Two clubs laud one icon

Hawthorn and Carlton will share a unique celebration this weekend when they honour David Parkin.

On Friday afternoon, a couple of days before Hawthorn and Carlton do battle at the MCG, past players and officials, as well as supporters of both clubs, will gather for a lunch to celebrate David Parkin, one of just a handful of people who can genuinely be regarded as an icon of two clubs.

At Hawthorn he is revered as the 1971 premiership captain and then premiership coach seven years later – only John Worsfold has done the same.

He artfully walked in the shoes of a club’s greatest figure – in Hawthorn’s case it was John Kennedy snr –creating a legacy of his own.

At Carlton, he inherited a brilliant but headstrong group of players.

By combining his strengths with theirs, he immediately had them back in the business of winning premierships.

Then after some time away, he came back to the Blues for a second coaching stint and landed a third premiership, this time with player empowerment as the driving factor.

And all the while he changed the art and the language of coaching with the “talls”, “smalls”, “corridors” and the like.

It speaks volumes for Parkin that he can so seamlessly bridge the divide between two clubs that traditionally have not had much time for each other, even as they shared Princes Park from 1974 to 1991.

The rivalry took a new twist when Parkin crossed from one set of dressing rooms to the other and joined Carlton in 1981.

Just two years after coaching the Hawks to the 1978 flag, he learned the club was looking to replace him.

He resigned immediately and within a few days the Blues grabbed him, unceremoniously axing favourite son Peter ‘Percy’ Jones as coach after just one season when Parkin became available.

Hawthorn enjoyed great success through the 1980s, winning four flags. But, initially, not against Carlton.

He knew his old club intimately and Parkin and his Blues took great delight in repeatedly beating the Hawks in his first few years there, especially in 1982 when Leigh Matthews cannoned into Ken Hunter in front of the Carlton Social Club, an act that so outraged Parkin that he wrote a letter to the Hawks champion expressing his profound disappointment.

While Essendon will always be considered Hawthorn’s greatest rival – along with Geelong in more recent times – any Hawks supporter who followed the club in the 1980s does not need much prompting when it comes to actively disliking the Blues.

But they don’t lay exclusive claims to Parkin.

He was a brilliant and courageous captain at Hawthorn and his teammates adore him to this day.

They didn’t keep concussion statistics during his career, but Parkin would have been close to the top of the chart.

As Hawthorn coach, he kept the Kennedy DNA of toughness (“injuries above the neck don’t count”) but added a sharp tactical edge.

He was the breath of fresh air that champions such as Matthews, Don Scott, Peter Knights, Michael Tuck and Kelvin Moore needed at the peak of their careers.

His hand-written, detailed match review dossiers were legendary at both clubs.

They were well received at the Hawks, but the superstars at Carlton initially bristled before a compromise was reached.

The Blues partied as hard as they played and Parkin, a noted teetotaller, agreed to look the other way as long as the players made time to read his notes.

It was the perfect arrangement.

When it comes to the Hawks versus the Blues, Parkin never takes sides.

He was known as the “Hawthorn bloke” in his first few years at Carlton and he joked himself that the 1995 will celebrate his contribution to both of them on Sunday. premiership was engineered by a “couple of Hawthorn supporters” –former Hawk Ken Judge was his assistant.

But he was proudly named coach of Carlton’s Team of the Century, a pretty significant achievement given the club has won 16 premierships all up.

Parkin’s influence in the game stretched to Fitzroy, where he coached for three seasons; the AFL umpiring department; the media, where he was an excellent performer despite his constant state-of-war with journalists when he coached; and as a mentor and confidante to many.

He has been a huge influence on Sam Mitchell as a player and coach.

Sunday’s best-on-ground will be awarded the David Parkin Medal, and he will be greeted with warm backslaps and hugs whichever rooms he visits post-game.

It takes a special person to be regarded as a favourite son by both Hawthorn and Carlton, two very different football clubs.

@hashbrowne