The footy Trang was holding in front of Saigon’s famous Tran Hung Dao statue had been signed by the 2007 Sydney Swans AFL Team. The footy was then flown to Hanoi where it was raffled at the Vietnam Swans Grand Final Party.

Meanwhile, back to Trang. In an event last week that she describes as ”nearly as exciting as an AFL Grand Final”, Trang gave birth to a beautiful baby girl.

Congratulations Trang on becoming a mother!

When the footy, supplied and signed by the Sydney Swans, landed in Vietnam, Ms Trang posed with the bundle of joy in front of HCMC’s statue of Tran Hung Dao.

Tran Hung Dao is revered as a National Hero in Vietnam after repelling 3 major Mongol invasions, led by the formidable Kublai Khan, back in the 13th Century.

After the photo shoot, Ms Trang returned the footy whereupon it was quickly put on a plane and whisked to Hanoi for the Grand Final Party. Unfortunately, the Grand Final was a fizzer as Poor Port didn’t seem capable of repelling even one of the Cats’ invasions of their porous defence.

Never mind. The Vietnam Swans cranked up the auction for the footy. Bidding was intense going dollar for dollar. Eventually, Dave from Vamed Engineering (a Gold Sponsor of the day) came out in front with a USD500 bid and collected the footy.

After the game, Dave was invited to wear a Swans footy jumper for the traditional photo under the TV as the Premiership Cup is presented to the winning team.  See Dave in the photo above proudly holding the Sydney Swans footy aloft.

For the record: Dave the Welshman is a rugby fan. He’s very much ”still learning to love footy”.

Thank you very much to the Sydney Swans for supporting footy in Asia. 

The Swans gave the ABC a choice: here’s the phone number of a sensible spokesperson from the Swans - and here’s the phone number of someone who will polarise your audience; a Port Power supporter by the name of Wayne “Bubbles” Tinlin.

It was a no brainer for the radio station and so they brought Wayne’s World to the listeners of Adelaide (Mad-elaide for those in the know).  

Without drawing breath, Bubbles described how Port would butcher the Cats as he nonchalently butchered the Queen’s language. He went on to talk about the previous night’s Grand Final Cyclo Parade in Hanoi and the Swans having played their first ever South East Asian Champs earlier in the year (Ed’s note, that would be “Asian Champs”).

With his celebrity status nicely enhanced, Wayne skipped off home to enter the world of sleep. The following day, our celebrity friend thought we were as interested as the ABC and gobbed off again about his Port Powderpuffs – until about the 30 second mark of the first quarter. Thankfully.

Nevertheless, at the business end of the game, the Team photo under the TV screen, Wayne was there. Full credit to him. In one of the more gutsy efforts of anyone associated with Port on that day, Wayne was still wearing his Port jumper and was still able to smile (or grimace)  for the photo above.

Those Red & White Angels, the Swanettes (also known as the Jim Beam Party Crew), made a welcome return to JASPAS in Hanoi last week for the Grand Final. Jim Beam, a Gold Sponsor for the day gave us 37 x 750ml bottles to distribute to the crowd.

And so, the Swanettes wandered through the crowd randomly asking people to name our Sponsors – whose names were written on the banners hung around the room. How easy was that??

Also, coming from JB’s sponsorship of the Swans for the Asian Champs, we gave away 2 x 4.5 mega litre bottles of JB as prizes for various competitions.

Jim Beam and the Swanettes were a definite hit and a real crowd teaser, ah, pleaser.

Meanwhile, training resumed in Saigon yesterday in preparation for the triple header on 17 November between Vietnam, Thailand and Laos. And, surprising a few, a box full of 375ml Jim Beams appeared and were duly distributed to those who had toured to Bangkok for the Champs. The half bottles were part of Jim Beam’s original sponsorship.

Gotta be very happy with that.

Above are some photos of the Saigon Saints’ Grand Final Brunch last weekend at the Legend Hotel. It was sold out before tickets even went on sale which was a month before the Grand Final! 279 people attended the function.

The Cafe Latin was packed on both the ground floor and 1st floor with well over a 100 fans. Also reporting brisk trade on the big day were Sheridans and the No. 5 Bar.

In Hanoi, more than 160 people attended the Vietnam Swans Grand Final Party at JASPAS.

Not to be out shone, sleepy ol’ Hoi An also got in on the act. They had 100 people attend a cafe, that is yet to be identified, according to an email received by the blog.

Footy’s a hit in this country. And that’s why they’re all honkin’ their horns. Because they love it.

Ex Swan, Chris Canty (of thehappiesthour.com fame) who has returned to Melbourne but still plugs the footy over here for us, broke the good news today.

Meanwhile, Micky J, our photogenic star in the photo said he had received separate news of his fame which had originally started with an email chain that went from the owners of the Melbourne Victory Soccer Club, to Vic Wide, to Boeing (in Seattle), to the Victorian CIB (must be Dodgy Mick!), to Box Hill Tafe (who do the teaching of KOTO staff in Hanoi) before landing in Mick’s email box.

The stream of good news continued for Mick when Chris mentioned that “the article is also up on the urinal wall of Fitzroy’s Napier Hotel (Melbourne) – and it don’t get much better than that!”

Click on the article to enlarge it. Also, click on In the Press to read more articles about the Vietnam Swans that have appeared in the Press.

The Grand Final Cyclo Parade was sponsored by Red Apron Wines, Tiger Beer and Le Pub.

Rumour or fact? Our sources on the ground in Melbourne will let us know for sure. 

Not withstanding the fact that it was a thrashing, it was awwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwesome. More news later.

Last Thursday night was the 2nd Annual Vietnam Swans Grand Final Cyclo Parade. More news on this soon.