Simon Feast (born 1 December 1974) is a former Australian rules footballer who played with the Sydney Swans in the Australian Football League (AFL) and for much longer with Sturt in the South Australian National Football League.

Early life

Born in

Port MacDonnell, South Australia Port MacDonnell, originally known as ''Ngaranga''Christina Smith, The Booandik Tribe of South Australian Aborigines: A Sketch of Their Habits, Customs, Legends, and Language', Spiller, 1880 is the southernmost town in South Australia. The smal ...

, where his father was a fisherman, Feast moved to nearby

Mount Gambier, South Australia Mount Gambier is the second most populated city in South Australia, with an estimated urban population of 33,233 . The city is located on the slopes of Mount Gambier (volcano), Mount Gambier, a volcano in the south east of the state, about sou ...

as an 8-year-old. Despite not coming from a sporting family, at 13 Feast started playing football for

East Gambier Football Club The East Gambier Football & Netball Club is an Australian rules football and netball formed in 1938 that currently competes in the Western Border Football League. History The East Gambier Football Club first formally formed in 1938 (though the c ...

in the

Western Border Football League The Western Border Football League is an Australian rules football competition based in the Lower South East region of South Australia, and south-western border region of Victoria. It is an affiliated member of the South Australian National Foo ...

. As a latecomer to junior football Feast wasn't the most gifted junior but developed into a promising ruckman. He had a trial at

Norwood Football Club Norwood Football Club, nicknamed the Redlegs, is an Australian rules football club competing in the South Australian National Football League (SANFL) in the state of South Australia. Its home ground is Coopers Stadium (Norwood Oval), which i ...

but returned home shortly after. Feast went to play football in Darwin in the 1994 off season as a 19-year-old and when he returned home Feast had an offer from Sturt's general manager Ross Tuohy, which he gladly accepted as an opportunity to leave his job at a timber mill.

Football career

Feast began when the Double Blues were at a low ebb – they had suffered six consecutive wooden spoons, and his debut season of 1995 was an unprecedented horror with Sturt losing all 22 games by no fewer than 24 points. Feast, however, won Sturt’s best and fairest award as a rookie, and continued this form as the Double Blues made a remarkable revival over the following three seasons to win sixteen matches in 1998, winning another best and fairest in 1998. Sydney drafted Feast, a ruckman, from the Double Blues with pick 71 in the National Draft. He made his league debut in round five of the

1999 AFL season The 1999 AFL season was the 103rd season of the Australian Football League (AFL), the highest level senior Australian rules football competition in Australia, which was known as the Victorian Football League until 1989. The season featured s ...

, coming into the side for

Greg Stafford Francis Gregory Stafford (February 9, 1948 – October 10, 2018), usually known as Greg Stafford, was an American game designer, publisher, and practitioner of shamanism. Stafford is most famous as the creator of the fantasy world of Gloranth ...

. In his time at Sydney he was never able to become a regular fixture in the team, playing five games in 1999, four in 2000 and five in 2001. Feast played VFL football for

Port Melbourne Port Melbourne is an inner-city List of Melbourne suburbs, suburb in Melbourne, Victoria (Australia), Victoria, Australia, south-west of Melbourne's Melbourne central business district, Central Business District, located within the Cities of ...

as they were the Swan's reserve side and received the second most votes in the 2001 J. J. Liston Trophy. After being discarded by Sydney for the 2002 season, Feast returned to Sturt and played in the Double Blues’ only premiership since 1976. He continued to play for Sturt until his retirement in 2008, by when he had played 205 games in the double-blue strip.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Feast, Simon 1974 births Living people Australian rules footballers from South Australia Sydney Swans players Sturt Football Club players Port Melbourne Football Club players