KANGAROOS’ PROUD HISTORY

This is a continuation of the series of the History of the Kangaroos which Steve Ricketts compiled at the request of then Australian coach, Mal Meninga ahead of the 2024 Pacific Cup tournament. The decade by decade look at out national rugby league side was contained in a booklet presented to the players when they went into camp.

CHAPTER 10
1980-1990
THE INVINCIBLES

The 1982 Kangaroos were the first Australian touring side to make a clean sweep of an Ashes series in the UK. Centre, Mal Meninga scored 48 points (two tries 21 goals) across the three Tests and was the crowd favourite. ‘Big Mal’ had made his Test debut against the touring Kiwis earlier that year, but the seeds for his Australian selection were sown in the inaugural State of Origin match in 1980, when he kicked seven goals and proved a danger whenever in possession in Queensland’s 20-10 win.

On the International front in 1980, the Kangaroos toured New Zealand, winning both Tests. John Lang, who had played eight Tests in the 1970s, was a deserved selection for the tour after moving to Sydney to play for the Roosters.

Making his debut, fullback, Garry Dowling (Parramatta) was Man of the Match in the First Test 27-6 victory. Five provincial matches followed the Test and Australia was held to a 10-10 draw by a Maori selection, and suffered a loss to South Island. A weary Kangaroos’ outfit lifted for the Second Test, winning 15-6. (Dowling was killed in a car accident in the Gold Coast hinterland in 1983, returning from a trial match at Beaudesert).

France toured Australia in 1981, and the Kangaroos avenged their 1978 tour losses with comprehensive wins in both Tests. Future Immortal, Wally Lewis made his debut at five eighth in the 43-3 win in the First Test at the SCG, outside another debutant, Steve Mortimer, who scored two tries. The French put up a brave showing in the return game in Brisbane before losing 15-2, with giant winger, Terry Fahey Australia’s Man of the Match.

The Kiwis toured Australia in 1982, with Ces Mountford the coach. It was a lucky escape for the Kangaroos in the First Test in Brisbane with replacement forward, John Muggleton scoring the only try in the dying minutes, despite a hint of obstruction. (No bunker in those days). Australia won  11-8, and then moved up a gear in the return match in Sydney, winning 20-2. Brilliant centre, Steve Rogers captained the Kangaroos.

The Kangaroo touring party was chosen at the end of the domestic season, and the surprise was young Balmain second rower/lock, Wayne Pearce ahead of Manly’s Paul Vautin, who had made his Test debut against the Kiwis. Pearce’s devotion to physical fitness was a pointer to a new age of rugby league on the horizon.

The style of football played by the Kangaroos under Frank Stanton’s coaching, and the captaincy of Manly veteran, Max Krilich, captured the imagination of the British public, with national media coverage, and visits to training by coaches from a range of sports, wanting to learn the secrets of these amazing footballers from ‘down under’. According to British league great, Alex Murphy, they were ‘a team from another planet.’

Steve Ella, who did not play in the Tests against Great Britain, scored four tries in a 37-7 win over Wales in Cardiff, with former British Lions Rugby Union halfback, David Brynmor Williams rating the Kangaroos the best team he had played against, in either code. The only player from the starting 13 in Cardiff to feature in the First Test against Great Britain in Hull was veteran forward, Rod Reddy. That illustrates the depth of the 28-man touring squad.

Stanton’s decision to start with Parramatta pair, Peter Sterling and Brett Kenny in the halves instead of the incumbents, Mortimer and Lewis, was a source of controversy, particularly in Queensland where Wally was indeed ‘The King’.  In the end it was hard to argue when Sterling and Kenny played so brilliantly in all three Tests, with the Kangaroos scoring 99 points to 18.

Australia made light work of the provincial games in France, but the French were courageous in the Tests – much tougher opponents than the British. Australia won 15-4 in Avignon and 23-9 in Narbonne.

So the history making Kangaroos returned to Australia having won all 22 games, including a Test against Papua New Guinea on the way to the UK. The Australian party actually split in two, with those not involved in the PNG Test, playing against Western Australia in Perth. Early in 1983 the Kangaroos were provided a motorcade through the streets of Sydney, in a repeat of the honour bestowed on the 1963-64 Kangaroos.

Graham Lowe succeeded Mountford as coach of the Kiwis in 1983. Australia won the First Test in Auckland, with Queenslander, Wally Fullerton Smith making an impressive debut. In the return match in Brisbane, three more Queenslanders – fullback, Colin Scott; centre, Gene Miles and prop, Brad Tessmann – made their debuts. Miles joined Mal Meninga in the centres – the first all-Queensland Test centre combination since Alex Watson and Noel Hazzard in 1954. (Working for Brisbane’s Telegraph newspaper, I arranged a photograph of the young Kangaroos with the former greats, at the team hotel, the Park Royal).

The Kiwis had no time for sentiment, and won the Lang Park match 19-12, performing a haka after the match, and not before. Australia retained the Trans-Tasman Trophy on points difference.

Great Britain toured in 1984, with a new look side, as you can imagine, after the embarrassments of 1982. The Lions gave youngsters like Lee Crooks, Ellery Hanley, Andy Gregory, Garry Schofield and Tony Myler a chance, and this time there was no problem with their fitness levels or pace, under the coaching of Frank Myler, who had captained the Ashes winning 1970 British side in Australia.

It was Wally Lewis’s first campaign as Australian skipper, and Queenslanders dominated the series given the Maroons were thumping the Blues at Origin level. The Kangaroos won the First Test 25-8, with hooker, Greg ‘Turtle’ Conescu becoming the last man chosen for Australia from a regional centre. Conescu was playing club football in Gladstone at the time, under the terms of his contract with the QRL.

Poor old Greg grabbed most of the headlines after his Test debut, with British forward, David Hobbs hitting him with a vicious forearm to the head late in the game. The impact sent one of Conescu’s front teeth flying onto the cricket pitch area of the SCG, with players returning to the field after fulltime to find it. Conescu was carried from the field on a stretcher, while Hobbs was sent from the field.

In the Second Test at Brisbane’s Lang Park, the British targeted Lewis, and some of the assaults were little more than back street thuggery. Meninga, who was overlooked for the First Test, scored a try and kicked three goals in Brisbane. Mal kicked four goals in Australia’s 20-7 win in the Third Test, which was the international farewell for Ray Price, who was carried shoulder high from the field by Lewis. It was a wonderful gesture from ‘The King’, who had had many run-ins with Price on the field, along with a number of tense exchanges in the media. 

Terry Fearnley, who like Stanton the previous year was coach of the New South Wales Origin side, was appointed national coach in 1985, with the Kangaroos to play three Tests against the Kiwis – one at Lang Park and two at Auckland’s Carlaw Park. The Lang Park Test saw the debut of prop, Steve ‘Blocker’ Roach; Indigenous winger, John Ferugson; Parramatta icon, Peter Wynn and Queensland Origin hero, Chris ‘Choppy’ Close. (Close had toured New Zealand with the Kangaroos in 1980, without playing a Test).

On the football front the Lang Park Test is remembered for winger, John Ribot’s two tries and a crucial goal in a 26-20 win by the Kangaroos. But the headlines surrounded a brawl between Australian prop, Greg Dowling and Kiwi rival, Kevin Tamati, a noted amateur boxer. Dowling and Tamati had been sent to the sin bin by French referee, Julian Rascagneres, but as they left the field they engaged in a slanging match, then a bit of push and shove, which developed into a fight. Both men finished up against the wire perimeter fence, head butting each other. Nearby was future Australian cricket captain, Mark ‘Tubby’ Taylor, who had played fullback for NSW Tertiary Colleges in a curtain raiser, with the team given seats inside the fence. Sponsors from Steinlager Brewery, who were also seated inside the fence, told journalists they were splattered with blood as Dowling and Tamati went at it.

When the Australians arrived in New Zealand for a tour, which would include two Tests, they were the centre of unprecedented media attention ‘across the ditch’, knocking the All Blacks off the back page for the first time.

The Kangaroos won on the bell in the return Test in Auckland, with that man Ribot scoring in the corner from a scrum move. Fearnley wasn’t happy, even though the series had been won, and made major changes for the Third Test, dumping Queenslanders, Mark Murray and Greg Conescu and relegating Chris Close and Greg Dowling to the bench. The Kiwis won the Third Test 18-0, again knocking the All Blacks off the back page.

There was outrage back in Brisbane at the axing of their Maroon heroes, which was to be expected, and the Australian Rugby League decided it wasn’t wise to appoint Origin coaches to the national job. Canberra’s Don Furner, was given the Test job in 1986. Furner was a New South Welshman, but he played much of his senior football in Queensland, and had represented his adopted State against New South Wales, so he was the perfect fit.

INVINCIBLE AGAIN.

In 1986 Wally Lewis became the first Queenslander to captain the Kangaroos in the northern hemisphere since Tommy Gorman in 1929. Australia, with Lewis as skipper, had won the 1986 Trans-Tasman series 3-0, with centre, Brett Kenny scoring five tries. Celebrations were dampened by the fact vice-captain, Wayne Pearce had torn the anterior cruciate ligament in the left knee, and despite a courageous effort to prove his fitness, was ruled out of the tour of Britain and France.

Dual international, Michael O’Connor was a star in both rugby codes. His best backline? The 1986 Kangaroos’ Test line-up: Halfback, Peter Sterling; five eighth, Wally Lewis (c); centres, Brett Kenny, Gene Miles; wingers, Michael O’Connor, Dale Shearer; fullback, Garry Jack. That’s right – Mal Meninga was forced back to the bench/second row. The likes of Gary Belcher, Greg Alexander, Terry Lamb and Les Kiss (appointed Wallabies coach in 2025) played the mid-week games.

Lewis, Kenny, Sterling, Miles and Meninga were all members of the 1982 Invincibles, and now they were part of the ‘Unbeatables’. Meninga remained a crowd favourite, particularly as he had had a stunning stint with St Helens in 1984.

Sterling believed the 1986 team’s achievements ranked slightly above those of 1982, because Great Britain had improved. But French standards had dropped, and Australia scored 96 points to two in the Tests in Perpignan and Carcassonne.

There was a one-off Test against the Kiwis in 1987, at Lang Park, just six days after the completion of one of the tightest, most intense Origin series on record. It turned into a real ambush with the Tony ‘Tank’ Gordon coached Kiwis winning 13-6.

Lewis was named inaugural captain of the Brisbane Broncos in 1988, and that same year led the Kangaroos to a 2-1 home series win over Great Britain, and a 25-12 win over the Mark Graham led Kiwis in the World Cup final at Eden Park, Auckland, in front of a record crowd (for the code in NZ) of 47,363.

Thousands of supporters from the UK followed the 1988 British side, which was coached by the legendary Mal Reilly. Australia won the First Test in Sydney 17-6, with Canberra centre, Peter Jackson scoring two tries on debut. Australia was even more impressive in the return match in Brisbane, winning 34-14 with O’Connor scoring a try and kicking five goals.

The Third Test was expected to be cakewalk for the home side, but Britain defied the critics, and won 26-12, their first win over the Kangaroos since 1978, and their first win in Australia since 1974. British supporters celebrated in the streets of Sydney’s CBD as if they had won the series. Australian prop, Sam Backo, scored a try in each Test.

Broncos’ Ipswich born halfback, Allan ‘Alfie’ Langer made his Australian debut in a one-off Test against Papua New Guinea at Eric Weissel Oval, Wagga Wagga, a ground named after the Kangaroos’ five eighth on the 1929-30 Kangaroo Tour in Britain. This was the first Test in Australia played outside Sydney or Brisbane. ‘Alfie’ and Meninga each scored two tries, while Michael O’Connor crossed four times, as well as kicking seven goals.

The Kangaroos also played a match against a Rest of the World selection to celebrate the Bicentenary of European settlement in Australia, and ‘Big Mal’ broke his left arm for the fourth time in two years. Australia beat the World side 22-10 with Gavin Miller Man of the Match.

Lewis broke his arm in the World Cup final in Auckland at the end of the season, but not before he helped steer Australia to a 21-0 lead. The final score was 25-12 with Langer Man of the Match.

‘King Wally’ finished the decade by leading the Kangaroos on an undefeated tour of New Zealand, with Canberra’s Bradley Clyde named Man of the Series. The ‘Immortal’, Bob Fulton had succeeded Furner as Australian coach, and he went for a giant pack to combat the aggressive tactics of the Kiwis. For the first time Rotorua hosted a Test, and 26,000 turned out to support the code, which had been embraced over rugby union by many Maori in the Waikato region.

At the end of the year, Lewis was sacked as Broncos’ skipper, while the man who would succeed him at Test level, Mal Meninga captained the Canberra Raiders to an extra-time Grand Final win in a match still widely regarded as the greatest grand final of them all.

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