St Kilda Football Club historian Russell Holmesby reflects on a Saints match in Gippsland more than half a century ago.
It was only one game in his 134 game career but 87 year old Ken Mulhall has clear memories of St Kilda’s foray to Gippsland 63 years ago.
“The mud came up over your boots” recalled Ken this week. “It had been raining for three days and they spread coal-dust over the ground to try and absorb it, but that only ended up making it worse, we ended up looking like Chimney Sweepers!”
Saturday’s NAB Challenge game won’t be the first time that St Kilda has headed to the Gippsland coalfields region.
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Back in 1952 the VFL arranged a promotional round of matches at various locations around Australia. The matches were fully fledged official games and were played in capital cities such as Sydney, Brisbane and Hobart as well as regional country Yallourn, Euroa and Albury. St Kilda was scheduled to meet Footscray at the Yallourn Oval.
Everything was set for a big day and the ground was in excellent condition on the Friday before the VFL came to town.
But heavy rain started 24 hours before the game and left large the sheets of water all over the surface.
A curtain raiser between Footscray fifths and central Gippsland schoolboys churned up sections of the oval into mud patches. Heavy rain was driven by a strong south-easterly wind and made conditions dismal for the 3500 hardy souls who huddled around the fences protected by umbrellas. An Argus report said that there “was never any inspired barracking”.
St Kilda looked more adept at handling the wet ball and showed occasional spasms of system which was enough to overcome Footscray who never settled down as a team. St Kilda showed more fire, determination and better understanding than the haphazard Bulldogs.
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There were few lofted kicks because of the sodden, heavy ball. Ken Mulhall remembers: “It was a hard, slogging game, and there was no system at all.”
A newspaper clipping the following day.
Footscray had started well with Teddy Whitten getting a goal in the first five minutes, but it could not score another goal until the third quarter. Holding Footscray to just the one goal with the wind in the opening term was crucial.
St Kilda gained the ascendancy with a second quarter of four goals to nil. Footscray needed a drastic improvement to have any chance, but when the Bulldogs did eventually lift in the last quarter it was too late. They booted three goals in the final term but St Kilda always seemed to have the upper hand.
Few players could handle the wet ball, but exceptions were Alan Squire with splendid ruckwork and safe marking, Nick Bloom, and Des Nisbet of St Kilda and Alan Martin and Wally Donald who were strong defenders for Footscray.
St Kilda won by 7.7 (49) to Footscray 5.4 (34). Goalkickers for the Saints were Jack McDonald (2), Jim Ross, Ken Mulhall, Mark Langdon, Alan Squire and Irving Davidson.
The Yallourn ground is no more, as indeed is the town itself. The town was shut down in the late 1980s and the area was used to extend coalmining.
