Howard Hallett (1890–1970) was an Australian

rugby league Rugby league football, commonly known as just rugby league and sometimes football, footy, rugby or league, is a full-contact sport played by two teams of thirteen players on a rectangular field measuring 68 metres (75 yards) wide and 112 ...

footballer and coach for South Sydney of the

New South Wales Rugby League premiership The New South Wales Rugby League premiership was the first rugby league football club competition established in Australia and contributor to today's National Rugby League. Run by the New South Wales Rugby League (initially named the New Sout ...

. Hallett primarily played at . He represented for

New South Wales ) , nickname = , image_map = New South Wales in Australia.svg , map_caption = Location of New South Wales in AustraliaCoordinates: , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name = Australia , established_title = Before federation , es ...

and

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...

and is considered one of the nation's finest footballers of the 20th century

Playing career

Hallett was originally an

Australian rules 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 ...

footballer and once kicked eighteen goals for the Crown Street Public School against Ultimo. He graduated with Souths in 1908, the first season of rugby league in Australia and made his debut in the first-grade team in 1909. Hallett was a playing member of three premiership-winning teams;

1909 Events January–February * January 4 – Explorer Aeneas Mackintosh of the Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition escaped death by fleeing across ice floes. * January 7 – Colombia recognizes the independence of Panama. * Januar ...

1914 This year saw the beginning of what became known as World War I, after Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria, heir to the Austrian throne was Assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand, assassinated by Serbian nationalist Gavrilo Princip. It als ...

and

1918 This year is noted for the end of the First World War, on the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month, as well as for the Spanish flu pandemic that killed 50–100 million people worldwide. Events Below, the events ...

. At the end of the 1914 season, Hallett was awarded a silver belt by the Sanderson Whiskey company as ''Player of the Season''. Hallett was first selected to play for New South Wales in 1911. In the same year he was selected to tour with the

1911–12 Kangaroo tour of Great Britain The 1911–12 Kangaroo tour of Great Britain was the second ever Kangaroo tour and was actually a tour by an " Australasian" squad that included four New Zealand players in addition to 24 Australian representatives. It took place over the British ...

, making his debut playing against the

Northern Union The Rugby Football League is the governing body for professional rugby league in England, and until 1995 for the whole British Isles. The name Rugby Football League previously also referred to the main league competition run by the organisati ...

Newcastle Newcastle usually refers to: *Newcastle upon Tyne, a city and metropolitan borough in Tyne and Wear, England *Newcastle-under-Lyme, a town in Staffordshire, England *Newcastle, New South Wales, a metropolitan area in Australia, named after Newcastle ...

as a and scoring his one and only test try. He played the remaining two tests at fullback. Hallett toured with New South Wales to New Zealand in both the 1913 inaugural tour and 1914. Hallett's final year as a member of the national team was in 1914 when the Northern Union toured Australia. In a game against Western Suburbs in 1924, Hallett was involved in a heavy collision, fracturing his jaw. Weeks later, he had surgery on his jaw. The scalpel from the surgeon however, left a permanent mark on the side of his face.

Coaching career

Hallett retired from first-grade in 1924 and in

1925 Events January * January 1 ** The Syrian Federation is officially dissolved, the State of Aleppo and the State of Damascus having been replaced by the State of Syria. * January 3 – Benito Mussolini makes a pivotal speech in the Italia ...

he was back at Souths as coach. He coached the team through their only unbeaten season; twelve games. The final two games of the season were cancelled as Souths sat at the top of the ladder, ten points ahead of their nearest rival. A four-team semi-finals series, along with other rule changes to speed up the game, was introduced in 1926 in an effort by the NSWRL to attract crowds back to the matches. Hallett once again coached his team to the top of the premiership ladder, with eleven points separating Souths from the

Glebe Dirty Reds The Glebe Dirty Reds are an Australian rugby league foundation club which played in the New South Wales Rugby Football League's Sydney premiership, the major competition for the sport in Sydney, from 1908 until their exit at the end of 1929. Th ...

, and took the team on to win the first

finals series Final, Finals or The Final may refer to: *Final (competition), the last or championship round of a sporting competition, match, game, or other contest which decides a winner for an event ** Another term for playoffs, describing a sequence of cont ...

. Hallett retired from coaching at the end of the 1926 season.

After football

Hallett's son, Howard Hallett Jnr, played 7 seasons for South Sydney between 1940 and 1949. Hallett died on 28 May 1970. In February 2008, Hallett was named in the list of Australia's ''100 Greatest Players'' (1908–2007) which was commissioned by the

NRL The National Rugby League (NRL) is an Australasian rugby league club competition which contains clubs from New South Wales, Queensland, Victoria, the Australian Capital Territory and New Zealand. The NRL formed in 1998 as a joint partnership ...

and

ARL ARL may refer to: Military * US Navy hull classification symbol for repair ship * Admiralty Research Laboratory, UK * United States Army Research Laboratory * ARL 44, a WWII French tank Organizations * Aero Research Limited, a UK adhesives compan ...

to celebrate the code's centenary year in Australia.

Footnotes

* *

References

External links

* (archived by web.archive.org
Statistics at nrlstats.com
* (archived by web.archive.org
Coach Statistics at nrlstats.com
{{DEFAULTSORT:Hallett, Howard 1890 births 1970 deaths Australasia rugby league team players Australia national rugby league team players Australian rugby league coaches Australian rugby league players New South Wales rugby league team players Rugby league centres Rugby league fullbacks Rugby league players from Sydney South Sydney Rabbitohs captains South Sydney Rabbitohs coaches South Sydney Rabbitohs players