Australian Football

Warren Stanlake was hailed as a potential star when he arrived at the Western Oval from Lavington in the Ovens and Murray League. A local Footscray newspaper went so far as to describe him as Bernie Quinlan and Kelvin Templeton rolled into one. The veracity of those claims proved to be somewhat doubtful, though, as Stanlake played only one senior match for the Bulldogs, a 94-point thrashing at the hands of Collingwood at Victoria Park.

Though Stanlake's numbers—eight kicks, two handballs, two marks and a behind—were by no means the worst of a V/AFL debutant, he was dropped for the following match and never donned the red, white and blue in a senior VFL match again. He returned to Lavington, where he had commenced his senior career in 1979, and gave fine service to the Panthers as a player until 1992, playing in the winning Grand Finals of 1983 and 1986.

Stanlake was later an assistant manager at the Lavington Sports Club. His son Jack was rookie-listed with the Gold Coast Suns in their inaugural AFL season while younger son Billy is a 204 cm fast bowler who made his One Day International debut for Australia in January 2017.

Author - Andrew Gigacz