Do you know these footy grounds?

Recently scoreboardpressure.com commissioned* photographer Michael Wearne to travel around Australia taking photos of scoreboards in the kind of places we haven’t been able to get to.

Anyway he did a pretty good job, as you can see from this effort here.

However we really need more information on footy in some of these of these far-flung places. So if you know something: the name of a famous ex-player or maybe you played there etc please let us know, either by a comment here or via email, so we can enhance our scoreboardpressure.com posts.

The scoreboards are at…

•Crathern Oval, Trinity Beach, Cairns, Qld
• Sandgate, Qld
• Talbot, Victoria
• Geevston, Tasmania
• Cygnet, Tasmania
• Penguin, Tasmania
• Morphettville, SA (didn’t Black Caviar play there once?)
• Harrup Park, Mackay, Qld
• Josie & Mick Rogers Oval, East Mackay, Qld
• Penneshaw, King Island, SA

All contributions welcome and will be acknowledged.

* By commissioned we mean he was going so we asked him to take some pics if it wasn’t too much trouble.

About Les Everett

A Footy Almanac veteran, Les Everett is the author of Gravel Rash: 100 Years of Goldfields Football and Fremantle Dockers: An Illustrated History. He is the footyalmanac.com WAFL correspondent and uses the money he makes from that role to pay for his expensive websites australianrules.com.au and talkingfrankie.com and fund the extravagant Vin Maskell at scoreboardpressure.com

Comments

  1. Mark Duffett says

    Didn’t play there, but Penneshaw is on Kangaroo Island, not King Island.

    The main club playing out of Geeveston actually went by the name of nearby locality Kermandie. Unfortunately the seniors went into recess a couple of years ago, the sad end to 127 years of history is partly told here http://www.theage.com.au/afl/afl-news/wacko-jacko-and-the-wizz-cant-save-kermandie-20100409-ryyp.html and at http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Southern_Football_League_%28Tasmania%29&oldid=436988944#Demise_of_Kermandie

  2. Penneshaw is on Kangaroo Island, SA not King Island, Tas. Unfortunately I can’t help you with information about the ground or the team.

  3. Sandgate footy club is hallowed turf for haiku bob.

    Firstly, it is the club Alex Jesaulenko spent his last years of playing footy, captain-coaching them in ’83-84 and leading them from the wooden spoon to the finals in his first year. I recall watching Sandgate play their losing elimination final at the Mayne footy club in his first year. I jumped the fence at three-quarter-time to listen to his address. They trailed by 5 goals and I was full of anticipation as I jockeyed for a position in the huddle within earshot. Jezza stomped around the huddle, chewing on his gnarly mouthguard and carrying his plastic cup of Cottees orange juice before uttering the immortal words…”you blokes got yourself into this…now get yourself out of it!” They lost by 10 goals.

    Secondly, it is the ground on which haiku bob ‘came of age’ as a junior footballer, playing a starring role on the wing in the drawn second-semi final and second-semi final replay in the 1981 under 14’s, catching the attention of local talent scouts who would select him to play for queensland in the under 15 championship the following year!

    hb.

  4. Harrup Park in Mackay has hosted a single One Day International. In the 1992 World Cup Sri Lanka played India in a match that lasted 2 balls before the rain came, from memory India batted and Kris Srikkanth faced both balls. It also hosted a Ryobi Cup match between Queensland and Tasmania last season. Whilst I have never seen or played at the ground (I’ve only played at 2 of the Mackay venues, Etwell Park at Bakers Creek and the Whitsunday Sports Ground at Airlie Beach which is home of the Sea Eagles, plus been a water runner at a game at Zeolla Park which is North Mackay’s home), Mackay City Hawks are the host club. The ground has been upgraded recently in terms of surface (particularly for cricket), and has lighting for Night Football.

    The Rogers Oval is home of the Eastern Swans club, can’t provide much else unfortunately.

  5. I know nothing about the Talbot Footy ground, but have spent quite a few weekends enjoying the ambience of this small gold fields town. It has a top pub, and its Farmers Markets, on the third Sunday of each month is one of the best in Victoria.

    Glen!

  6. Thanks… all useful information.

    King Island was just a slip of the finger on my part.

    I remember listening to an interview with an AFL player who was from Kangaroo Island on ABC radio a few years ago… a ruckman? Buggered if I can can remember who he was. An Almanacker must know.

  7. Tony Roberts says

    Les
    Gee, you’re up early today! (Your post would have been date-stamped 5.54am in Perth, just seven hours ahead of Abbott’s press release on Slipper and Ashby.)

    About 10 years back, there was some excitement that Currie on King Island had produced its first AFL footballer, who went to St Kilda as a budding ruckman. His name was Barry Something (which tells you enough about how that panned out).

    However, Kangaroo Island can lay claim to at least one very good AFL player, also a ruckman, but with over 200 games and a premiership to his name – Brendan Lade.

  8. Bloody Brendan Lade. Twice he kicked 80m torp goals against Freo… once it was the winning goal to delay our first ever win at Football Park. The other was in round 1 2007 at Subi Oval when the Dockers went from premiership favourites to whoops in a quarter.

    We have to be up early in the West to run the rest of the country and write press releases.

  9. I am pretty sure Brendan Lade came from Parndana Football club, in the middle of the island and quite a distance from Penneshaw. Here is a link to the history page for Parndana Football Club.

    http://www.parndanafootballclub.com/club_history.php

  10. Tony Roberts says

    Les
    Your 9.38 remark that Sandgropers need to be up early to run the Eastern States shows the benefits of early-rising habits developed during all those years of writing applications for assistance to the old Loans Council.

  11. Haiku Bob has pretty much nailed Sandgate. Would only add that the address is Lemke Rd for no other reason than it pops into my head, (probably wrong though), and some young pups I used to train with are now playing A Grade with them now. Have had some reasonable success in recent years, although knocked out early this year.

    I also used to enjoy hopping the fence and listening to the ex VFL stars motivate. Mick Nolan had some moments too, with Mayne(?). Ron Wearmouth and Danny Craven at Wests. Sadly for Haiku Bob, Wests didn’t have much success with Ray Shaw.

  12. Barkly St End says

    An ODI that lasted only 2 balls.

    It’s possible that that was where they got the idea for T20.

  13. Sri Lanka won under the Duckworth-Lewis system.

  14. PC Paterson says

    Morphettville, SA: that would be Kellett Reserve right on Denham Avenue, right? (Home of the SFL’s Morphettville Park.)

    There is a ground with a view of South Australia’s racing headquarters, Camden Oval, but that is technically in Novar Gardens.

  15. TALBOT plays in the Maryborough Castlemaine District League. Known as the Hawks, they wear a brown jumper with a gold yoke.

    The club played in nine consecutively grannies: won 1995-98 inclusive, runners-up in 1999 & 2000, bounced back to win in 2001 over Harcourt, then went down to arch-rivals the Apple Eaters from Harcourt in 2002-2203.

    Have not made the Big Dance since.

    Glen is correct. there’s a fantastic Farmers’ Market 3rd Sunday of each month. Main streets are blocked off for stall holders to set up and display their produce and allow easy pedestrian access.

  16. Rocket Nguyen says

    Also recall going to Harrup Park Mackay for the World Series cricket match in 1992 between Sri Lanka and India from Rockhampton.

    Beautiful ground, but can’t remember the scoreboard – only 2 balls bowled…

    Indian students from CQU in Rocky went in droves – all extremely diasppointed at virtually no ply.

  17. Actually looking at the Sri Lankan team let’s hope they didn’t hire an Adelaide Oval type board, they’d still be painting the Sri Lankan pace bowling attack of Ramanayake, Wickramesinghe and Wijegunawardene……

  18. The Black Prince says

    Tony,
    The ruckman from KI you refer to is Barry Brooks, and yes, it didn’t pan out we’ll. I stand corrected but I’m quite sure he played for they Tassie Mariners in TAC cup in the early 90’s and also state U16’s with my younger brother.

    I’ve lost count of the amount of times I’ve played footy (and cricket) at the Penguin Oval. Currently ‘Pirtek Park’…(yes commercial naming rights to major sporting venues is not just restricted to the big smoke you know), I must admit to it being one of my least favoured grounds for which to ply my trade. For no other reason than its size, and the fact that the visitors rooms have had nothing more than the odd lick of paint, passed off as renovations, done to them since my father played U19’s there for Wynyard in 1979! No, I am not exaggerating, they are very uninviting, not to mention bloody cold. One suspects a gentlemans agreement between the local Central Coast Council and the Penguin FC not to replace the said relic. Such is the visiting sides reluctance to even get changed, let alone participate, fair to say it’s as good as six goal start to the home side.

    Back to it’s size. A CHF’s nightmare when a centre square tap to the RR and resultant short pass can end in a shot at goal from 30m. Very small in other words! Seldom would a classical game of Australian Rules unfold, but still, a close game is a good game and more often than not, that is what you’ll find.

    The traditional scoreboard has been replaced in recent years to an electronic version…talk about getting ones priorities arse about face! It provides only the basics. Goals, behinds, total. Q1, 2, 3 and 4. And of course, a time clock. The somewhat irregular nature of this modern beast though is the fact that it counts down…from 20 minutes to nothing, stopping occasionally for time-on. As a player, I hate this. A, because I’m old school and B, I have seen the outcome of a match take a path it may necessarily not have because of this feature…it’s just not cricket!

    It is also worth mentioning that in summer, again due to the aforementioned confines, that a council by-law was introduced after continual bleating from a minority of surrounding residents. Wait for it……….six and out. Yes, over the fence on the full is six and out, noted as ‘retired hurt’ in the book for those of you wondering. Albeit a different sport in a different season, but another example of how a quirk of this tiny North-West Coast oval, has influenced the result whereby it may otherwise would not. I say again…it’s just not cricket.

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