Alessandro (Alex) Bellino was supposed to be called Adrian. His mother had settled on it.

But in 1971, a year after Alex Jesaulenko launched himself onto Graeme Jenkin’s shoulder to complete the game’s most iconic mark, Alex’s older brother Sebastian had other ideas.

A devoted Carlton supporter, Sebastian, then 13, set about convincing their Mum that the newest Bellino should carry the christian name of football’s biggest star.

That was because there was one tactical problem. She wouldn’t have gone near the moniker had she known why.

“Sebastian didn’t tell her it was for a footballer, because if he had, she wouldn’t have done it,” Alex laughs. “So he just kept persisting, persisting, and in the end he worked her around. She said, ‘All right, let’s call him Alex’, and I’m Alex because of ‘Jezza’. The rest is history.”

Last week, the day after his 55th birthday, Alex treated himself to a belated present: a tour of Carlton’s old home at Princes Park home.

For him it was a privilege. As he said afterwards: “I’ve learned so many things, and been able to access areas I’ve never been able to access before. Best day today”.

Not surprisingly, THE moment came with a visit to the dressing room and the No.25 locker, which forever carries the name of the man after whom he was named – and there he was photographed for posterity.

Carlton was never really a choice in the Bellino family. Alex’s late father Vincenzo had arrived from Francofonte in Siracusa in Sicily’s south-east; his mother Rosaria (known to everyone as Sarina) from Scordia in nearby Catania. They had married by proxy, and as the Bellino family grew, the fruits of Vincenzo’s labors were sent home to cover passage to Australia for his mother and his siblings.

But it was Alex’s Uncle Joe, a younger brother to Vincenzo and quicker to master the King’s english, who fell for the footy and for Carlton in particular.

“My Uncle Joe said to all of our cousins, ‘You’re a Bellino. You barrack for Carlton. You’ve got no other choice,’” Alex said. “One of our cousins once tried to support another team, and he gave her so much grief that in the end she said, ‘Uncle Joe, it’s not worth it. I’ll come back to Carlton’. Thank God for Uncle Joe.”

When Alex turned seven his mother handwove his first Carlton jumper (complete with monogram cut from a vinyl tablecloth) and a matching beanie – and as Vincenzo never fronted for a Carlton game, Alex’s older brother dutifully took him to Princes Park.

How fondly Alex remembers those days.

“I couldn’t see over the crowd, so I’d wait for the men to finish drinking their beers, collect the cans and make a little stool so I could see easier,” he recalled.

Alex also remembers watching on with his brother when Stephen Kernahan raised the 1987 Premiership Cup, with the 1995 silverware doubling as his belated first anniversary wedding present.

Fate later brought Alex into contact with Jesaulenko’s late wife Anne-Maree at Freedom Furniture where the former once worked in the mid-1990s.

“Anne-Maree popped into the showroom to make a purchase and in completing the paperwork I immediately recognised her surname,” Alex remembered. “I asked Anne if she was related and when she said he was her husband I told her that ‘Jezza’ was my favourite player. I also told her that I had a footy card with him on it, and she said ‘If you bring it in next week I’ll pop back, take the card home and get him to sign it’.

“True to her word, Anne-Maree came back with the signed card - and I still have it to this day.”

Thesedays Alex and his wife Maria, whose love for all things Carlton is every bit as intense, regularly front up to IKON Park to watch Cripps and Co. go through their paces.

“I’m going to be here as much as I can,” he said. “To be here for open training, watch the games and immerse myself in them.” It is a fitting promise from a man who has worn ‘Jezza’s’ name all his life.

Fifty-five years on, Alex Bellino is still a Blue . . . and he’s still flying.