The Sporting Globe Bar & Grill Geelong — Restaurant in Victoria

Walking up the steps of the Preston Hotel.

The Good Old Days. It was 11:00 pm. As I was strolling up the wide marble steps of the Preston Hotel into the disco, I can’t remember the name of the disco, “Desiree’s” maybe, but it was a popular nightspot of the era, the bass was so all-encompassing that I could feel it manifesting an adiabatic expansion and compression of the air within my ribcage. The Preston is now The Sporting Globe Hotel in Ryrie Street, Geelong. As I was walking up the stairs, a bouncer and a patron came swinging through the entrance doors at the top of the stairs. They were locked in an embrace with the stiction and the manic impetus that if either one were to let go, it would be the end of both. They reminded me of the dancing couple one would see in the little musical jewellery boxes of the past that had dancing couples gyrating with the same manic abandon and intensity when one opened the lid of the box. Their legs swinging akimbo, but their torsos and arms seemed fixed with some impervious glue that locked them together forever in an unending embrace.

Then the bouncer saw his prize. His prize was the concrete wall at the bottom of the stairs. The entrance to this fine establishment required that a person entering from Ryrie Street would have to walk in and up a few steps and then do a hard left and walk up the marble staircase. It was this wall at the bottom of the stairs that was the bouncer's prize. Luckily, I was closer to the north wall of the staircase, rather than smack dab in the middle of the staircase. Why lucky? Because the bouncer did his final pirouette with the entangled punter and threw him, holus-bolus, down the middle of the stairway into the concrete wall at the bottom of the staircase.

The punter bounced up off his three-point landing, a rather uncomfortable and dangerous three-point landing, head pointing down, his left shoulder smashing the wall hard, and his legs splayed atop his crumpling body like Winston Churchill’s “V for Victory” sign, colloquially known as “the forks”. Said punter then collected his wits and, with a split-second, somewhat furtive, glance up the marble staircase at the bouncer, decided that his match was met and did a runner out of the entrance door onto Ryrie Street and safety.

I foresaw the testosterone-fuelled intent of the bouncer split seconds before he launched the punter and realised I had nowhere to go. I had no escape route from becoming an innocent and inadvertent part of this melee. My instinctual response was to embrace the north wall like it was the most passionate lover that I had ever embraced. I embraced it starfish style, trying to mix the atoms of my existence with the atoms of the wall, at a quantum physics level. It worked. I felt the rush of air as the punter flew headfirst down the stairs. The rush of air had the smell of desperation mixed with stale carpet and Brut 33. I am still gob-smacked that a person could fly through the air for the equivalent of two flights of stairs, smack full-body into a concrete wall, shake their head, and run off with nary an issue. Unbelievable. I continued up the stairs, waiting for the next instalment of unwelcome punters. There were none forthcoming. I smiled at the bouncer. The bouncer smiled at me. Into disco-land, I plunged headlong myself. I still didn’t...

DO NOT HOLD AN EVENT HERE !!! If I could give 0 stars I would. Went to a function a bit over a week ago in the upstairs room for a 21st birthday and it was horrible. The heat in the room was unbearable and they hadn’t let the hosts know before hand that the air conditioning hadn’t been working for weeks. You would think such a popular & expensive venue would have some sort of back of fans or better communication from events coordinators. There were elderly people attending and people with health conditions attending who seemed to be really struggling, the water dispenser at the bar had no ice and the water was warm, and once empty it was not refilled. At that point I would consider it a health hazard. The bar staff were very grumpy (understandably so in the heat), and unhelpful. The hosts asked several times for equipment to cut the cake and ended up having to go downstairs to the restaurant staff to complain and get cutlery, the restaurant staff were also quite rude when concerns were brought up. By the time this was sorted, the expensive cakes had been sitting in the hot room for so long they melted and became inedible. The food was also average, and brought out earlier than had been asked for. The hosts wasted money on a DJ since almost all of the guests had to gather outside on the balcony due to the unbearable heat and humidity upstairs. It was far too warm to be inside let alone dancing. I really feel for the hosts who paid a lot of money for such an important milestone birthday event, only to be met with such disappointing and below average service. For the birthday girl to be so upset and even embarrassed by the event their family and friends had attended was very upsetting to witness. Do better...

Average food, average atmosphere, orders were mucked up twice during the day.

The worst part; I tried to use eftpos at the beer garden bar and was told “sorry mate the card machine doesn’t have reception out here, go get cash out from the atm inside”. I went to the indoor bar and tried to order the exact same thing and pay with eftpos, but was questioned as to where I was sitting, I told him I was sitting in the beer garden and he refused to serve me, stating: “is it really that much of an effort to just get cash from the atm and use the beer garden bar”. I asked “is it that much of an effort to accept eftpos”, and asked why I couldn’t use eftpos at the beer garden and he said “the machine are faulty, banks fault”.

I tied to question the difference in stories/excuses and he said he was the manager and refused to discuss it further. Threatening to not serve me if I questioned him again.

These guys are rude, but more importantly, incredibly dishonest. The manager was obnoxious and arrogant. They refuse to accept eftpos in the beer garden to take advantage or punters and make them pay fees at the ATM they have installed. It’s a busy bar and they just assume they can get away with it, for the most part, they probably do.

Steer clear. Management lying to customers In order to make a buck from third party atm operators.

But honestly, disregarding all that. Food = average. Service = average. Atmosphere = average.

Don’t waste your money eating/drinking here. Go to the wine bar over the road, or the chicken place in little Malop. Maybe try black mans brewery for some...