Frank Golding looks back
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The greatest goalkeeper the game has seen”; the late Con Hickey, one of Australia's best football administrators, once paid this tribute to Frank Golding. Stuart star of 25 years ago.
This is the record of Frank Golding, one of the greatest footballers to wear the double-blue guernsey of the Sturt Football Club:
League games: 246 (207 for Sturt)
Interstate games: 40
Carnival teams: 1914, 1921, 1924
Captain of the State team: Nine matches in 1925 and 1926.
Golding played in almost every position from full forward to full back, and after the 1924 carnival in Tasmania, the late Mr Con Hickey, then secretary of the Australasian Football Council, said: "Frank, in my opinion, you are the greatest goalkeeper the game has seen."
Today, at 55, Frank is a City Council employee, and secretary of the Old Players and Officials' Association, which has a membership of nearly 300. He began his football with West Perth in 1906 when he was 15, and he retired in 1927, at the age of 36... one of the longest periods any footballer here has remained in the game.
Let me say right now, I was not one of the specially imported "Dempsey's immigrants," who came from Western Australia and Victoria to play for Sturt in 1909. It was only by chance that I played for Sturt in that year. I would have been with Norwood, only for an unkept appointment.
But I'll start from my first year in football. While a schoolboy at Newcastle Street School in Perth in 1906 I was a keen soccer fan. I captained the school team and was selected as captain for a combined schools' match. I was 15. That Saturday it rained cats and dogs, and the league games were cancelled. Bert Renfrey, then captain of West Perth, with some other officials, strolled across to see our soccer match. Afterwards, they asked me if I'd like to play league football. I was eager, and for the rest of the season, I played soccer for my school on Saturday mornings and league football for West Perth in the afternoons. I played for West Perth until 1908.
Then I had an offer from South Melbourne which sounded good. So I got a passage on the old Kanowna and headed eastwards in February 1909. When I left, though, Billy Plunkett, an old Norwood player, wired Adelaide that I would be passing through. When the Kanowna reached Port Adelaide I was met by a Norwood supporter, and he arranged an appointment with Mr Jack Woods, then a Redleg official, for next day. Next morning I was walking down Rundle Street when suddenly someone tapped me on the shoulder and said, "Hey, what are you doing in Adelaide." It was "Diver" Dunne. He was one of "Dempsey's immigrants." I told him I was going through to South Melbourne. "No, you're not. You'll stay with us," said Diver very definitely.
I went to the appointment place later in the morning, but Jack Woods, of Norwood, was not there. So I decided to go with "Diver." How did they become known as Dempsey's immigrants? Well, a Mr J. Dempsey was a prominent tramways traffic official and a keen Sturt supporter at that time. Sturt decided to put out a strong team for the season, and Mr Dempsey did the importing. He brought Diver Dunne, Phil Matson, and Albert Heinrichs from the West and Harry Cumberland and Bert Renfrey (then with St. Kilda, I think) from Victoria. All were given jobs at the Tramways Trust. Phil Matson, I remember, was an electric tram driver at the time when the trust was changing from horse-drawn to electric cars. Cumberland was an inspector.
I'll never forget an incident one Saturday morning in the next season, 1910. We were to play Norwood at Adelaide Oval in the afternoon, and I was having a shave in Webb's barber shop (a meeting place for players) in Currie Street. I was lathered up, in the chair, when Billy Miller, a Norwood half-forward, who did not know me from a bar of soap, piped up, "I'll bet a fiver Golding doesn't get a kick today. My brother Harold will cane him." I whispered to Webb. "Take that bet for me." Webb did. Anyway, Harold Miller was taken away from me at half time—he was the one who hadn't had many kicks—and Lionel Hill was sent to cover me. Next Saturday morning, when I was in Webb's barber shop again; Billy Miller came in, and when I asked him for the £5 he looked at me hard and curiously, and remarked, "Hey didn't you play for Sturt last week?" I denied it at first but later had to admit that I did and was Frank Golding. The little barber's shop crowd roared at Billy's discomfiture.
But the hardest match I think I had was in the Sturt-Torrens grand final in 1924. Remember that match—over 40,000 at the Adelaide Oval. There was nothing much in the game, when, about five minutes before time, I intercepted a Torrens shot at goal, and cleared to Clarrie Scrutton, on the wing. "Nuzzy" Minear, Torrens forward pocket man, was racing after me, but when I passed to Scrutton. Nuzzy couldn't pull up, and to avoid charging me he jumped. As he did, I involuntarily ducked my head. Nuzzy went right over the top of me. Now, although Clarrie Scrutton had already taken my pass, and was driving the ball on, the umpire whistled and gave a free to Minear. As Minear took his kick, from about 45 yards out, I could see it was going to fall short. The full forward, whose name I can't remember, and I were jostling for position, when suddenly the umpire whistled again, and gave a free against me for interference. I was dumbfounded . . . and Torrens got their easiest goal of the day, with only minutes to go. Torrens won their first premiership that day with the scores at —Torrens, 9-12; Sturt. 8-10.
I was goalkeeper that year, for the second full season. But I was nearly a spectator. This is what happened. After a Torrens match in 1922, I was injured. I stood down for a match or two—I was then playing half-forward—and trained on the Thursday night a fortnight later. Afterwards, the selectors came to my home. They said, "Frank, we don't think you're fit enough to play." I said "Didn't you see the way I trained tonight," and they replied that they had, but still didn't think I was fit. "We'll have to' drop you, Frank," they said. I was 31 then, at a time when most footballers are nearly through. But I said, "Don't you think I could take a position in defence." Rather surprised, they said, "We didn't think you would." So they placed me as goal keeper. I didn't look back.
In the next year, I managed to run Horace Riley, a teammate, very close for the Magarey Medal. In fact, just before the 1923 semi-finals, when it was announced that Horrie had got the coveted medal, I saw him on the day of the first semi-final. I congratulated him and he said, "Frank, it was really yours." I told him to go out and show that crowd that it was really his, and he had earned it. But that day Horrie played one of the worst games ever, and I had one of those days when nothing goes wrong.
The next year, when I was vice captain of the carnival team which went to Tasmania, there was skin and hair flying in all matches. "Snowy" Whitehead, our ruckman, became a casualty. We decided to replace him from the State second team then playing in Melbourne. I suggested to the late Eric Tassie, of Norwood, and manager of the side, that Vic Peters (West) be brought from Melbourne. Vic was captain of the State second team, and just the solid type to hand out all the bumps and vigour that the Vics would want. But instead, "Tiger" Potts, another hard-goer, but not as hard as Vic, came over.
The Victorian goalsneak that year was a man named [Lloyd] Hagger (Geelong). He and I had words early after he had backhanded me a few times. He growled, "You'll just have to take what's coming," after I told him to cut it out. I thought if that's how he wants it, here goes. Well, Hagger was taken off me some time later. Then [Alec] Duncan took his place. Duncan's sentiments were the same. So were mine. I was sick and sore after that game but so were my opponents.
There were no 'beg pardons' in that match—in fact, in any of the Tasmanian carnival games. Everybody was expected to give and take anything that was going, with no excuses….and they did. Billy Mayman, an old friend and former Sturt player, was captain of the Tasmanian team that year.
When it comes to naming the best player I've seen, though, I hand it to a player named Gravenhall, who came to Western Australia about 1907 from St. Kilda, as sports master to Scotch College. He was one of those players who could mark the ball, and "run in the air," so smartly was he off the spot again. About 6 ft. tall, and 13 stone, he was such a bug-bear to West Australian League teams that our instructions before a match were to grab Gravenhall and give him a free as soon as he gets the ball.
But I take my hat off to Nip Geddes, who played for Torrens. I was still only a boy when Nip was round. He would always give kindly and useful advice, and as a ruckman could drive the ball down the forwards' throats. There were many good full-forwards in my time, [such as] Jack Owens (Glenelg), Bulla Ryan (South), Percy Lewis (North), and Bonnie Campbell (Western Australia), but I give the crown to Gordon Coventry (Victoria). When Coventry grabbed the ball, it would take a hydraulic jack to prise his hands off it. He was cuning with it, and an unerring kick, and was the best "sneak" I ever met.
Footnotes
Title: The greatest goalkeeper the game has seen
Author: Lawrie Jervis
Publisher: News (Adelaide, SA: 1923-1954)
Date: Saturday 11 May 1946
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