Blog

By Tony De Bolfo

Former Carlton footballer Tom Simmons. (Photo: Carlton Football Club)

Tom Simmons, whose football prowess at Princes Park in the post-World War II years of Henfry and Deacon was more than matched by his prodigious talents as a professional athlete, has died at the age of 84.

By the time he was recruited to Carlton from Northcote District juniors in Melbourne’s inner-city north, Thomas Edwin Francis Simmons’ reputation on the track preceded him. Standing six foot in the old measurement, he had taken the 100 and 200-yard championships of Melbourne Technical Schools, together with the high and long-jump titles, and had also triumphed in the 220-yard dash at the Inter-Technical schools championship at Olympic Park.

At Carlton, he would later combine football with cricket commitments, as would “Mick” Price and Jim Baird, his club contemporaries.

Simmons earned Carlton’s Best First-Year Player award in 1948 – the first of just two seasons at senior League level – during which time he alternated between half-back and half-forward.

Wearing the famous No.2 of John Nicholls, Greg Williams and (now) Troy Menzel, Simmons completed his senior debut barely a month after his 19^th birthday. He would string together 27 senior appearances for the Blues through 1948 and ’49, having been adjudged their best first-year player.

Simmons’ rare litheness was on show in what was an all-too-brief League football foray. His impressive speed, long-kicking and high-marking, together with his insatiable appetite for the contest, made him a formidable foe. An old teammate, the late Laurie Kerr, said of Simmons: “He looked and performed like Mighty Mouse on the field”, and the noted field umpire Harry Beitzel rated the player a champion in the making.

Allan Greenshields, the 16-game Carlton Premiership player of 1947 who later pursued his career with St Kilda, is one of Simmons’ few surviving contemporaries.

“Tom was a good athlete. He had a very good body and a good pair of legs,” Greenshields, now 87, said.

“I went to St Kilda in mid-’49 and I reckon he was still there then. I remember him as a half-back flanker who got a few games and went well, although he got injured and couldn’t play anymore.

“But he was another player up against me, which is why I thought ‘I’d better get out here’. There were just too many blokes in for my position.”

Tragically, Simmons’ football career ended before it had effectively begun. In a pre-season practice match in 1950, he buckled with serious knee damage which later warranted two separate surgical procedures.

Simmons took on professional foot running as he completed a remarkable recovery, taking out the Terang, Ararat, Maryborough and Port Fairy Gifts as backmarker through the summers of 1950 and ’51. Clearly he could still run the straight lines.

But while he again committed to Carlton to help fill the void left by the recently-retired full-forward Ken Baxter, he was never able to emulate his footballing feats, although he did follow up as a field umpire in the sticks.

Simmons married his sweetheart Lorraine the following year, and later forged a successful career as an industrial chemist for companies such as Revlon and Estee Lauder. He and his wife raised a family of seven children, and he was a regular at Carlton games for many years long after his on-field career had ended.

A funeral mass for Tom Simmons is to be held just down the road from the old Carlton ground, at St. Carthage’s Church, Royal Parade, Parkville, this Friday (October 11) from 11am.

A private burial is to follow.

 

—————-

The Simmons family very kindly provided photos from Tom’s private collection to the Blueseum. Please CLICK HERE to see pictures from Tom’s time at the Blues and his running career.

By Tony De Bolfo

The Flynn family at Visy Park earlier this week. (Photo: Carlton Football Club)

On the hallowed turf at the old Carlton ground, clan members came from various parts of regional Victoria and metropolitan Melbourne to stand in tribute to ol’ Jim – a three-time Premiership player in the Jack Worrall-coached teams of 1906, ’07 and ’08.

Photographed for posterity were the following descendants;

Mandy Allen (Flynn’s great granddaughter, aged 41), Kelli Gayfer (great granddaughter, 42), Di Flynn (daughter-in-law, 66), Paul Flynn (great grandson, 36), Pat Flynn (grandson, 70) and Shane Flynn (great grandson, 33).

Also in the frame were Thomas Gayfer (great-great grandson, two months), Jade Gayfer (great-great granddaughter, six), Grace Gayfer (great-great granddaughter, four), Charlie Flynn (great-great grandson, four), Joe Allen (great-great grandson, 10), Sam Allen (great-great grandson, 12), Georgia Allen (great-great granddaughter, 13) and Tilly Flynn (great-great granddaughter, six).

Of those appearing in this historic photograph, only Pat knew Flynn in person, and only then as a boy of 12.

“He (Flynn) was a great man, a great old person,” Pat said. “He was very fond of his grandchildren and I was the eldest of them. I used to go rabbiting with him and a couple of dogs in a horse and gig on his farm up at Wilby, which was just south of Yarrawonga.

“Jim was a farmer. He farmed wheat and he had a few sheep and cattle on a few hundred acres at that farm, which I think was called Glenview. He used to take me on the horse and gig into the general store in Wilby twice a week. We used to collect the mail and a few groceries at the store and it’s no longer there now.

“He also suffered from Parkinson’s Disease in his later years. I can remember at dinner time he’d be at the table and his knife would be shaking on the plate. But my fondest memories are of going rabbiting with him and heading into Wilby in the horse and gig.”

Pat remembered that Flynn found a soft spot for the Wilby Football Club.

“People well into their 80s who live up there remember him and still speak very highly of him,” Pat said. “Going to the football at Wilby, he had a particular spot on the fence at which he stood, and he’d give advice to members of the team.”

He added that his grandfather never recounted tales of the old days at Princes Oval (other than extolling the virtues of his old mentor Worrall), “and all the old photos which used to grace the walls of the old house are gone now”.

Fortunately, some precious mementoes remain – like the Premiership caps, medallions and certificates hard won and dear – which for years now have graced Pat’s menswear store, Flynn’s of Wangaratta.

As Pat said: “They’re displayed on the wall of the shop and they’re looked at by many, many people. They’ve created a lot of interest.”

James Edward “Jim” Flynn was born in Geelong on March 21, 1871, the son of John and Ellen Flynn (nee Moloney), natives of Tipperary in Ireland. John and Ellen had completed the eight-week voyage to Melbourne from Plymouth aboard the sailing ship Percy the previous year – during which time their two year-old son Thomas had died of a fever and was buried at sea in the presence of Captain James Cooper, passengers and crew.

Little is known of Flynn’s early life, but his football exploits have been documented. He had a run with Benalla, then Collingwood in the old VFA days and for a brief period Canterbury, but later turned out for Geelong in 74 senior appearances through six seasons from 1897 –  including the team’s maiden VFL appearance against Essendon at Corio Oval.

Carlton’s first premiership captain, Jim Flynn. (Photo: Carlton Football Club)

Flynn joined Carlton in 1903 (Pat believes it was on Worrall’s sayso) after landing work as a barman, and contributed to the cause as both ruckman and defender through 77 matches in eight glorious seasons. As mentioned previously, Flynn was a member of Carlton’s three consecutive Premiership teams – the third of them (1908) after having been talked out of retirement by the coach.

In Flynn’s first season, Carlton rose in the ladder standings from sixth to third. Such was his impact, Flynn was named vice-captain in the following year, as right hand man to the former Geelong ruckman Joe McShane.

When McShane stepped down at the end of 1904, Flynn assumed captaincy duties. Such was his reputation as a genuine leader that the Punch correspondent of 1907 was drawn to write “he was as Napoleon, Wellington, Julius Caesar, Great Scot and Kitchener . . . ”

By 1910, Flynn was considered lost to football, until fate again played its hand. In the wake of the sensational withdrawals of Doug Gillespie, Alex “Bongo” Lang and Doug Fraser amid bribery allegations, captain-coach “Pompey” Elliott persuaded Flynn to complete yet another comeback for Carlton, in the 1910 semi-final with South Melbourne.

Flynn was 39 at the time.

After that one last tilt at League football, Flynn pursued his business interests, in acquiring the St James Hotel. In October 1911, he married a local St James girl, Ellen Cleary. Together they would raise six children – Edward, Mary, James, Alicia, John and Anastasia.

Sometime later, he put the hotel on the market and relocated with his family to the farm at Wilby.

There he worked the land until August 1955, when he died not long after falling and breaking his hip.

This week, some 68 years after Flynn’s passing and 35 more after he last laced a boot, ol’ Jim’s memory was perpetuated by the clan.

By Tony De Bolfo

The surviving members of Carlton’s Under 19 Premiership team. (Photo: Supplied)

The gathering, which included 15 members of the victorious 20, was championed by the best player afield that day, Peter Smith, who took some months to locate fellow Premiership players – including Carlton’s Team of the Century rover Adrian Gallagher, and others like the club’s former Senior coach Denis Pagan, who turned out for the Unders twice in that all-conquering ’63 year.

Smith, who set the ball rolling in publicizing his push for the 50^th anniversary reunion, hailed the gathering an enormous success.

“The past players were all over the moon with the turnout,” Smith said. ”We’d never reunited before, so we’re hoping we’ll meet at least once a year from now on to catch up for lost time.”

Smith, then a 17 year-old wingman with the Unders, was adjudged best player of Carlton’s ’63 finals series, which culminated in its 38-point Grand Final victory over Essendon – 12.11 83 to 6.9 45. That win iced a very tasty cake given that the Carlton team was anchored to the bottom of the ladder with only one win from the first seven matches that season – only to win the last 13 on the trot including the GF.

Bizarrely, the Carlton players had to wait three weeks to realize their dream, as Essendon and Richmond drew the Preliminary Final. The Bombers duly won the Prelim replay and earned the right to meet Carlton on Grand Final day, October 12, 1963 – at Bacchus Marsh’s Maddingley Oval of all places.

Smith wisely lobbed at the pub armed with nametags. As he said: “It’s 50 years after all, so without the nametags we would have been struggling”.

“The reunion gave all of us an opportunity to talk about things that had been forgotten,” he said. “For example, Brian Gorman was suspended for four weeks in the second semi and it had slipped my mind. He reminded me that he snotted an Essendon bloke and turned up to the Grand Final to watch on, but got crook, had his appendix out and missed the celebrations.”

Smith said that all past players took the liberty of raising a glass to their former Carlton coach Tom Brooker (“the blokes would have run through a brick wall for Tommy”), together with their old captain John Morrison, Chris Challenger, Clive Gordon and John Kemp, all since deceased.

Other players from the ’63 year – Gerry Nagel, Alan Grace, Bob Cohen, Doug Thomas and Robert Guest – couldn’t be located for the purposes of the reunion, and as Smith suggested, “Maybe we’ll track them down in time for the 51^st”.

By Tony De Bolfo

Alex Jesaulenko with Bryan Quirk on tour. (Photo: Supplied)

With the clock counting down to auction day, a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity exists for a Carlton collector or collectors to acquire the extensive lot of Alex Jesaulenko’s football memorabilia in its entirety.

The Alex Jesaulenko Collection, carrying an estimated worth of $370,000, is to be auctioned at Charles Leski Auctions in Hawthorn East on the evening of Thursday, September 26.

A total of 158 lots (with the exception of lot 13, the No.25 dark Navy Blue guernsey worn by Jesaulenko into the 1970 Grand Final which cannot be authenticated and has been withdrawn) are to go under the hammer.

Each lot, in part, tells the whole of the story of one of the greatest Australian Rules footballers ever to lace a boot – a four-time Carlton Premiership player, Carlton and AFL Team of the Century representative, and a Club and League Legend who is Alex Jesaulenko.

With the Carlton Football Club’s 150^th year looming, the vast collection of items carefully managed by Jesaulenko’s late wife Annie – including premiership medallions, trophies, mounted footballs, guernseys both club and representative, blazers, certificates, letters, slides, photographs and scrapbooks – carries enormous historical significance.

Particularly precious items include Jesaulenko’s 1979 Premiership Medallion which he earned as the game’s last Grand Final-winning captain-coach, and the 1976 Players’ Association trophy – the first ever awarded – in 1975.

Jesaulenko evades four Tigers. (Photo: Supplied)

Also available is fragile 8mm footage shot by Jesaulenko of his various international sporting tours, including that which involved Carlton and the Dallas Cowboys.

“You’ve got Carlton players interacting with American gridiron players, and footage like that is years ahead of its time. There wouldn’t be any other footage shot of Carlton in that location. There was no TV crew around then.”

As the club has a blanket policy of not purchasing items of memorabilia, it relies on the goodwill of Carlton-friendly collectors to avail precious items on loan for future display at the club, like those making up The Alex Jesaulenko Collection.

Max Williamson, sports specialist at Charles Leski Auctions, described the collection as “probably the best football collection we’ve had . . . and Alex Jesaulenko is the iconic Carlton player”.

“We’ve had a few others players’ collections, which included Premiership trophies of their particular period, but the difference here are the scrapbooks collected by his wife, together with the photographs that were ordered from the newspapers, which are pretty complete,” Williamson said.

“The reality is that unless you’ve got someone really major – and Carlton possibly has – then the collection won’t remain intact.

“It did happen with Shirley Strickland’s collection, when a group of collectors got together to make an offer for the whole thing. In the end, the items were withdrawn from auction and acquired, which was in keeping with what Shirley actually wanted – and ultimately on-sold to the National Sports Museum.”

By Tony De Bolfo

Carlton Vice-Captain Kade Simpson. (Photo: David Callow/AFL Media)

With news filtering through that Kade Simpson is to ditch his sizeable beard in support of the noble cause of Down Syndrome Victoria, time is of the essence in celebrating Carlton’s facial-haired heroes.

After much time and effort (few beards could be found in any Carlton team photographs from the 1890s through the 1960s), a 22-man team of Bluebeards dating as far back as the 1860s, has been selected for your personal enjoyment and edification.

And it’s a team that quite literally grows on you.

Amongst the bearded best is Jack Donovan, Carlton’s captain and the competition’s Champion of the Colony in the pre-VFL years of the 1870s, together with Henry Finch Rix, who was part of an outstanding outfit which took out the Premiership hat trick of 1873, ’4 and ’5.

Donovan’s actual playing position cannot be verified, but he slots nicely into the first ruck role given the following prose of a journalist of the late 1880s who so eloquently wrote:

“There are many thousands of the community who will well remember the days when,

Donovan stout, with a mighty rush,

Through the serried ranks of the foe would crush,

Leaving behind in a shapeless mass

A dozen of coves on the slippery grass.”

Donovan, Rix and the good Alderman John “Tiger” Gardiner are welcome inclusions from the early days, as are the bushy-faced Blueboys of the VFL/AFL era. Making the cut (pardon the pun) from this period are no fewer than nine Carlton premiership players – Rod Ashman, Peter Bosustow, Bob Chitty, Brent Crosswell, Bruce Doull, Wayne Harmes, Robbert Klomp, Brad Pearce and Robert Walls, the club captain of 1977-78 and Premiership coach of 1987.

Named captain-coach of the coveted Bluebeard outfit, Walls was staggered to learn that a 22-man team could actually be sourced . . . “and I’m very proud to be captain-coach”, he dryly suggested.

Carlton great Rod Ashman. (Photo: Carlton Football Club)

“I went with the full beard around the mid-1970s,” Walls said. “It was something that just grew over Christmas holidays and when I let it go for four or five weeks I thought ‘Oh I’ll just let it go’. So if I had to put it down to anything I’d say it was just laziness.

“I stuck with it for about 27 years until 2002 when I opted for the goatee. I remember I was in Ireland on one of those International Rules tours and for some reason I thought ‘Oh bugger it, I’ll shave part of the beard off and go with the goatee’.”

Walls said he had looked back on photographs of Carlton teams he had coached “and I’m the only bloke wearing a beard”.

“But after a while, nobody takes any notice,” Walls said. “It just becomes part of you.”

Current players Zach Tuohy, Andrew Walker and of course “Simmo” are there, with Zach earning bragging rights as the only bearded Blue with a “ginge tinge”.

Ashman, Doull and Walls made Carlton’s 22-man Team of the 20^th Century, with Bob Chitty named as one of four emergencies.

Doull and Harmes are also Norm Smith Medallists, with Doull the only bearded member of the AFL Team of The Century’s starting 18.

Brad Pearce, pictured here with Peter Turner and Scott Camporeale in the mid-1990s. (Photo: Carlton Football Club)

It must also be said that some licence has been taken with the inclusion of Chitty, who sported his gargantuan facial growth for the plum role of Ned Kelly in Rupert Kathner’s film feature The Glenrowan Affair, which was shot on location in Benalla in the late 1940s.

So here it is – a 22 of bearded Blues who would undoubtedly beat most clean-shaven opponents by a whisker.

Best 22 Bluebeards

Backs: Robbert Klomp, Geoff Hocking, Greg Sharp

Half-backs: Zach Tuohy, Bruce Doull, Bob Chitty

Centres: Kade Simpson, Wayne Harmes, Alan Mangels

Half-forwards: Peter Bosustow, Robert Walls (c-c), Brent Crosswell

Forwards: Brad Pearce, Andrew Walker, Brad Fisher

Rucks: Jack Donovan, Brad Shine

Rover: Rod Ashman

i/change: Denis Collins, Mark Williams, Wayne Deledio

sub: Henry Rix

President: John “Tiger” Gardiner

By Tony De Bolfo

Senior Coach Mick Malthouse is interviewed by Carlton’s Media Manager, Loretta Smith, at this morning’s YMCA Bridge Project breakfast. (Photo: Carlton Football Club)

 

The spirit of the former Carlton footballer “Jack” Massey is alive and well at YMCA, with Carlton Coach Michael Malthouse this morning dedicating his time and energy to a Breakfast convened by the YMCA Bridge Project of which he has been Patron since 2006.

Malthouse gave of his time to address guests at the breakfast at Show Time on the South Wharf Promenade. Few in the room could have known that Malthouse’s commitment to the cause is in keeping with that of the late Jack Massey MBE – the two-game Carlton footballer of 1910.

For it was Massey who also served as honorary Captain i/c of the YMCA with the AIF’s 4th Division from 1915-19; as National Staff Member of the YMCA in the United States in 1925; as Executive Secretary of the National YMCAs of England in 1939; and as National General Secretary of the YMCA of Australia from 1944.

Malthouse, in an interview with Carlton Media Manager Loretta Smith, told the gathering of his passion for the YMCA Bridge Project, which helps rebuild the lives of young offenders who have been involved in the youth justice system.

He talked of his keen personal interest in helping to rehabilitate young men whose lives have gone off the rails in some way and he used sport as a means of telling the story.

“If you go back through history you see great sporting achievements from people who have been given a second, third and fourth chance,” Malthouse said “You look around the world and you see people on the sporting field and in life in general just get that opportunity, that one glimmer of hope . . . and run with it.”

Malthouse’s dedication to the YMCA, which in Victoria has served the community since 1853, follows in the grand tradition set by the likes of men such as Massey.

John Tolson Massey was born in Hawthorn on May 1, 1887, the son of Henry John Massey, a draper, and Fanny Tolson. Recruited from Carlton Juniors (later Carlton District), Massey became the 242nd senior player to represent the Blues, managing two appearances in Rounds 17 and 18 of the 1910 season. The accompanying portrait was taken in 1912.

John Tolson Massey. (Photo: Carlton Football Club)

Notwithstanding his involvement with the YMCA, Massey was also seconded to the Commonwealth Government as organiser of voluntary organisations and churches assisting assimilation of immigrants into Australian life in 1949.

He was twice married, lived in Glen Iris and died in Camberwell on July 18, 1981 at the age of 94.

By Tony De Bolfo

Jim Clark on the training track during his time with the Blues. (Photo: Carlton Football Club)

Jim, who by the age of 22 had played his part in both the ’45 and ’47 Premierships, was also a three-time Victorian representative and, at 26, the winner of the ’51 Robert Reynolds Trophy for Club Champion.

By then, he was 161 games into his senior career and at the peak of his football powers. But he had played his last game for Carlton – the lure of a new house too great for him not to accept the position as captain-coach of Echuca.

Recruited to the club from Elmore on the Campaspe River, Jim’s links with Carlton were forged in 1943 – the year in which four of the club’s five former players paid with their lives in the field of combat.

One of them, Lieutenant James William “Jim” Park, was killed in the defence of a strategic Allied airfield in Wau, New Guinea. Less than five years previous, Carlton’s No.26 had quelled Collingwood full-forward Ron Todd’s influence in the 1938 Grand Final, and was a revered figure for those who followed, Jim Clark amongst them.

A wonderful raconteur, Jim’s understanding of the Park legacy was triggered by a faded sepia photograph, which hung from the old brick walls of what was once the players’ changerooms deep within the bowels of the Robert Heatley Stand.

The photograph, captured by a newspaper “snapper” at Princes Oval in the 1930s, swiftly earned iconic status. Taken from behind, the photograph featured Park completing an extraordinary chest mark, with his left foot planted firmly in the back of his hapless Melbourne opponent and his right leg extended outward to retain balance.

“We used to look at that photo, in the club, of a chap called Jim Park, who was a full-back for Carlton in the time of Rod McLean and those fellows,” said Jim in a final interview a few years ago.

“It was a famous photo of him taking a mark with his foot in the back of ‘Tarzan’ Glass, a ruckman. It was a famous one, published around the world it was.

“About a month after Jimmy Park was killed in the war, Mr Bell ,the secretary, came over to me in the clubroom and said ‘Jim, we’re going to take your number off you that you’ve got and give you Jimmy Park’s number,” Jim said.

“Talk about an honour. To be given Jimmy Park’s number out of respect for Jimmy Park was an honour that was hard to believe.”

Wearing Park’s No.26 like a badge, Jim took his place at half-back alongside Bert Deacon. Together they savoured the Grand Final triumphs of 1945 and ’47, and dealt with the disappointment of Grand Final loss in ’49.

The ’45 Grand Final – at which 62,986 people, many of them returned service men and women, somehow crammed into Princes Park to bear witness – has taken on mythical proportions with the passing of time and for the memorable observations of old-timers like Jim.

Only three players still live to tell the tale – Ken Hands, Alex Way and Doug Williams – but it was Jim who once declared: “Of ‘The Bloodbath’ I heard a fella say ‘I was at the wrong bloody war’”.

Fondly-dubbed “Racehorse”, Jim’s nickname probably had as much to do with his penchant for the equines as his fleet-of-foot athletic prowess.

“Jim Clark was always fond of the horses, even as a young man,” said Alan Bell, son of the then Carlton Secretary Harry Bell. “Back in those days there were only two phones at the club, one in the football club secretary’s office and the other in the cricket club secretary’s office. Quite often, just before a game, Jim Clark would come to my father and say ‘Mr. Bell, could I use your phone?’. And Dad would say ‘Yes, and put five bob on it each way for me too.’”

Jim’s loss to Carlton at the end of ‘51, together with the departures of fellow Premiership players Bert Deacon and Jim Baird, was truly felt. As was noted in the club’s 1952 Annual Report, “The loss of Jim Clark was a loss that could not be over-estimated and could have meant the difference between victory and defeat on several occasions . . . ”

And yet this most engaging of characters never forgot Princes Park or its people – the likes of President Ken Luke and Coach Perc Bentley – who were the Blues’ galvanising forces both during and beyond the dark years of wartime.

Jim, whose entire career was run and won under Bentley’s tutelage, once said of the man: “Loved him. Loved him”.

“He (Bentley) was a very prominent player in the times of ‘Skinny’ Titus and Jack Dyer,” Jim said. “I know I speak for all the players when I say he had the respect of every one of us. I never heard him swear in an address and he was always so supportive in his instruction. He was always encouraging.

“The same applied to Mr Luke. He was a great man. He was always a very hale fellow with us and I never heard an ill word from any one of the players who ever had any dealings with him.”

Jim last appeared for Carlton in a contest of further controversy – the Round 18 match of 1951 at Princes Park, in which the great John Coleman copped four matches for striking Harry Caspar – thereby depriving him of his place in the 1951 Grand Final and almost certainly costing the Bombers the chocolates.

On Saturday night, Carlton players will wear black armbands to honor the memory of Jim when they confront Essendon on the vast expanses of the MCG.

Predeceased by his wife Marg and son Gary, Jim Clark is survived by sons Lex, Greg, daughters Lesley and Jillian, and their families.

Jim’s funeral service will be held at Tobin Brothers, Bromley Chapel, 457 High Street, Echuca on Monday, August 26, commencing at 12.00 noon.

The funeral will leave at the conclusion of the service for burial at the Echuca Lawn Cemetery.

From: carltonfc.com.au

Carlton’s oldest living captain, Ken Hands, with current skipper Marc Murphy. (Photo: Carlton Football Club)

More than 600 people turned out at the Grand Hyatt for Thursday’s Spirit of Carlton lunch, celebrating Carlton’s captains.

Current captain Marc Murphy was joined by his teammates and past leaders who are still at the Club, including Stephen Kernahan, Andrew McKay and Chris Judd.

Other former captains in attendance included Ken Hands, Sergio Silvani, Ron Barassi, Robert Walls, Percy Jones, Wayne Johnston, Mark Maclure, Craig Bradley, Anthony Koutoufides, Lance Whitnall, endeavour the great John Nicholls.

Coach Mick Malthouse gave the opening address, saying of all the clubs he has been a part of, the thing that stands out about Carlton the most is the way it continues to look after players when they retire from football.

“They’re still a part of the family. This Club stands alone in its endeavour and its history – they look after those players so well.”

There were laughs as past players reminisced over old stories – Wayne Johnston revealing how he got his nickname “The Dominator”.

Johnston, who was Carlton Captain from 1980-1983, says it came about after he claimed to have been dominating in a room full of ladies at a nightclub – only to later be ejected by security and go home alone.

Carlton greats Sergio Silvagni, John Nicholls, Ron Barassi and Chris Judd catch up. (Photo: Carlton Football Club)

“We had fellas like Maclure and Buckley and blokes like that around the footy club, so there wasn’t much that didn’t get through the door,” Johnston said.

“I turned up to training the next morning, and they said to me as I walked in a bit sheepish, ‘G’day Dominator, how are you?’”

“They made out that my ego was well in advance of my ability.”

The gathering also heard from Ken Hands, Carlton captain from 1952-1957.

Hands, who wore the number one guernsey now sported by Andrew Walker, enjoyed much success at Carlton, playing in two premierships and later coaching the side.

But one of his great achievements, that perhaps isn’t as widely known, is that it was Hands who was responsible for recruiting John Nicholls to Carlton.

“I was very fortunate to play with him in his first year and my last,” Hands said of Nicholls.

“What a great ambassador he has been for the club.”

Here are the thoughts of some of Carlton’s former captains on the Spirit of Carlton lunch:

“For me it’s a lovely day. Our footy Club continues to improve, and this will go on longer than you and I, and the rest of the people in the room. We’re just a passing parade of people who enjoy the company of each other.” Mark Maclure

“It’s wonderful. It’s great seeing all these old faces – you see them around now and then, but it’s great seeing them all at once.” Percy Jones

“It’s great catching up with everyone at events like the Spirit of Carlton – it’s great to see everyone back together. Hopefully we can get over the Bulldgos this weekend and get into the finals.” Jim Buckley

“It’s pretty awesome. Coming back and seeing all these great captains and great players. It’s a great thrill.” Lance Whitnall

“I regard it as a pleasure, seeing a lot of people that I haven’t seen for a long while. I had some happy years at Carlton.” Ron Barassi