By Alex Brown
The Sydney Morning Herald
April 30th, 2003
It's 1992. You're at Kogarah Oval. You wade through the sea of red-and-white clad supporters, pick a random fan and tell him/her that within a decade St George will form a joint-venture with the Illawarra Steelers, home games will be alternated between Wollongong and Moore Park, and Kogarah will be devoid of first-grade fixtures for almost four seasons.
You duck.
It's those fans, the ones from the St George area, the ones sapped of passion when the joint-venture transferred Sydney home games to Aussie Stadium, for whom Johnny Raper feels.
And it's those same fans fellow Dragons great Graeme Langlands hopes will return to the renovated stadium for Sunday's clash with Cronulla - the first game at Kogarah since July 11, 1999.
"I still thought there should have been room to play games in Kogarah," Raper said. "I think it upset quite a few people. People from Bexley who used to come to this ground had to go a lot further to get to the Sydney Football Stadium. Hopefully, those fans will be packing the stands and climbing the trees outside the ground again now that their team is back in their area."
Langlands added: "They probably lost a lot of fans. They were essentially playing their home games at the Roosters' home ground. When they played home games against the Roosters, the crowd was three-quarters Easts fans. That's no home-ground advantage. They should never have left altogether. I think you'll notice a big lift when they run on the field this weekend."
Former Dragons captain Lance Thompson won his first grand final - with the under-sevens Earlwood Saints - at Kogarah.
He also recalls his maiden first-grade game at the ground (against the Gold Coast) and the corner in which he scored his first premiership try (against Penrith).
"I ran off a pass from Noel Goldthorpe, should've passed it to Wayne Bartrim but got a bit greedy to score my first first-grade try," he said, pointing to the corner nearby the partially renovated grandstand. "It's a special ground for me. The Footy Stadium never really felt like a home ground.
"There were a few games we lost there that we might have won if we were playing at Kogarah. It's good to be back."
Mark Gasnier, too, played much of his junior football at the ground, then in later years crammed onto the hill to watch the 1989 Canberra Raiders battle the Dragons.
But come Sunday, Gasnier, after 55 matches, will play his maiden Kogarah first-grade game, pending a medical clearance.
"At one point some of the boys went to [management] and asked to either get us back to Kogarah, or play all our games at WIN Stadium," said Gasnier, who rated himself an 80 per cent chance of recovering from a calf injury in time for Sunday's clash.
"The Footy Stadium wasn't really a home ground.
"But just to walk around Kogarah is something special. It's the ground I always dreamed of playing first grade on. I feel like a kid again just walking around this place."
Copyright © 2003. The Sydney Morning Herald