With rugby league grand final fever gripping the eastern states over the past week, thoughts turn to the birth of the game in Gunnedah and the north west.

With league internationals like John (Bunk) O’Neill, John (Dallas) Donnelly and Ron Turner placing Gunnedah on the map, the game has continued to thrive but in its heyday the Gunnedah Bulldogs Rugby League Club rode high on the crest of a wave.

The breakaway code of rugby league came to the North West after World War 1, quickly becoming the main spectator sport in the region.

By around 1920, rugby league was being played in Gunnedah, Narrabri, Quirindi and Tamworth. The first league teams in Gunnedah played in a local competition, which comprised the Reds, Blues, Blacks and the Cockatoos, as well as teams from Carroll and Curlewis. A little later came the Blackjack and the Rainbow Rockets as well as the Bellringers (1931), who lost only one of 26 games in their first season. At various times, there were teams such as Boggabri Flour Mill, Court House Gorillas, YCW and Police Boys as local competition continued after World War 2.

Those early players did it tough – one of the Cockatoos, George Kirkpatrick, recalled that, for jerseys in their first season (1920), he and his team-mates cut arm holes in sugar bags with a hole for their heads cut in the sewn end, then a yellow strip of cloth sewn from the left shoulder to the right waist.

The infant code received an enormous boost in the north with the donation of a challenge trophy, the Spicer Cup, by Moree bookmaker and tailor Bill Spicer in 1922.

The cup quickly became the most prized trophy in the north and league has never known such peaks of popularity as it had in the 1920s and 1930s. Special trains packed with supporters ran between towns for Spicer Cup games, and a conquering team was feted like royalty, players chaired down the main street on their return, with the town band playing and the trophy borne aloft in triumph. To be a Spicer Cup footballer in towns such as Moree, Narrabri, Boggabri, Gunnedah was to be someone special.

Narrabri was the first out of the hat in the challenge draw in the first year of 1922 and the cup changed hands immediately, Narrabri beating Moree 3-0 on June 3, 1922.

Narrabri’s tenure of the trophy, however, lasted just one week – in the next challenge Gunnedah lifted the cup 12-8 and held the trophy against all challengers through 1922 and until the last match of 1923 when Moree reclaimed the trophy.

One of the close matches in 1922 was against Boggabri, which Gunnedah won 5-4. There were six members of the Eather family in the Boggabri side, described by the correspondent for the Gunnedah Independent as “players who can always be identified by their physique, carrying plenty of avoirdupois not superfluous”.

Narrabri was the dominant team of the 1920s, holding the trophy from the last match of the 1925 season until the last game in 1929, when Moree took the Spicer Cup home again.

Narrabri was the dominant team of the 1920s, holding the trophy from the last match of the 1925 season until the last game in 1929, when Moree took the Spicer Cup “home” again.

One of the headline players of the 1920s was Narrabri halfback Billy Butler, who was said to have been unlucky to miss the Kangaroos’ touring team to England in 1926, after outplaying the chosen half, Chimpy Busch, in a City-Country game.

Butler came to Gunnedah in 1930 and in next to no time, Gunnedah had the Spicer Cup, though Narrabri remained the dominant team through the 1930s and immediately after World War 2. The spearhead of the Narrabri was Bill Butler’s younger brother, Joe.

Although Gunnedah had only periodic success in Spicer Cup football, at least the game flourished locally with new teams joining the local competition.

The Spicer Cup continued to draw large crowds in the 1940s but its influence began to wane as competition football took over, in much the same way, and at the same time, as another famous challenge trophy, the Maher Cup, started to decline in the south.

Gunnedah joined the Tamworth-based competition, forerunner of Group 4, after the war and achieved its first premiership success in 1956. Among the players that year were Kevin Mortimer, Alan Davidson, Ron Rice, Peter Dennis, John Gurd, Col Pritchard, Alan Moodie, Bruce Grace, Bill (Rocky) Donnelly, Geoff (Tut) Hayne, Greg Nelson, Neville Laird, Sid Williams, Phil Maybury, Stan Letchford, Bernie Mahoney, Ron Tolmie and Peter War- moll.

In the grand final, Gunnedah defeated Armidale 23-5, despite the loss through injury, of Rocky Donnelly before half- time. Highlight was the performance of flying winger John Gurd, who scored three tries. Alan Davidson was inspirational in the wet conditions, Pritchard and Tolmie were tireless in the forwards and hooker Peter Dennis won the scrums 22-15.

In 1965 Gunnedah won first and reserve grade premierships. The reserves withstood a second-half fightback by Narrabri to win 20-19 but the firsts had a much easier time, trouncing Quirindi 29- 4. The Gunnedah team, brilliantly led by Paul Pyers, one of the most gifted footballers ever to come to town, scored six tries in the second half to take control. Centres Merv Turner and Bob Heiler, winger Terry Kennedy, half Bob Thomas and hard-working forwards John Baldwin and John Turner led the way, with Pyers the “general” in another masterful display.

The 1973 side could lay claim to being Gunnedah’s best-ever side, scoring a slashing 25-5 win over West Tamworth in the grand final at Kitchener Oval. The match climaxed a memorable season for coach Roger Buttenshaw and captain Paul Hassab, as Gunnedah was also awarded the Clayton Cup for the premier side in NSW Country football. The team scored seven tries, two to Hassab and one each to Merv Turner, Ray (Spike) Smith, Robert Miller, Gary Scovell and Robert Jones.

The grand final drew a huge crowd, estimated at 5000.

Gunnedah’s most successful period in competition football was from 1983 to 1985 when the Bulldogs (as they came to be known) won three successive Group 4 premierships. Coach in 1983 was Terry Donnelly, a member of Gunnedah’s best- known footballing family. In a fine playing career, Donnelly represented five different divisions in NSW Country and played for Queensland as a lock forward.

The 1983 grand final was a thriller, Gunnedah getting home at Kitchener Oval in extra time against Tamworth City. A try by winger Robert Brady in extra time gave the Bulldogs a 26-22 lead but they had to defend their line tenaciously. The day’s stars were lightweight for- wards Mick Bennett and David Welsh, wingers Brady and Les Baker, centres

John Lennan and Damon Meaney, Terry Donnelly and Kevin Dickie and rugged prop Ross Whitaker. All the other team members – fullback Greg Donnelly, halves Steve Howard and Warren Hinton and hooker Chris Reading – played fine supporting roles.

John Lennan, a third-generation Gunnedah footballer, took over as captain/coach in 1984, when Gunnedah downed North Tamworth 35-20 at Kitchener. The

Bulldogs ran in 10 tries in a spectacular display. Man of the match was prop Laurence Hoey, and other stand-out players were Terry Donnelly in the second row, five-eight Steve Howard and centres Mick McCann and Lennan.

In 1985 the Bulldogs pulled off an historic treble, downing a gallant Narrabri 19-12. An electrifying burst of 12 points in the first 10 minutes set up the win. Steve Howard was the star, supported by Donnelly and Lennan, centre Mick McCann and young second-row forward David Gallagher, who later signed with Western Suburbs in Sydney, and hard-working forwards Peter Cook and John Best.

The Bulldogs had to wait 13 seasons for their next top-grade premiership. The 1998 season was badly disrupted by a series of major floods. After having been beaten four times through the season by Wee Waa, the Bulldogs turned the tables in the grand final, winning 33-14. Captain/coach Peter Ryman led the way, supported by Group 4 Player of the Year, Tom Finlay, veteran half Steve Howard, centres Richard Turner and Roger Torrens and lock Brian Ferguson.

Three Donnelly brothers, Reg, Bill (Rocky) and Ray played in Gunnedah teams in the late 1940s and 1950s. Reg, a tough front-row forward, also had a season with Newtown in the Sydney competition.

The highest honour in league came to Rocky’s son, John, a schoolboy prodigy who represented NSW at 18 and went on to play Test and World Cup football.

Reg’s sons – Terry, Brian, Garry, Phillip and Greg – were also good footballers, Terry achieving interstate standard, captaining Queensland, and Greg winning selection as NSW Country fullback.

The first international from the district was Boggabri’s Trevor Eather, who played in the centres with Australian captain Joe Jorgenson in the Third Test against Great Britain at the Sydney Cricket Ground in 1946. Great Britain won 20-7.

Gunnedah was well and truly in the league spotlight in the 1970s, with John O’Neill, Ron Turner and John Donnelly all winning selection in Australian teams.

Don Pascoe, a big, mobile winger, forced his way into the NSW team in 1968 and 1969, on debut scoring three tries in NSW’s 32-8 win over Queensland on the Sydney Cricket Ground in May 1968. He scored six tries in six games for NSW and played in a World Cup trial in 1970.

Flying winger Bruce Mercer was a member of the Australian schoolboys’ team which toured England in 1972-73.

A rugged prop forward, Lindsay Johnston played two State of Origin games for NSW. Between 1983 and 1989 he played for North Sydney, Eastern Suburbs and South Sydney.

Alan Davidson, John Gurd, Col Pritchard, Bob Thomas, Paul Hassab, Hilary Daley, Terry and Greg Donnelly, David McCann, James Wynne, Roger Torrens and Peter Ryman have all represented Country and Phillip Hawkins Combined Country juniors.

In 1984 John Lennan, Ross Whitaker, Robert Brady, Greg Donnelly and Mick McCann were in the Northern Division side which played Great Britain in Tamworth.

On the same day, at Kitchener, Gunnedah defeated the Moree Boomerangs 48-46, after trailing 40-0 at halftime, one of the most amazing recoveries in the history of competition football.

The entry of women’s teams into the Group 4 competition has changed the face of rugby league, with the matches quickly drawing a large following – but that’s another story.

The Gunnedah rugby league team which first won the Spicer Cup in July 1922. Back row, from left, Harry Mullane, Romany (Baker) Baker, Charlie Herman, Cecil Pritchard, Hubie Hinton, Andy Neader, Cec (Blue) Hyland, Sid Smith (President). Seated, from left, Vic Gilmore (secretary), Mick Stevens, Snowy Pitt, Keith Mitchell (captain), Doug Childs, Fred Martin, Wick McDonald, George Dowell. Front, Jack Pryor, Hec Reading, Billy Parnell.

The 1973 Gunnedah team which won the Group 4 competition, defeating old rival West Tamworth in the grand final. Back row, from left, Neville Launt (strapper), Derek Lucas, Roger Gawthorne, Gary Scovell, Don Pascoe, John Donnelly, John Rennick, John Lennan (manager). Second row, from left, Neville Bayliss (secretary), Ray (Spike) Smith, Merv Turner, Roger Buttenshaw (coach), Paul Hassab (captain), Barry Tydd (President), Ivan Wheeler, Hilary Daley. Front row, from left, Peter Wilkins, Robert Jones, Vern Bartlett, A. Rennick (ballboy), Robert Miller, Richard Gallen, Ken McKenzie. Gunnedah also won the Clayton Cup, as the champion team in NSW Country.

The Donnelly brothers of the 1940s and 1950s. From left, Ray, Bill (Rocky) and Reg.

 

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