It’s ironic that Travis Cloke will line up in Saturday’s 2010 AFL Grand Final for the team that his father, David, helped destroy on that “One Day In September” 30 years ago . . .

David Cloke was one of the stars of Richmond’s then record-breaking win in the 1980 Grand Final, booting six goals, from 11 kicks and nine marks in a powerhouse display up forward against Collingwood.  And, Cloke could easily have finished the premiership-decider with nine goals, as he missed three fairly easy set shots.

He was simply too big and strong for anything the hapless Magpies could throw at him on that glorious Saturday afternoon of September 27, 1980.

Cloke senior was 25 years, 243 days old that day, playing his 140th game with the Tigers, in his seventh season of league football.

In comparison, Travis Cloke, in his sixth season of AFL football, will be 23 years, 204 days old when he does battle for the Magpies on Saturday, in his 123rd game.

David Cloke’s six-goal haul in the 1980 Grand Final took his season’s tally to 47, which followed his 57-goal return in 1979 and his 48-goal season in 1978.  In Cloke’s last season at Tigerland before joining Collingwood - 1982 - he kicked 40 goals.

The goals dried up for Cloke after that as his on-field role changed with the Magpies, playing predominantly as a ruckman.

He spent seven seasons with Collingwood, from 1983-89, before being persuaded to return to Punt Road by his old premiership teammate Kevin Bartlett, who was about to enter his third year as the Tigers’ coach.  Bartlett felt Cloke was the ideal type of on-field mentor for his young, inexperienced Tiger team and the veteran big man was happy to answer the SOS call.

So, 16 years after being a member of Richmond’s 1974 premiership side, in his debut season of league football, Cloke took to the field with the Tigers in 1990, at the ripe, old age of 35.

He was a consistent performer, playing as a ruckman for Richmond throughout the ’90 season, but decided to hang his boots up at the end of the year, before KB managed to convince him change his mind and go around again in 1991.

Although now 36, Cloke continued to provide the young, struggling Tigers with considerable value in the ruck.  And, in the last three rounds of the ’91 home-and-away season - the final three games of Cloke’s long, illustrious league career - he was outstanding.

In a feat that saw him receive a nomination for Richmond’s “Individual Performance of the Century”, during the Club’s 2008 league football centenary celebrations, Cloke polled the maximum nine Brownlow Medal votes in those final three games of his 333-game league career.

Cloke’s farewell appearance took place at the MCG on Saturday, August 30, 1991, against the Tigers’ arch-rival Carlton. He started the game in the ruck, but late in the first quarter, with the team floundering, was shifted to the forward pocket.

It proved to be an inspired move, with Cloke turning the clock back a decade, to the 1980 Grand Final, where his dominant six-goal display up forward had made mincemeat of the Magpies.  In his last game, ‘Clokey’ finished with a career-best eight goals (from nine shots, and 11 kicks overall) as the Tigers scored a stirring, come-from-behind victory.

What made that effort all the more remarkable was the fact that, in his second stint at Richmond, up until his swan-song against the Blues, Cloke had managed just three goals in 42 games with the Tigers!