Ken Kearney

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Ken Kearney
Personal information
Full name	Kenneth Howard Kearney
Date of birth	1924
Place of birth	Penrith, New South Wales, Australia
Date of death	2006
Place of death	Gold Coast, Queensland
Nickname	Killer
Occupation(s)	Insurance Sales
Rugby league career
Position	Hooker
Professional clubs		Caps	(points)
1948–1951 1952–1961	Leeds RLFC, UK St George	95 156	(6) (58)
State Representation
1952–1958	New South Wales	33	(12)
National teams
1952–1958	Australia	31	(3)
Rugby union career
Playing career
Position	Hooker
Clubs
1942&1947-48	Parramatta Two Blues
National team(s)		Caps	(points)
1947–1948	Australia	7

Kenneth Howard Kearney (born 3 May, 1924, died 18 August, 2006) was an Australian rugby footballer - a dual international. He represented the Wallabies in 7 Tests and the Kangaroos in 31 Tests and World Cup games. He captained Australia in 9 Rugby League Test matches in 1956 and 1957. He was a hooker and captain-coach with the St. George Dragons in the first half of their eleven year consecutive premiership winning run from 1956 to 1966.

[edit] Rugby union

Kearney was born in Penrith, New South Wales. He joined Parramatta's 1st grade rugby union side from school before serving in the Royal Australian Air Force in WWII. After discharge he resumed Rugby Union and debuted for the Wallabies against the All Blacks playing two Tests in June 1947 then toured Europe in 1947-1948 playing against each of the five European rugby nations.

[edit] Rugby league

[edit] Club career

After a season with the Leeds Rugby League Club he returned to Australia in 1952 and joined St George. He played 156 games from 1952 to 1961, captained the club in five winning Grand Finals (as captain-coach for the latter four) and coached them to further victory in 1961.

Kearney brought tactics and strategy from English rugby league and is often credited with masterminding the Dragons successful run. He was able to inspire loyalty in his players by leading from the front and to develop a level of fitness and ruthless, mistake free football. This discipline was the foundation for the famous straight line brick-wall defence that kept the St George team at the top through those years.

In 1956, the commencing year of the Dragons' record breaking run Norm Tipping had coached the team to an excellent season result of 15 wins, four losses and 1 draw but regardless would be ousted from the coaching job shortly after the grand final victory. He was the loser in a power struggle with Kearney, who led the side on-field and who that year had captained Australia to a three Test whitewash of New Zealand, had captained New South Wales to state victory over Queensland, won the Sunday Telegraph's Player of the Year award and ultimately captained the Saints to premiership victory. The St George committee chose to back Kearney's fine football brain and his advanced strategies on attack, defense and conditioning in choosing him as their captain-coach to go forward. In the process they laid the foundation for the club's eleven year premiership stranglehold.

[edit] Representative career

Australian national rugby league captain

At the end of his first club rugby league season back in Australia with St George, Kearney was selected for the 1952 Kangaroo tour. Kearney played in the 3rd Test against Great Britain, all three tests against France and sixteen minor tour matches. Kearney's international rugby league debut in Bradford on 13 December 1952 saw him become Australia's 24th dual code rugby international, following Len Smith and preceding Rex Mossop.

He went on the 1953 tour of New Zealand playing in all three Tests and the following year represented in the inaugural World Cup in France.

Following his premiership success with St George as both captain and coach, Kearney was selected as captain-coach of Australia for the 1956 trans-Tasman series against New Zealand with Clive Churchill unavailable due to injury. Australia won the series 3-0 to regain the trans-Tasman trophy that the Kiwis had held since 1935.

Kearney stayed on a captain-coach for the 1956 Kangaroo tour in spite of the availability and tour selection of Churchill with whom he reportedly enjoyed an uneasy relationship. The touring side won all three Tests in France but lost against Great Britain 2-1. Kearney played in all Tests on tour. He played in an exceptionally talented Australian side who win the 1957 World Cup under skipper Dick Poole and the 1958 domestic Ashes series under captain Brian Davies before retiring from international football.

[edit] Coaching career

After retiring as a player Kearney coached the Parramatta Eels to the semi finals in 1962-1964 and was the foundation coach for the Cronulla Sharks in their first three seasons from 1967. He was a Freemason and worked in insurance sales in Sydney for 25 years. He retired to the Gold Coast where he died of a heart attack aged 82.

[edit] Accolades

In February 2008, Kearney 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]

[edit] Footnotes

[edit] Sources

• Whiticker, Alan (2004) Captaining the Kangaroos, New Holland, Sydney
• Writer, Larry (1995) Never Before, Never Again, Pan MacMillan, Sydney

[edit] External links

• NineMSN "St George great 'Killer' Kearney dies" August 19, 2006
• St George Leagues Club Journal Tribute November 2006