By JARROD POTTER
DANDENONG JOURNAL – 150TH ANNIVERSARY: DANDENONG THUNDER’S MAGNIFICENT 2012
SOCCER has emphatically become one of the biggest sports in our town. Its rise can be charted throughout the decades, but the biggest moment came when Dandenong Thunder lifted the third and final piece of the Victorian soccer silverware treble a few seasons ago.
There were highs of the season and the trophy wins, lows of the post-season controversy surrounding sanctions against an incident at the 2012 VPL grand final, but above all it’s the season where the Dandenong Thunder proved itself one of the greatest sides in Victorian soccer history.
It’s a clear choice for talking about Dandenong soccer’s legacy as it was a season where it all clicked together then just as quickly as the success came, the team went their separate ways and we were left reminisce.
Here’s an extended interview with Dandenong Thunder club favourite Shane Rexhepi, co-captain of that 2012 side that won the Dockerty Cup, VPL minor premiership and the VPL grand final, and what that season meant to him as he looks back on the amazing campaign.
For more on Dandenong’s 2012 season, grab a copy of this week’s Dandenong Journal on Monday morning, as we celebrate the 150th birthday of the newspaper.
That magnificent year in 2012 – how was it from the inside, as there was all the hype surrounding you guys as the wins kept piling on, the minor premiership, winning the Dockerty Cup – what sort of things were you thinking going through that season?
As it was going along just the way that we were playing and the confidence that the boys had and that winning spirit – I knew from the start that we were going to create history.
You just had that feeling that you’re not going to lose and you’re going to win every game that comes across you – whether it’s a cup final or playing against the bottom team. We just had that belief in one and other, in the team, in the coaching staff and even with the supporters and everyone. It was one big army, and we said from the start ‘we’re not going to lose, we’re going to win everything we played and the results showed that.
It was the perfect roster wasn’t it? You had options everywhere up forward, you guys down back – with you, Craig (Elvin), Bryan (Bran), the younger boys like (Andrew) Mullett and (Matthew) Theodore as well – there were just options everywhere and do you think that played into it a fair bit or was it more than just the perfect side?
It definitely was the perfect team. If you win the treble, you need to win it with a perfect team. Not only the starting 11, but the bench players as well. The start of the season, your bench players, a few of them start creeping into the seniors and starting 11. Timmy Mala for example, was starting on the bench for half of the year, but come the second half of the year he got his opportunity, took it and started every game after that and started in the grand final and done really well.
That team – those players – credit to Chris Taylor who brought a lot of players in there that were young and fresh and no names in the VPL, and made them superstars and are absolutely dominating now in this league. Credit to them, they deserve it – players like Iqi Jawadi, Theodore and Andrew Mullett and whatnot playing in Melbourne City.
Is there one moment in the season that just defines it? The grand final wins of course were fantastic, but is there anything else that was happening that set in your mind – and everyone else’s – that this was legitimate and you guys were power-packed and ready?
Being an Albanian boy at an Albanian club and knowing Dandenong Thunder all my life, playing at that club – especially in times like that where everything was unstoppable – it was fantastic. Being in that Albanian community – not just that year, but all of the years I was there – it was just that buzz. You rock up to training and it was just that buzz, you feel it in the air. With the players and the coaching staff and I’ve got a lot of good friends at that club and now I’ve got some really best mates that come from there. Probably my best moment at that club, especially that 2012 season, was lifting the trophy with a good friend of mine Veton Korcari. He’s been captain of that club and he’s the Dandenong Thunder golden child and for him and I to be co-captains that year and lifting two trophies – the Dockerty Cup and the VPL Cup – I still look at those photos every couple of days and think “that there, I’ll never forget that”. He’s such a great bloke and such a great champion of that club, so for me that just ticks every box.
What do you reckon a win like that did for the Dandenong soccer community? We’ve seen all these little clubs pop up afterwards and all the juniors have come through and everyone is tearing it up – it really just set the stage and told everyone that Dandenong soccer isn’t just for juniors and little run-around soccer, but is a big threat and massive at its core.
It always has been – Dandenong at its core has always been a big club within Victoria. Before 2012 it always had a big history, but never won any silverware. The whole suburb of Dandenong and all the supporters of Thunder and everyone deserved that cup. Deserved all those wins and deserved all the success that we got. Since then it’s been upwards and credit to everyone there and credit to all the players that have moved on from then, but you never forget those things. You always look back and smile and sometimes people post videos up on Facebook and I watch the grand final every now and then and I still get goosebumps thinking to myself that there is no better feeling than winning cups and winning grand finals with your best mates and team mates and you just want to do it again and again.
Do you think the limited and fleeting nature of that side pays into the legend of it as well? You guys were pretty much decimated the year after, with a fair few going and there’s probably only three or four of those guys left at the club now. Do you think because it was that one perfect year, and then pretty much everything around it hasn’t happened again, makes it more special?
I would’ve loved to go on the year after and win it again, but being in this league and it’s so hard to keep a championship team together. There’s clubs out there that poach players and pay ridiculous amounts of money to players and they’ve got families and own lives that they have to look after. I know every person that left the club didn’t leave because they wanted to – they left because it was the right decision for them and their family. That’s the same as me – I didn’t want to leave Dandenong, would’ve loved to play there a long time, but people have got to move on and it makes that year very special. Every time I think about 2012, it’s a treble-winning year and I don’t think there’ll be a club to do that for a very long time anyway.
After it all happened, you’re holding this cup at AAMI Park and everything is finished for that year. After you walk into the change rooms and belt out the song, then what happened after that? What was the feeling in the group when the commotion settled down a bit and you guys realised the treble was yours?
I couldn’t really remember as I was a bit hungover the next day. It was that feeling where you’re on top of the world and nothing is going to stop you. You’ve pushed yourself for eight months and the reward at the end of it – walking into AAMI Park with that cup was one of the best moments, not only in my football career, but in my life. You can never win enough grand finals and I was lucky enough to have won one and I might only win one for my whole career and it’s just an unbeatable moment. Something you’ll look back on for the rest of your career.
What else about that year stands out to you?
Besides my winning penalty in the Dockerty Cup? That was awesome and I saw you giggling there in the background. (Note: it was hard not to get caught up in this side’s celebrations.) That there was obviously fantastic – kicking the winning penalty to pick up the club’s inaugural piece of silverware, for me that was a great achievement and something I gave back to the club that gave so much to me.I still tell that story to this day – a lot of my team mates and a lot of them are sick of hearing it but I still them it regularly, even to my Hume team mates I tell them the story, but it was a great moment for the club and that’s what counted.
