Black-and-white army: Part of the massive support base of Collingwood at Saturday’s AFL Grand Final were Cooma cricketers Liam and Mason Scopelliti and their Stanhope policeman father, Frank. They were at the MCG as Collingwood secured the 2023 AFL premiership.
Stanhope policeman Frank Scopelliti was back in the blue uniform of Victoria Police on Sunday, having only 24 hours earlier been kitted out in the black and white of his beloved Collingwood Football Club at the Melbourne Cricket Ground.
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He and his sons, Liam and Mason, had “ringside’’ seats for the Magpies premiership victory and he shared the story of their experience with the Free Press on Sunday.
Frank was unofficially “back on the job’’ at the Celebrate Stanhope Food and Wine Festival on Sunday after an almost month-long break from his community duties that included a three-week trip to Italy and culminated in him attending the AFL Grand Final alongside his sons.
Frank, Liam and Mason were at ground level, right on the fence at the 50-metre mark, for the Collingwood and Brisbane match — having earlier had a financial windfall when Liam won $500 in the popular Triple M radio station feature that is Billy’s Quiz.
“A Brisbane supporter had answered the first nine questions and Liam was second in line. He got the chance to answer the 10th question and win the $500,” Frank said.
“The question was ‘who is the 2010 Collingwood premiership player who played for the Brisbane Lions.”
The answer was Dayne Beams, which Liam knew and duly answered — pocketing the first prize.
“Billy (Brownless, former Geelong goalkicking legend who is now a Triple M Radio personality and host of the quiz) said to Liam off camera to give him a bit of a yarn before coming on,” Frank said.
“He told him to make sure it wasn’t a boring story, so he told my story. He told Billy he had just flown in from Italy, which had some truth because I had.”
The Scopelliti boys had a little bit of attention outside the ground as they were mistaken for the Daicos brothers, which was used on the radio as a promotional tool by Brownless.
“They both look a bit like the Daicos (brothers), Mason was getting asked for autographs,” Frank said.
Frank and his wife Tina had toured Italy for the previous three-and-a-half weeks and their sons managed to secure tickets as the family has the AFL membership.
“I went to 2018 when we lost and only Mason was with me,“ Frank said.
“We left a bit sadder that year.”
Frank said the KISS concert was also a highlight of a special time for the trio and even his sons — Liam, 20, and Mason, 23, enjoyed the veteran rockers, who were the headline act for the pre-game show.
Go Pies: Being a Collingwood supporter I (Rohan Aldous) was keen to celebrate with the Stanhope policeman who only 24 hours earlier had been at the MCG for the grand final victory.
