Len Fitzgerald (7 May 1929 – 17 April 2007) 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 of exceptional talent 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) and

South Australian National Football League The South Australian National Football League, or SANFL ( or ''S-A-N-F-L''), is an Australian rules football league based in the Australian state of South Australia. It is also the state's governing body for the sport. Originally formed as the ...

(SANFL). At various time he played in the key positions of

centre half-forward In Australian rules football, the centre half-forward is a position on the half-forward line of a football field. The directly opposing player is a centre half-back. Royce Hart of the Richmond Football Club and Wayne Carey of the North Melbour ...

centre half-back In the sport of Australian rules football, the half-back line refers to the positions of the 3 players on the field that occupy the centre half-back and left and right half-back flank positions. Centre half-back The role of the centre half-back ...

and ruck-rover.

VFL career

Fitzgerald started his career at Collingwood at the age of 15, in 1945. By 1950 he was an established key player with arguably the country's most illustrious sporting club.

Move to SANFL

It was thus surprising that in 1951 he was lured to the

Sturt Football Club The Sturt Football Club, nicknamed The Double Blues, is a semi-professional Australian rules football club based in the suburb of Unley, South Australia, which plays in the South Australian National Football League. Founded in 1901 by the Stur ...

in the South Australian competition. Fitzgerald was clearly attracted to the offer of better paying employment proffered by Sturt. One source has suggested however that the move was engineered by Collingwood powerbroker

John Wren John Wren (3 April 1871 – 26 October 1953) was an Australian bookmaker, boxing and wrestling promoter, Irish nationalist, land speculator, newspaper owner, racecourse and racehorse owner, soldier, pro-conscriptionist and theatre owner. He b ...

at the behest of a political ally in South Australia.

SANFL career

Arriving at Sturt in 1951, Fitzgerald quickly made an impression, being appointed captain after three games, and took over the coaching role mid-season. In 1952 Fitzgerald dominated the League, winning his first

Magarey Medal The Magarey Medal is an Australian rules football honour awarded annually since 1898 to the fairest and most brilliant player in the South Australian National Football League (SANFL), as judged by field umpires. The award was created by Willia ...

as the "fairest and most brilliant" player in the League. He was to win two more in 1954 and 1959. Despite Fitzgerald's brilliance, Sturt was unable to secure a premiership. In 1955 Fitzgerald got Sturt to the preliminary final, but the club failed to honour a promise of a bonus. Fitzgerald took himself to the Ovens and Murray League for the next three seasons, coaching and playing for

Benalla Benalla is a small city located on the Broken River gateway to the High Country north-eastern region of Victoria, Australia, about north east of the state capital Melbourne. At the the population was 10,822. It is the administrative centr ...

. When Fitzgerald returned to Sturt in 1959, he helped them to make the finals that year, the first time since his departure. Injuries began to take their toll on his playing and Fitzgerald finished his playing career in 1962 after playing 127 games for Sturt, kicking 201 goals and winning the club's best and fairest award three times. He represented his adopted State of

South Australia South Australia (commonly abbreviated as SA) is a state in the southern central part of Australia. It covers some of the most arid parts of the country. With a total land area of , it is the fourth-largest of Australia's states and territories ...

20 times and was named an

All Australian The All-Australian team is an all-star team of Australian rules footballers, selected by a panel at the end of each season. It represents a complete team, including an interchange bench, of the best-performed players during the season, led by ...

in the 1953 Adelaide Carnival. Fitzgerald coached Glenelg for three seasons after his retirement as a player, but with little success. He was inducted into 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 ...

in 1996 and the SANFL Hall of Fame in 2002, as one of the inaugural inductees in each.

References

External links

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SANFL Hall of Fame
* {{DEFAULTSORT:Fitzgerald, Len 1929 births 2007 deaths Collingwood Football Club players Sturt Football Club players Glenelg Football Club coaches Sturt Football Club coaches Australian Football Hall of Fame inductees All-Australians (1953–1988) Magarey Medal winners Australian rules footballers from Victoria (Australia) Benalla Football Club players South Australian Football Hall of Fame inductees