Received this from a friend of a friend who like most of us #foreverfreo crew bleed purple and rusted on @freodockers fans - fair to say it got the hairs to stand up! "Here I am, a freo supporter…. Barracking for the Fremantle Dockers for the last 31 years has looked a little something like this… I was there when Pav kicked six on the ’G as we knocked the reigning premiers Geelong out of the 2012 finals. I remember Mods kicking 10 against Melbourne at the MCG in 1999. I was there when he kicked seven against Richmond at Colonial Stadium in 2000. Seven goals, seven behinds. Fourteen shots at goal. Peak Modz I was there at Subi when Pav kicked his 700th goal in his final game. I was there when Mundy broke Richmond hearts at the MCG with the last kick of the game. Twice. I was there in 2024 when all we had to do was beat Port in the last game of the season to make finals… We didn’t. I was there when 40,000 people at Subi started chanting “MCG! MCG! MCG!” as we beat Sydney to make our first Grand Final. I was there when they made us play Geelong at Geelong in a final, and Hilly took off down the wing, bouncing the footy and kicked the goal that sent us into a home prelim. I was there in 2010 when Juddy elbowed Pav in the face at Etihad, split his cheek open badly enough that he needed five staples, somehow didn’t get suspended… Then won the Brownlow. I was there at Marvel in 2022 when we drew with Richmond. I was there for the heartbreak of Fyfe’s injuries. I lived the Fyfe era that had him stand up and accept two Brownlow’s, multiple MVP’s and be the best players in the comp for years, carrying the weight and expectation of our club with him every step of the way. I remember Fyfie playing through the 2015 prelim with a broken leg. Years later, with his career almost over, I remember him starting as sub, hurting himself in the warm-up and never even getting onto the ground. My heart broke for him. I was there at the MCG in 2022 when Melbourne were the reigning premiers, had won 17 games in a row and we went onto their home deck and ended the streak. I was there at the MCG in 2025 when we came from 22 points down in the last quarter and beat the Pies by a point in front of 62,198 feral Collingwood supporters. I was in Adelaide this year when our skipper Alex Pearce threw himself at the footy for that game-saving smother against the Crows. I was there at the MCG in 2008 when we somehow got 51 points in front of Melbourne… Then somehow lost by six. That’s Freo. I was there at the WACA watching Sticks Kernahan and Carlton tear us to pieces in those early days. I was there in 2013 when we seemed to kick the ball to Brian Lake about 87 times, couldn’t kick a goal to save ourselves and lost our first Grand Final by 15 points. But some of my favourite memories aren’t just games I was at. I remember Andrew Wills kicking one from the boundary, taking off doing the aeroplane while Gerard Neesham laughed in the coaches’ box. I remember Mods turning Ashley McIntosh inside out in a Derby, kicking the goal and lying face-down on the turf slapping the ground. I remember Shauny Mac getting absolutely poleaxed in a Derby, getting back up and somehow finding another gear. I remember Dale Kickett drawing a line in the sand. I remember Craig Callaghan looking at me after another loss when I was a shattered teenager and saying: “Stick with us, mate.” I did. I remember watching Anthony Morabito go down again and wondering what might have been. I remember Ballas getting punched in the head by Matthew Scarlett. I remember knowing that no matter who the opposition’s best midfielder was, Crowls would get him. Ablett. Juddy. Goodes. Crawford. Pendlebury. Stevie J. Sam Mitchell. Didn’t matter. I remember David Mundy streaming out of the middle, locks flowing behind him, putting it lace-out on Pav’s chest. I remember Ashley Prescott, Steven O’Reilly, Peter Mann, Spider Burton, Luke Toia and Des Headland. I remember 2011, when Ballas lined up from outside 50 after the siren in a Derby. I remember thinking we’d won it. Ballas thought we’d won it. Then it hit the bloody post. I remember loving Clive Waterhouse. I remember hating Clive Waterhouse. Sometimes in the same quarter. I remember Fletch, Belly, Shane Parker and Chris Bond fighting their guts out for us week after week. I remember when Fletch kicked it straight to the umpire. (And he marked it) I remember Sirengate. Winning a game four days after we’d actually played it. Only Freo. I remember Sandi getting absolutely crunched by Nic Nat in a Derby. A knee to the ribs that left him with fractured ribs and a collapsed lung, requiring surgery and almost a week in hospital. I remember the players we lost along the way. Peter Bell. Winston Abraham. James Clement. Trent Croad. Chris Tarrant. Leigh Brown. Lachie Neale. Ed Langdon. Lachie Schultz. Some hurt more than others. I watched Belly and Winston become premiership players at North. Croad won one at Hawthorn. Leigh Brown at Collingwood. Neale at Brisbane. Langdon at Melbourne. Sometimes I wondered what might have been if things had gone differently. I remember our Indigenous boys. The Wiz. Hilly. Sonny. Johnno. Roger Hayden. Troy Cook. Des. Antoni Grover. Dale Kickett. Winston Abraham. Clem Michael. Scotty Chisholm. Gary Dhurrkay. Steve Koops. Now Pearcy, Duds and Bolts carry that story forward. For a club only born in 1994, our connection with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander footballers is something incredibly special. In 2017 we became the first club in VFL/AFL history to field eight Indigenous players in the same side. That history isn’t just something Fremantle talks about. It’s part of who we are. I’ve watched this club live at the WACA, Subiaco Oval, Optus Stadium, Princes Park, Waverley, Victoria Park, the MCG, Marvel, Adelaide Oval, the Gold Coast and Canberra… And this week, the SCG. Thirty-one years. Different grounds. Different jumpers. Different coaches. Different players. Same club. Same purple. Same ridiculous emotional investment. Through all of it, I’ve somehow only grown to love this club more. The wins. The losses. The heartbreak. The false dawns. The blokes who became champions. The ones who never quite got there. The games we had no right to win and the games we had absolutely no right to lose. Maybe I love this club so much because we’re both battlers. We get knocked around. We get back up. We reinvent ourselves. We believe again. Maybe I see a little bit of myself in Fremantle. Done it tough at times. Had some bloody good times. Had some bad ones. Had plenty of “almost” moments. But kept going. I’ve grown up with this club. From being a teenager hearing “stick with us, mate” after another loss, to being here 31 years later, still riding every kick, every tackle, every win and every bloody heartbreak. I stuck with us. I’ll die supporting this club. And when, not if, we finally win that first flag… Every one of those 31 years will have been worth it. Come on boys." 💜🤍💜🤍