George Michael Moloney (7 August 1909 – 5 January 1983) was an

Australian rules football Australian football, also called Australian rules football or Aussie rules, or more simply football or footy, is a contact sport played between two teams of 18 players on an oval field, often a modified cricket ground. Points are scored by k ...

er who played for the Claremont Football Club in the

West Australian National Football League The West Australian Football League (WAFL) is an Australian rules football league based in Perth, Western Australia. The league currently consists of ten teams, which play each other in a 20-round season usually lasting from March to September, ...

(WANFL) and for the

Geelong Football Club The Geelong Football Club, nicknamed the Cats, is a professional Australian rules football club based in Geelong, Victoria, Australia. The club competes in the Australian Football League (AFL), the sport's premier competition, and are the 2022 ...

in the

Victorian Football League The Victorian Football League (VFL) is an Australian rules football league in Australia serving as one of the second-tier regional semi-professional competitions which sit underneath the fully professional Australian Football League (AFL). It ...

(VFL). An inaugural member of the

Australian Football Hall of Fame The Australian Football Hall of Fame was established in 1996, the Centenary year of the Australian Football League, to help recognise the contributions made to the sport of Australian rules football by players, umpires, media personalities, coa ...

and an inaugural Legend of the

West Australian Football Hall of Fame The West Australian Football Hall of Fame was created in 2002 to recognise and enshrine those who have made a significant contribution to Australian rules football in Western Australia. People eligible for inclusion are players, coaches, umpires, ...

, "Specka" Moloney had a formidable reputation as a centre, a goalsneak and a key forward. He is one of few players to kick 100 or more goals in a season in both the WANFL and the VFL/AFL competitions. After four years at Claremont in the 1920s, Moloney drew strong attention as a goalsneak for

Western Australia Western Australia (commonly abbreviated as WA) is a state of Australia occupying the western percent of the land area of Australia excluding external territories. It is bounded by the Indian Ocean to the north and west, the Southern Ocean to th ...

at the

1930 Adelaide Carnival The 1930 Adelaide Carnival was the seventh edition of the Australian National Football Carnival, an Australian rules football interstate competition. It was held from 30 July to 9 August and was the second carnival to be hosted by the South Austr ...

. The following year, he moved to Victoria and joined the

, where he played for five years, generally at full forward; he won a premiership with the club in 1931, and kicked 109 goals in 1932. In 1936, Moloney returned to Claremont in the WANFL, he won the

Sandover Medal The Sandover Medal is an Australian rules football award, given annually since 1921 to the fairest and best player in the West Australian Football League. The award was donated by Alfred Sandover M.B.E., a prominent Perth hardware merchant and be ...

in 1936 as the league's

fairest and best In Australian sport, the best and fairest award recognises the player(s) adjudged to have had the best performance in a game or over a season for a given sporting club or competition. The awards are sometimes dependent on not receiving a suspensi ...

player playing primarily as a centre. In 1938, he led Claremont to its first-ever premiership, and repeated the feat in the next two seasons. All told, he played a total of 190 WA(N)FL games, some of them alongside brothers Robert (103 games 1930-36) and Syd (145 games 1934-41). Arguably the greatest name in the history of the Claremont Football Club, and certainly one of the most uniquely versatile champions ever to have adorned the game, George "Specka" Moloney rounded off his association with the Tigers by coaching them, without much success, from 1948 to 1951. In 1996, Moloney was inducted into the

and in 2004 he was inducted into the

where he has legend status.

References

Bibliography

External links

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Profile
at WAFL FootyFacts website
AFL Hall of Fame - Players

Profile
at WAFL Hall of Fame website {{DEFAULTSORT:Moloney, George 1909 births 1983 deaths Geelong Football Club players Geelong Football Club Premiership players Claremont Football Club players Claremont Football Club coaches Australian Football Hall of Fame inductees Carji Greeves Medal winners Sandover Medal winners VFL Leading Goalkicker Medal winners West Australian Football Hall of Fame inductees One-time VFL/AFL Premiership players Australian rules footballers from Fremantle