this match, and two more are out injured or suspended. “That’s my predicament,” shrugs Di Giulio.
Balmain play in the third tier of football in NSW. They train just two nights a week – Tuesdays at Birchgrove Oval and Thursdays in Caringbah – and play their home games at Wentworth Park in Glebe. But they couldn’t hold this match at Wentworth Park because there are no floodlights. They couldn’t even host it at Lambert Park in Leichhardt, their second choice, because the lighting was not deemed sufficient for the television broadcast. They’re hoping to break even from the game, although they’ll have to forfeit thousands of dollars in potential revenue in order to meet FFA’s strict requirements. This is a classic David versus Goliath scenario.
Di Giulio arrived in Australia in 1974 from Argentina. He was born in Italy before his parents moved to Buenos Aires, and so he grew up supporting River Plate. By 16 he was going every weekend to watch the Onega brothers and Oscar Más play for Los Millonarios, but at 18 the family migrated again, this time to Australia. We were actually going to go to Canada,” he says, “but then we find out about the temperature in winter, so we decided to come here.”
When he first started to learn English, he would take a note on the bus, instructing the driver to notify him at the correct stop. His first job at a factory also helped him familiarise himself with the language, as did completing his accounting degree.
Football was always a passion. His favourite National Soccer League sides were Blacktown City and Marconi, and by 1990 he got his first coaching gig with a South American team in SBS’s Ethnic World Cup, losing the grand final to a Portuguese side.
Family took him away from football, and then brought him back again. His own playing days finished when he met his wife, and he spent less time on the field and more time with the family. “She didn’t like sport at all, so that was the end of my soccer career,” he says with a grin. When his son Leonardo turned six, however, he was back in the game as his son’s coach.
Leonardo, 23, and James Kiosidis have been with Di Giulio since the Under-6s, and if it wasn’t for Leo’s broken leg, they’d both be playing tonight against Melbourne Victory. “All the way through it’s been a bonding experience with my son,” says Di Giulio, who has been with Balmain since 2011. “For me it’s not about coaching in NPL1 or A-League. It’s a bit late for me now, I always did it because my son was involved.”
There are a couple of juicy backstories to this match. First, while Di Giulio is polite and gentle off the field, he’s also a fierce competitor. Two seasons ago he was arrested in Mudgee in a wild state league match against Western NSW Mariners, after being sent off by the referee and then pouring a bottle of water on the groundsman’s head. I ask whether Victory coach Kevin Muscat, infamously known as “the most hated man in football” and a referee’s nightmare, may yet meet his match. Di Giulio chuckles and shakes his head: “I’m very calm these days”.
Second, many of the Balmain Tigers players are Sydney FC fans, and a couple are regulars in The Cove, Sydney FC’s active support group. The chance to play against one of Sydney FC’s main rivals will be a moment for them to savour, and more broadly, part of the romance of this new cup competition.
“Look, obviously it’s going to be hard to get a result and win,” says Di Giulio. “What I want is for the players to enjoy it, to get the most out of it, because it could be once in a lifetime experience.”
