Burge Family
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Frank, Peter, Albert and Laidley Burge were an Australian family of fine footballing brothers who represented Australia at rugby union and rugby league between 1907 and 1922.
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[edit] Frank Burge
| Personal information | ||
|---|---|---|
| Full name | Frank Burge | |
| Date of birth | 1894 | |
| Place of birth | Darlington, Sydney, | |
| Date of death | 1958 | |
| Place of death | Marrickville, Sydney, | |
| Weight | 93kg | |
| Nickname(s) | Chunky | |
| Club information | ||
| Position(s) | Prop forward | |
| Current club | Deceased | |
| Senior clubs* | ||
| Years | Club | Apps (points) |
| 1911–1926 1927 |
Glebe Dirty Reds St George Dragons |
148 (509) 16 (27) |
| Representative teams | ||
| 1912–1926 1914–1922 |
New South Wales Australia |
18 (83) 13 (35) |
| Professional clubs coached | ||
| 1927 1935 1936 1940 1947 |
St George Dragons North Sydney Bears Canterbury Bankstown Newtown Bluebags Western Suburbs |
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* Professional club appearances and points |
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Frank 'Chunky' Burge (born 14th August, 1894 in Darlington, New South Wales, died 5th July, 1958 in Marrickville, New South Wales) was the one of the greatest forwards in the history of rugby league in Australia. Later he was one of the game's finest coaches.
His club career was with Glebe and the St. George Dragons. He represented New South Wales on eighteen occasions. He played thirteen Tests for the Kangaroos and played for Australia in a further twenty three tour matches.
[edit] Club and representative career
Frank was a sensation as a teenager and played 1st grade rugby union at age 14, the youngest ever to play senior football in either code. Upon switching to the professional code, Frank was playing first grade for Glebe at age 16 and was selected for the state at age 18.
He debuted for Australia in the domestic 1914 Ashes series against Great Britain appearing in all three Tests, and on the 1919 tour of New Zealand in all four tests. Again in 1920 he appeared in all three Tests of the domestic Ashes series and then was selected on the 1921-22 Kangaroo tour where he played in all three tests and twenty representative tour matches scoring 33 tries in 23 matches, more than any touring forward before or since. Burge's representative record shows him appearing in every single Australian Test match played in the war-interrupted eight year period between 1914 and 1922.
[edit] Records and accolades
He was the NSW Rugby Football League's top try-scorer in 1915, 1916 and 1918 an extrmemely rare feat in even one year for a forward. In the 1920 season, he was the League's top point scorer.
He holds the standing record for tries in a match set when he scored eight in a club match for Glebe in 1920. His career tally of 146 first grade tries stood for eighty years as the highest by a forward until Steven Menzies broke it in 2004. He maintained an average of a try a game for seventeen seasons scoring 218 tries in 213 senior matches with 146 coming from his 154 Sydney first grade matches. That try-scoring tally today stands at eighth on an all-time list dominated by backs.
In February 2008, Frank Burge was named in the list of Australia's 100 Greatest Players (1908–2007) which was commissioned by the NRL and ARL to celebrate the code's centenary year in Australia.[1][2] Burge went on to be named as an interchange player in Australian rugby league's Team of the Century. Announced on 17 April 2008, the team is the panel's majority choice for each of the thirteen starting positions and four interchange players.[3][4]
[edit] The man and his playing style
At 93kg and equally effective anywhere in the forwards from lock to prop, he had the speed of a back to complement his strength and an anticpiation that made him a support player without peer. He was a teetotaller who was way ahead of his time in observing a strict diet, used coaching concepts familiar in modern sports psychology and upheld atraining regime that continued all year including the long Sydney summer off-season.
The Heads/Middleton reference quotes a colleague and former University rival Dick O'Brien who said on Frank's death in 1958: "May I say, as Anthony did of Caesar: his life was gentle, the elements so mixed in him that nature might stand up and say to all the world "This was a man" '. [5].
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[edit] Peter Burge
| Peter Burge | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Personal information | |||
| Full name | Peter Burge | ||
| Date of birth | 14 February, 1884 | ||
| Place of birth | Penrith, New South Wales | ||
| Date of death | July, 1956 | ||
| Nickname | Emu | ||
| Rugby league career | |||
| Position | Forward | ||
| Professional clubs | Caps | (points) | |
| 1910 1911-1914 |
South Sydney Rabbitohs Glebe Dirty Reds |
1 15 |
(0) (3) |
| National teams | |||
| 1911-1912 | Australia | 0 Tests | |
| Teams coached | |||
| 1937 | St George Dragons | ||
| Rugby union career | |||
| Playing career | |||
| Position | Lock | ||
| Clubs | |||
| 1904-1908 | South Sydney | ||
| Provincial/State sides | Caps | (points) | |
| 1905-08 | New South Wales | 3 | |
| National team(s) | |||
| 1907-1908 | Australia | 3 Tests | |
Peter Harold Boyne Burge (1884 - 1956) represented his country at both sports. He was the eldest of the four brothers and one of the first Australian dual-code rugby internationals.
[edit] Rugby union career
Playing rugby union with South Sydney in 1904 the twenty-year old Burge was selected for the Metropolis (City) representative side against the Great Britain tourists. When the All Blacks toured in 1905 Burge played against them firstly for Metropolis and then in a New South Wales side.
He made two rugby union tours, to New Zealand in 1905 with the first full Australian team and later on the epic 1908-09 tour of the British Isles, Canada and the United States. On both trips he only played one game due to injury. Peter played at lock in three Tests (two as Captain) for the Wallabies in 1907 against the touring All Blacks.
On the Wallaby tour of 1908 he broke his tibia in his first match against Devon. He took no further part in the tour and one of the replacements sent over to fill the touring squad was his brother Albert.
[edit] Rugby league career
He was one of the fourteen 1908-09 Wallabies including Chris McKivat, Charles McMurtie, "Boxer" Russell and Arthur McCabe who defected to rugby league after their return from the Olympics and the epic tour. In Burge's case he joined his brother Alby in the 1909 "Wallabies v Kangaroos" promotional match which then disqualified him from the amateur code.
He joined the South Sydney Rabbitohs in 1910 but then the following year linked with Alby and Frank at Glebe. He toured Great Britain with the 1911-12 Kangaroos captained by his fomer Wallaby and then Glebe captain, Chris McKivat]. He made four tour matches appearances for Australia.
Along with McMurtie and Bob Stuart, Peter Burge made his international league debut in a tour match on that 1911 tour but did not play in any Tests. Collectively they were therefore Australia's 17th to 19th dual-code rugby internationals.
Like Frank in 1927, Peter in 1937 coached the St George Dragons.
[edit] Albert Burge
Albert Bentley 'Son' Burge (1889 - 1943) played rugby at lock with the Souths rugby union club in Sydney and at aged nineteen was selected and played two Tests for the Wallabies against New Zealand in 1907. He made the Wallaby tour of Great Britain of 1908, called up as a squad replacement fater Peter broke his leg. Alby appeared in a Test match against Wales. He was sent off for kicking in that match and did not make another rugby international appearance.
He switched to rugby league initially joining Newtown but then in 1911 he joined his brother Frank at Glebe. Albert was the captain of the Glebe side that lost the 1911 New South Wales Rugby League premiership final to Easts and captained the side for much of the next decade.
[edit] Laidley Burge
Laidley Burge represented for New South Wales in rugby league. He played 64 games for the Glebe Dirty Reds between 1916 and 1922 many of them alongside his brother Frank. He and Frank formed a front-row partnership in the Glebe side that contested the 1922 NSWRL Grand final against North Sydney.
[edit] References
- ^ Centenary of Rugby League - The Players. NRL & ARL (2008-02-23). Retrieved on 2008-02-23.
- ^ Peter Cassidy. "Controversy reigns as NRL releases top 100 players", Macquarie National News, 2008-02-23. Retrieved on 2008-02-23.
- ^ Todd Balym. "Johns, Meninga among Immortals", Fox Sports Australia, 2008-04-17. Retrieved on 2008-04-17.
- ^ Team of the Century Announced. NRL & ARL (2008-04-17). Retrieved on 2008-04-17.
- ^ [ A Centenary of Rugby League p110 ]
[edit] Sources
- Andrews, Malcolm (2006) The ABC of Rugby League, Austn Broadcasting Corpn, Sydney
- Whiticker, Alan (2004) Captaining the Kangaroos, New Holland, Sydney
- Whiticker, Alan & Hudson, Glen (2006) The Encyclopedia of Rugby League Players, Gavin Allen Publishing, Sydney
- Whiticker, Alan & Collis, Ian (2006) The History of Rugby League Clubs, New Holland, Sydney
- Heads, Ian & Middleton, David (2008) A Centenary of Rugby League, MacMillan, Sydney.
- Howell, Max (2005) Born to Lead: Wallaby Test Captains, Celebrity Books, Auckland, NZ.
