[url=http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2003/06/30/1056825337778.html][b]Man tells of umbrella attack[/b][/url]

July 1 2003
By Jamie Berry

[img]http://www.theage.com.au/ffxImage/urlpicture_id_1056825374551_2003/07/01/umbrella,0.jpg[/img]

 
Picture: SHANNON MORRIS
Harry Milas: spoke was 1cm from his spine.


On a day when Harry Milas should have been lamenting FIFA's about-face to disallow Oceania a direct entry into the World Cup, he was undergoing emergency surgery to remove an umbrella spoke from his back after an altercation at his son's soccer match.

A soccer referee and a confessed fanatic of the game, he was at Chadstone's Caloola Reserve on Sunday morning to cheer his son Daniel, 10, and his Monash team as they played Knox City.

During the second half of the under-11 match, Mr Milas sustained serious stab wounds to his right hand and left shoulder blade. The alleged assailant was an opposition player's father.

"I have no idea, it happened so quickly," Mr Milas said at the Alfred Hospital. The spoke pierced three layers of clothing and ended up one centimetre from his spine.

"The chief trauma surgeon said I was one of the luckiest people he had ever met," said Mr Milas, who required emergency surgery to remove 10 centimetres of umbrella spoke.

He said the altercation began after the other parent was instructing his team to engage in "ungentlemanly sporting conduct" against Monash. "What he was instructing the children to do was abhorrent," Mr Milas said. "There's no place for it."

Mr Milas said Daniel, his youngest son, did not want to play soccer any more. Neither did his eldest son, Nicholas, 13.

Detective Senior Constable Martin McLean said police had received different accounts of the fight between Mr Milas and the alleged attacker as investigations were continuing.

He said police were calling for witnesses, especially anyone who caught the fight on video.

Moral of the story, "Don't talk shit to a guy with an umbrella". Case closed.

I'm preempting this: please nobody say "ban assault umbrellas, it's for the children."

WTF is wrong with people?  This is happening more and more frequently.

These people can't even control their emotions and they're raising the next generation.  I hate to think what other values they've taught their kids.

[V]