Essendon-Carlton a rivalry steeped in history Greg Williams wouldn't comment on his rivalry with Essendon tagger Sean Denham this week, despite a rich history of confrontation between the pair in games between Carlton and Essendon. IT WAS Grand Final week, 1999, and the Carlton players had gathered in the centre of Princes Park during their last training session. Thousands had flocked to the ground, with many Blues supporters more satisfied with knocking off Essendon by a point in an amazing preliminary final than reaching the decider against North Melbourne. They weren't alone. A voice piped up within the players' huddle: "How many thousand do you think are here?" Greg Williams answered: "About four thousand more than are at Windy Hill tonight." Rewind to 1993 and two days after the Bombers had smashed Carlton in the Grand Final, TV crews captured a telling piece of footage of Sean Denham, who had again tagged Williams. Amid the revelry, Denham walked towards a pub wall plastered with footy memorabilia, found a photo of "Diesel" and turned it around to face the other way. Cue cheers of approval. Perhaps no two men better illustrate the hostility between Carlton and Essendon than Williams and Denham - figures at the centre of a rivalry that boiled over in the 1990s and is now simmering again before tonight's clash at the MCG. There have been September drama, Brownlow Medal upsets, off-field taunting, mystery faxes and physical stoushes that make up the ultimate hating game between the two clubs level on 16 flags. In the 1993 Grand Final, Denham won praise for muzzling Williams in the decisive first quarter - in which they exchanged several blows. Williams got the last one in, punching Denham well off the ball, breaking his nose and forever damaging his sense of smell. Four years later Williams became so enraged by Denham's tactics he pushed field umpire Andrew Coates and was hit with a nine-match suspension. In his book "Diesel," Williams would later describe Denham as "a specialist tagger who had been a so-so rover for Geelong in 44 games spread over five seasons." Neither Williams nor Denham would comment this week. Something about sleeping dogs, perhaps. IT has been almost 20 years since the 1993 Grand Final, but David Parkin still has nightmares. "I can still see Michael Long carrying the ball out of the middle and destroying us in that first quarter," the former Carlton coach said this week. Among the regrets from that warm spring day is the fax Parkin wished he'd received. "For three years we had dominated centre-bounce clearances ... from Justin Madden's around-the-clock work," Parkin said. For whatever reason no one had worked us out. We pissed ourselves laughing for a while that we were able to roll along with this dominance. But unbeknown to Parkin, in the fortnight before the Grand Final, Essendon assistant Neale Daniher had not only worked it out, he'd put together a five-page document exposing it. Daniher, working for a computer company at the time, faxed his homework to coach Kevin Sheedy and others in red and black, but had also accidentally sent a copy to one of his suppliers - a Carlton supporter. "Neale rang the bloke and said something like, 'That wasn't meant for you and if you pass it on, we won't buy anything more from you and we'll let the coppers know'," Parkin said. On Monday morning, two days after the Bombers had ripped the Blues apart at centre bounces in that damaging opening quarter, Parkin took a phone call from the distraught Carlton fan. He said, 'I need to see you immediately'. I saw him in the social club and he produced this bloody analysis," Parkin said. We both sat there and cried. I don't think Neale got any credit for it, but he produced the strategy to undo us. You talk about carrying a loss, I carried that one. CARLTON had just thrashed West Coast in the 1999 first semi-final when 100-gamer Glenn Manton, delisted by Essendon in 1994, stood up and spoke. "I hope we stick it up the f---ing Bombers next week," Manton yelled. Then-president John Elliott followed up with: "We all know (Essendon) went over the salary cap in 1993. They cheated to win the flag. Let's stick it up them next week. The scene was set and a week-long war of words ended with Carlton pulling off one of the greatest upsets in preliminary final history, winning by a point. "Winning that game, still to this day, is one of the highlights of my career," Manton said. It's a game people talk about where they were when they watched it and how they felt when they watched it and that's rare. It will stand the test of time. Typically, Parkin didn't mince his words. "We were the luckiest team in Australia to win that," he said. It was one of the best games I've been involved in. It prevented Essendon from matching our premiership record (16) and they were the best team in the competition, which they showed a year later by smashing everybody. FORMER Essendon teammates Darren Bewick and Peter Somerville this week recalled a rivalry that, during their time, was at its hottest. From the first moment you got to the club, whenever that week was coming up, it was always mentioned what had happened previously. There was always a bit more leading into the game than a usual game," Bewick said. Asked what his first emotion was when he heard the word 'Carlton', he said: "Dislike. Especially when I was playing there was a real dislike, but also a very healthy respect for what they were able to do. Somerville said the desire to beat Carlton started at the top. "Sheeds was passionate about beating Carlton," he said. When great footy clubs play against great footy clubs, there's going to be rivalry because everyone wants to be top dog. Tonight, on the 140th anniversary of when Carlton and Essendon first met - June 7, 1873 - the battle to be top dog will as fierce as ever.