80th Junee schoolboys’ football carnival
Author : Michael McCormack MP
80th Junee schoolboys’ football carnival
The Junee Schoolboys’ Football Carnival is celebrating its 80th event tomorrow with 155 teams nominated this year – a remarkable achievement!
Junee centre Laurie Daley makes a break in his team’s 26-0 win against Yanco on the way to winning the Riverina Schoolboys’ Rugby League Carnival 14A division at Junee in 1983
The carnival gave the legendary Junee boy Laurie Daley his first taste of footy. He first won the carnival in 1976 in the under 7s and went on to great things.
His team won the Junee knockout every year until the U15s.
When the initial lineup of teams nominated for the 1943 Junee carnival came out, it included three from Yanco.
Over the years, sides representing Yanco Agricultural High School have dominated the tournament.
The sight of the famous blue jersey with the yellow V was enough to strike fear in the hearts of many opponents.
YAHS always had formidable teams – large lads who were fit, fast and well drilled.
Yanco players seemed to impose themselves even before the kick-off!
In 1978 – the year I won a Junee carnival pennant playing for Saint Michael’s Regional High School – four teams, including Yanco, entered the 14 years’ C division.
Laurie Daley laces up before a game in August 1983. He scored a remarkable 481 points in 1982-83 for Junee in the Wagga Wagga Sub Junior Rugby League competition and won 10 consecutive premierships from juniors through to first grade for his beloved hometown
Cootamundra Catholic and Junee High also participated.
We went through undefeated, Cootamundra won twice and Junee once but Yanco, surprisingly, failed to win at all.
I remember the carnival well, not least because I badly injured my right knee in the opening exchanges against Junee … against players who I usually teamed up with in the Wagga Wagga Sub Junior competition.
That game, played on a sloping field, featured our Junee Saturday side shared between the two teams.
St Michael’s XIII included tough tackling forward Gerard Farrell, Anthony Heffernan, Michael McAlister and Brian Schultz – whilst Junee had Tony Fitzgerald, Robbie McLeod, Craig Spencer and the late Gary Crowe, a hard-running centre … good players all.
Junee missed the 1978 Wagga Wagga Sub Junior Rugby League under 14 finals so the carnival brought the curtain down on our season … but what a memorable finish for those who wore the red with the two blue Vs of St Michael’s!
St Michael’s also won the Junee carnival 14A division in 1978 and many of that team played for Brothers who prevailed in a thrilling WWSJRL Grand Final.
Michael McCormack MP Prized Possession: With my precious Junee carnival pennant from 1978
A fortnight later, winning 11-8 against a Kangaroo Panthers’ side containing Paul Upfield, a St Michael’s school-mate of mine who later played 92 NSWRL games with Illawarra, St George and Balmain and represented NSW Country.
The Junee carnival featured so many youngsters who went on to play the game at the highest level and certainly those helter skelter games on temporary, slanted and often muddy fields on that first August Saturday no doubt had a part to play in that!
Best of luck to the players, coaches, organisers and the many volunteers for another successful carnival.
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