by John Devaney
Geelong's Fred Wooller clears effectively against St Kilda. Wooller would go on to skipper the Cats to premiership glory in 1963. The St Kilda player endeavouring to spoil is 1958 Brownlow Medallist Neil Roberts.
Related Link: WANFL Match Programme And Results Season 1962 (PDF)
CONTENTS
Bunton's
Swans Remain Benchmark In West
Victorians
Re-establish Interstate Dominance
Plummeting
Hawks And High-Flying Bombers
Sandringham's
Amazing Grand Final Comeback
[All of the images which follow are CLICKABLE.]
Bunton's Swans Remain Benchmark In West
In
terms of attendances and public interest, the WANFL enjoyed a boom year in 1962.
There were a number of reasons for this, not least of which was the
stimulus to the game brought about by Western Australia’s stunning success at
the 1961 Brisbane carnival. Other
factors included the instilling of new life into the competition by Haydn Bunton
junior’s ‘rags to riches’ Swan Districts combination, and the fact that
the 1962 season saw “an incredibly fierce”[1]
race for the finals, which was not ultimately resolved until deep into time-on
on the last Saturday of the minor round.
That
minor round saw numerous attendance records broken, including the all time
record aggregates for both a split round (47,512 in round 3) and an ordinary
round (38,348 in round 16). Overall,
crowd figures broke the 800,000 barrier for the first time, while the 27,524
fans who turned up for the 1st semi final between West Perth and
South Fremantle
also constituted a record.
|
|
Reigning
premiers Swan Districts did not have things all their own way in 1962 in what
was an extraordinarily evenly contested season, with a mere 6 wins separating
first from seventh, and even bottom side Claremont (4 wins and 17 losses)
managing a stirring come from behind victory against eventual runners up East
Fremantle. Ultimately, however, 14
wins from their 21 minor round matches was good enough to see Swans top the
ladder for the first time in their history; East Fremantle was half a win behind
in 2nd place, while South Fremantle and West Perth, both with 12 wins, made up
the remainder of the ‘four’. After
seeming to have a mortgage on the double chance earlier in the season the
southerners had suffered a mystifying loss of form which left them facing a
‘do or die’ round 21 tussle with East Perth at Fremantle Oval after which
the winners would qualify for a knock-out semi final against West Perth, while
for the losers it would be ‘mothballs’ for season 1962.
In front of 13,188 spectators, its biggest home crowd of the season,
South Fremantle struggled for most of the match, and midway through the final
term looked down and out; however, during the last ten minutes of the match
players who hitherto had been out of sorts suddenly found hidden reservoirs of
strength while their Royals counterparts began to wilt.
The upshot of it all was that the Bulldogs kicked the last three goals of
the game to sneak a 7 point win, 18.16 (124) to 17.15 (117).[2]
Their glee was short-lived, however, as, after a closely fought first
three quarters in the following week’s 1st semi final, West Perth, inspired by
its formidable captain Brian Foley (pictured left, marking), added 3.7 to 0.3 in the final stanza to win
‘pulling away’.[3] |
The
2nd semi final saw Swan Districts firm as premiership favourites with a 17.9
(111) to 11.10 (76) defeat of East Fremantle,[4]
but Old Easts’ stunning 22.14 (146) to 9.16 (70) preliminary final
obliteration of the Cardinals caused many pundits to regard the grand final
re-match as ‘line ball’.[5]
Swan
Districts, however, with Keith Slater controlling the rucks, and winners on
every line such as full back Joe Lawson (shown below, right), centre half back Bagley, wingman Gray, half
forward Watt and forward pocket-cum-rover Walker, exploded out of the blocks
with 7 opening term goals to 1, and by ‘lemon time’ the grand final was
effectively over. Old Easts at least
managed 5 late goals to reduce the margin at the end to 18 points, and they did
provide the Simpson Medallist in Ray
Sorrell, but no one at the ground was left
in any doubt that Swans were by some considerable measure the superior team.[6]
| Swan
Districts also provided arguably the two finest players of the season in
captain-coach Haydn Bunton junior, who won both the Sandover Medal and two of
the three main media awards, and shrewd and highly effective ruckman Keith
Slater, who was successful in the other media prize.
Bunton’s Sandover victory made him the first son of a former winner to
claim the honour, his father Haydn Bunton senior having been a three time
Medallist with Subiaco. The younger
Bunton may have lacked his father’s elegance and poise, but no one could
possibly question his determination, strength of will and toughness; as a child
he had suffered for many years from a serious, crippling illness, while only
three years earlier he had had to have his right knee cap removed following a
car accident in Tasmania. As a
player, his ability to win possession of the ball under duress was unequalled;
in one match against South Fremantle during the 1962 season statisticians
credited him with no fewer than 88 kicks, 55 of them in the first half.
His handball statistics were not recorded, but given that Bunton was
renowned at the time as one of the most prolific practitioners of that
particular art, it is hard not to imagine his having exceeded 100 total
possessions for the match, an incredible, and quite possibly unsurpassed,
achievement.[7]
|
|
Keith
Slater probably deserves almost equal credit with Bunton for Swan Districts’
meteoric rise from cellar dwellers to perennial finalists.
A supremely talented all round sportsman, he made no fewer than 21
interstate appearances for Western Australia, and was also a fine cricketer,
representing his home state in the Sheffield Shield, and making one Test
appearance for Australia.[8]
Another
son of a famous father, Austin Robertson junior of Subiaco, hit the headlines in
1962 by registering 89 goals during the home and away rounds to top the WANFL
goal kicking list. Aged just 19, the
former Scotch College pupil served notice of an outstanding career in prospect
in what was his ‘big league’ debut season.
Quick, agile and an unwaveringly accurate kick for goal, Robertson shared
not only his father’s astuteness and skill, but also his memorably distinctive
nickname of ‘Ocker’; much more would be heard of this formidable talent in
years to come.[9]
Victorians Re-establish Interstate Dominance
|
|
If
1962 was a memorable season domestically, however, in another, equally important
sense it was an extremely disappointing year for Western Australian football.
The state side travelled to Melbourne in June hopeful of not only
repeating its heroic success against the ‘Big V’ of the previous year, but
of winning at the MCG for the first time ever.
An all time record interstate match crowd of 64,724 turned up anxious to
see a restoration of Victorian supremacy, and in the end they went home highly
satisfied; at quarter time, however, they could perhaps have been excused for
thinking that the players were following the same script as for the previous
season’s Brisbane carnival encounter. With
Brian Foley, Les Mumme, Haydn Bunton and John Todd to the fore, the Western
Australians matched the home side in every facet of the game, and ended the
opening term 5 points to the good. Thereafter,
however, it was a quintessential case of 'men against boys' as the navy and
white machine lurched ominously into top gear, adding 22.7 to 4.8 over the
remainder of the match to win with an ease that was as consummate as it was
unexpected. Geelong’s Doug Wade
(pictured left)
booted 10.2 for the victors, who after the first quarter had winning rovers in
Johnny Birt and Bob Skilton, the best ruckman on the ground in John Nicholls,
and other fine players in Ted Whitten, Graeme Ion, Ron Barassi and Brian Dixon.[10] |
On
the same afternoon in front of 15,310 spectators at North Hobart Oval
Victoria’s ‘B’ team overcame a stern 3rd quarter challenge from Tasmania,
which got within 5 points at one stage, to pull away in the end to an emphatic
42 point victory, 11.19 (85) to 5.13 (43). Earlier
in the season the Tasmanians had played host to the VFA at Devonport where, in
front of a crowd of 10,255, they had fought back strongly from a 26 point three
quarter time deficit to go under in the end by just one straight kick.
Final scores were VFA 12.15 (87) to Tasmania 12.9 (81).
It was the first time the two sides had played one another in Devonport.[11]
| On
the Saturday after its game against Victoria on the MCG, Western Australia met
South Australia on the Adelaide Oval with its squad seriously weakened by an
influenza virus. Indeed, “at least
eight of the players would have been declared unfit had they been named at home
to play in a club match”.[12]
In the circumstances therefore it was no disgrace to lose by only 32
points after staying right in touch with the croweaters until half time.
The Western Australian half back line, notably Ken Bagley and Denis
Marshall, was in superbly resilient form throughout, while Keith Slater was the
game’s dominant ruckman. Across
centre, however, the home side, with centreman Don Hewett most observers’
choice as best afield, remained comprehensively on top all match, while
ruck-rover Neil Kerley and rover Jeff Potter combined well to negate a certain
amount of Slater’s good work in the ruck.[13]
The South Australian press was not pleased, however, with one reporter
suggesting that the team would have to “improve ten goals” to beat the Vics
in three weeks time.[14] Far
from improving, however, South Australia put in its worst interstate performance
since 1959 when it allowed the formidably pumped up Victorians to seize control
right from the start, and indeed the longer the match went on the less of a
realistic challenge the croweaters offered.
The VFL went on to more than double South Australia’s score, winning
13.17 (95) to 6.11 (47), with Richmond’s Ron Branton
(shown right) vying for best afield
honours with team mate Verdun Howell of St Kilda.
‘Big V’ full forward Doug Wade again played well, adding 5.4 to the
10 goals kicked against Western Australia, while for South Australia centreman
Don Hewett was once again, by some measure, the pick of a somewhat mediocre
bunch.[15] |
|
Football’s
unpredictability was starkly demonstrated a fortnight later when the South
Australians ventured to Subiaco Oval, a venue which, so often in the past, had
proved a graveyard for their ambitions, and turned in “a superb display of
football ability and courage”.[16]
South Australia was forced to omit Neil Kerley and Geof Motley from its
starting line up after the pair failed fitness tests on the morning of the
match, and worse was to follow after injuries to Potter, Hayes, Kernahan (shown
below, left) and
Bills left the team with only 16 fit men for the vital final term which started
with Western Australia 9.14 to 8.8 ahead. In
a performance that was as full of resolve and courage as the display against the
VFL had been inept and wayward, South Australia added 3.4 to no score in a
tempestuous last quarter to win both the match and the acclaim of the usually
partisan Perth crowd, which reserved a special ovation for ruckman Harry
Kernahan, the victim of a broken collar bone, who nevertheless elected to fight
through the pain barrier and stay on the field, where he ended up making a more
than modest contribution to his team's final term effort.[17]
|
|
The
1962 SANFL season was largely the story of three coaches.
In the first place, Jack Oatey, whose revolutionary ideas on the game had
positively transformed the fortunes of Norwood (1945 to 1956) and
West Adelaide
(1957 to 1960) had, after a one year break from the game, been persuaded to take
over the coaching reins at Sturt, a club which had had made only sporadic finals
appearances since World War Two. Oatey
was initially reluctant to resume coaching, but had finally been talked around
by Blues chairman Ray Kutcher.[18]
Ultimately, ‘the Oatey era’ would develop into far and away the most
successful in Sturt’s history, but in 1962 “you couldn’t help feeling that
Oatey and his players weren’t operating on the same wavelength”.[19]
The Blues managed just 4 wins from 19 matches and finished just one place
off the bottom. The
second coach to make headlines in 1962 was Fos Williams who returned to the
coaching helm at Port Adelaide having spent the 1960 season at
South Adelaide,
and after having enjoyed a sabbatical in 1961.
The Williams method was immediately applied to great effect to restore
the Magpies to pole position in South Australian football.
That method had previously garnered six successive premierships,[20]
with its chief ingredients being well known: |
Tremendous
team work, understanding and confidence. Sometimes
ability seems to be an afterthought. It
is hard to imagine Port paying thousands of pounds to import interstate players
and coaches.[21]
This last remark was a
reference clubs like Norwood, which had endeavoured, without success, to
‘buy’ a premiership by appointing, at considerable expense, renowned
firebrand orator Alan Killigrew as coach, and West
Torrens, whose failed
attempts to do the same had involved the appointment as coach of legendary
former Essendon player and coach Dick Reynolds, along with experienced Bomber
half back or centreman Bob Shearman (pictured below, right), who had earned All Australian honours in
his first season with the Eagles in 1961, and who would go on to captain the
club in 1963 and 1964.
| Perhaps
the most dramatic story involving a coach in 1962 centred around Neil Kerley,
who following his success in steering West Adelaide to a premiership in 1961
went within 3 points of doing the same this year.
West’s performance was all the more meritorious in that it had been
blown off Adelaide Oval to the tune of 61 points by grand final opponents Port
Adelaide in the 2nd semi final a fortnight earlier.
A solid 29 point preliminary final win over Norwood bolstered confidence,
but even so there were few who expected Kerley’s mob to get anywhere near the
all powerful Magpies when it counted. As
it was, West faced significant obstacles even before the opening bounce, with
1962 Magarey Medallist Ken Eustice and 1961 All Australian Don Roach both
failing fitness tests on the morning of the match.
Then, in a match where the lead changed hands repeatedly and there were
seldom more than a couple of kicks separating the teams, Westies’ three main
goal kickers unaccountably decided to put in their worst collective display of
the season, managing just 1.11 between them.[22]
Of course, some of the credit for this must go to the redoubtable Port
backline, but one is hard pressed to find anything but praise for West
Adelaide’s effort in going so close to a second successive premiership against
virtually all the odds. |
|
Praise, however, was
the last thing on the minds of West’s club committee, who in a decision that
seems even more extraordinary with the benefit of hindsight, elected not to
reappoint Neil Kerley as coach for the 1963 season.
Kerley’s contribution to the club in 1962 had been unsurpassed, for in
addition to his coaching achievements he had won West’s best and fairest
player award, the Trabilsie Trophy, for the fourth time in five years – and
this in a season when, as mentioned above, team mate Ken Eustice had been voted
the best and fairest player in South Australia.
Allegedly, no reasons were ever given to Kerley for what, to all intents
and purposes, constituted a dismissal, but given that relationships between key
figures at football clubs often tend to be fairly combustible one feels
constrained to speculate that the man who was popularly referred to as
'Knuckles' did not always enjoy the most harmonious of relationships with those
holding the purse strings - and hence the real power - at Richmond Oval.[23]
In Tasmania, North
Hobart’s dominance at both TFL and state level continued.
In the TFL grand final, watched by a record crowd of 19,311, the Robins
proved just that little bit steadier than a determined Clarence team, which was
contesting that club’s first ever premiership decider at this level, and edged
home by 15 points, 10.12 (72) to 7.15 (57).[24]
Shortly afterwards, North Hobart’s second successive state title was
gained on home turf at the expense of NWFU premier Burnie, which had overcome
NTFA premier City-South at Launceston in the preliminary final.
Plummeting Hawks And High-Flying Bombers
Among
the major talking points of the 1962 VFL season were reigning premier
Hawthorn’s failure to reach the finals – the Hawks won just 5 games and
finished a dismal ninth – and the enthralling and controversial preliminary
final marathon between Carlton and Geelong, which began with only the third tied
finals match in VFL history. Carlton’s
1961 Brownlow Medallist John
James (pictured below, left), who had been controversially dropped to 19th
man for this game,[25]
almost won it for the Blues at the death, but his long range snap shot ended up
missing everything and sailing out of bounds.
The final scoreboard read Geelong 13.7 (85) to Carlton 12.13 (85).[26]
|
|
The following
Saturday’s replay, in front of a record preliminary final crowd of 99,203, was
just as exciting, and ended in a welter of controversy.
With moments to go, and Carlton in the lead by 5 points, Geelong full
forward Doug Wade, who already had 6.1 to his name, marked about thirty metres
from goal directly in front, only for umpire Irving to take the ball off him and
hand it to his opponent, Peter Barry. Irvine
later said that Wade had been holding Barry by the shorts, but most media
observers were scathing of the decision. Seconds
later, before Barry could even take his free kick, the siren sounded to propel
Carlton into a grand final showdown with minor premier Essendon, which had lost
only twice all year.[27] The grand final
actually attracted fewer spectators than the preliminary final replay, with a
crowd of 98,385 turning up to see a lack lustre game that was as good as over by
quarter time, the Dons having by that stage accumulated 6.5 to the Blues’
paltry 1.1. Thereafter both sides
managed 7 goals, but Carlton never seriously threatened to overhaul the Bombers,
for whom centreman Jack Clarke, rover John Birt and “will-o-the-wisp”[28]
ruck rover Hugh Mitchell were superb. The
Blues had been well served by Sergio Silvagni and John James, but overall they
had been “run.......off their feet.”[29] |
Geelong
players won the main individual plaudits in 1962, with Doug Wade kicking 68
goals to top the goal kicking list for the first time, and classy, elusive
centreman Alistair Lord running away with the Brownlow Medal nine votes ahead of
his nearest rivals, Richmond’s Ron Branton, Essendon’s Ken Fraser, and Kevin
Murray of Fitzroy.
Sandringham's Amazing Grand Final Comeback
The
VFA’s two division system entered its second year and continued to prove
popular with fans. The division one
grand final at Junction Oval saw one of the greatest come from behind victories
in the competition’s history as Sandringham, 44 points in arrears
at the last change against Moorabbin, added 8.3 to a solitary goal in a rampaging final quarter to squeeze
home by a point.[30]
In 2nd division, Dandenong scored a comprehensive victory over
Prahran,
16.24 (120) to 8.12 (60).[31]
Both grand finals attracted crowds in the region of 11,000.[32]
|
Victoria
was also the venue for the eighth staging of the Australian Amateur Football
Council interstate championships which saw the home state extend its unbeaten
record in carnivals to 14 games. Tasmania,
which beat both South Australia and Western Australia, finished as runner up for
the first ever time. Future Test
cricketers Ian Redpath (Victoria) and Eric Freeman (South Australia - shown
right)
participated in the carnival.[33] One
week after the conclusion of the championships, an All Australian amateur side,
selected from players who had competed at the carnival, travelled to Manuka Oval
where it scored a hard fought, 14 point win over a Canberra combined team,[34]
in what was the only representative match played by any of the minor states and
territories in 1962. The
ACTAFL premiership went to Eastlake after one of the lowest scoring grand finals
on record. In conditions that
"would have been more suitable….for the America's Cup than a footsprawl
match……(Eastlake) manager Jack Chandler blotted his copybook by forgetting
to bring the snorkels".[35]
Notwithstanding Chandler's oversight, Eastlake overcame reigning premiers
Ainslie quite comfortably, 4.9 (33) to 2.6 (18). |
|
The
NSWANFL grand final saw Sydney Naval triumph over Newtown by 31 points to
procure a second flag in three years, while Mayne's 16.13 (109) to 9.13 (67)
grand final defeat of Coorparoo brought the Tigers' their second premiership in
succession. In the NTFL, St Marys
recovered from its 1960/61 hiatus with a perfunctory 10.12 (72) to 8.8 (56) grand
final victory over Buffaloes.
After the tumultuous excitement of a 1961 season which witnessed many upsets, breakthroughs and dramatic events, 1962 represented something of a return to the status quo. However, those who derived solace from such a development would all too soon be clutching their comfort blankets in despair, as 1963 would bring yet another series of giddying, disorientating challenges to football's established order.
Where now?
or
[7]
Ross
Elliott’s Western Australian Football Register 1962, page
38. Graeme Atkinson’s and
Michael Hanlon’s 3AW Book of Footy
Records, page 54, suggests that some statisticians claimed Bunton had
more than 100 kicks in this game. Back
[8]
The official WAFL website at www.wafl.com.au,
and The Footballers by Geoff Christian, page 74.
[9]
Ross Elliott’s Western
Australian Football Register 1962, page 8, and Diehards
1946-2000: The Story Of The Subiaco Football Club by Ken Spillman, pages
90-91. Back
[11]
A Century Of Tasmanian Football
1879-1979 by Ken Pinchin, page 107, and The
Pioneers by Marc Fiddian, page 34, although the latter source
incorrectly gives the venue of the Tasmania-VFA match as Hobart. Back
[13]
Ibid., pages 57-58, and South Australian National Football League 1963 Official Yearbook,
pages 15 and 16. Back
[20]
Technically, Geof Motley was in charge for the sixth of these
premierships in 1959, “but even he would admit that he just pulled the
levers that operated the machine patented by F.N. Williams”. SANFL
1963 Official Yearbook, page 51. Back
[26]
The Complete Book Of VFL Finals
From 1897 To The Present by Graeme Atkinson, page 203.
[27]
Ibid., page 203. The
Bombers’ losses were by 17 points against Hawthorn at Glenferrie in round
8, and by 37 points in round 17 against Footscray at the Western Oval.
(Source: Every Game Ever
Played: VFL/AFL Results 1897-1991 by Stephen Rodgers, pages 459 and
461.) Back
[33]
A History Of The South
Australian Amateur Football League 1911-1994 by Fred Bloch, pages
155-157, and For The Love Of The Game:
A Centenary History Of the Victorian Amateur Football Association 1892-1992 by
Joseph Johnson, page 123. Back
[34]
Bloch, op cit., page 157, and The
National Game in the National Capital by Barbara Marshall, page 115.
Back
