Graham Quinn (centre) with his St George teammate Mark Shulman and their coach, Harry Bath
Former Queensland State of Origin centre, Graham Quinn talks in reverent tones about his first coach at St George Dragons, the legendary Harry Bath, a man known as ‘The Old Fox’. Quinn was a member of ‘Bath’s Babes’, the young team which won the 1977 Sydney premiership in a replay with Parramatta, after the grand final finished 9-all. Quinn won another premiership under Bath in 1979, with the Dragons beating Canterbury-Bankstown 17-13.
“Harry didn’t need notes or stats,” Quinn said of his fellow Queenslander. “He could just rattle stuff off. He had a Plan A and Plan B. He also believed you should never coach the initiative out of a player. You should harness it. After Ted Goodwin did a chip kick from inside his own 20-metre area, Harry said to him that he what he did was brilliant, but to consider the percentages in future. Keep doing it, but look at where you do it.”
Quinn had joined St George on the recommendation of St George’s future ‘Immortal’, Graeme Langlands who had coached New South Wales against Queensland in 1976, when Quinn played for the Maroons for the first time.
A product of Cannon Hill Stars junior rugby league, the club that produced Wally Lewis, Quinn should have made his State debut in 1975, at the Sydney Cricket Ground, when he was chosen as a reserve for the third and deciding match.
“(Coach) Barry Muir wanted to give me a run late in the game, but the trainer couldn’t get John Payne off the field,” Quinn said. “‘Paynee’ kept telling him to f… off. ‘Garbo’ (Muir) apologised afterwards. He wanted me to play lock, that’s why he was calling (second rower) ‘Paynee’ to the sidelines.”
Quinn remained on the bench for another rep., game in 1975 – Brisbane against England’s World Series’ team, coached by the legendary Alex Murphy.
“Nev Hornery (Brisbane’s lock) decided he wanted to take on the English pack, and early in the game he knocked out their hooker, Keith Bridges,” Quinn said. “It was on from there. Some of the stuff that happened, you wouldn’t believe. (Brisbane coach) Henry Holloway turned to me on the bench, and said ‘I won’t let you on, young fellow’. He wanted to protect me.”
Quinn’s State debut came the following season, against NSW at Lang Park, with Harry Cameron his co-centre. Quinn replaced Tony Obst, who had played in the Maroons’ 33-9 loss in the opening match of the series at the SCG.
In Game 2, Queensland went down fighting, losing only 10-5, with Maroons’ hooker, John Lang the man of the match.
The Courier-Mail’s Jack Reardon was glowing in his praise of Quinn’s performance.
“Quinn had a distinguished baptism, and lost nothing in comparison with his more experienced rivals, Mick Cronin and Steve Rogers,” Reardon wrote.
After the third game, which the Blues won 15-13 in controversial fashion, Reardon predicted Quinn would become a fixture in Queensland teams for years to come.
Instead, Quinn played only one more match for the Maroons, before his move to Sydney, and that was against touring English club side, St Helens.
“That third game against the Blues was the one where the outer used the ‘bullshit’ chant for the first time,’ Quinn recalled. “The Sydney referee (Gary Cook) gave NSW a late penalty for a shepherd, and that’s how the Blues won. The outer just lit-up.
“Against St Helens I marked (Welshman) Eddie Cunningham, and he knocked me out, off the ball, with the neatest elbow. I had no idea what happened. In that match, we played with Qantas advertised on the jersey, which I think is the first time that had happened with Queensland.”
A student at Iona College at Lindum, on Brisbane’s southern bayside, in the heart of Wynnum-Manly territory, one of his rivals at schoolboy level was future Wallaby, Paul McLean, who attended St Edmund’s in Ipswich. (McLean did not play union until he completed his schooling at Nudgee College on Brisbane’s northside). It was thought Quinn would play his senior football with Wynnum. But he heard nothing from the club, and said they did not send any players to the college for coaching clinics.
Instead, he followed Cannon Hill teammate, Alan Beauchamp across the river to Brothers, at northside Grange, and aged 18, made his first-grade debut in 1972, in a home trial against North Sydney, when he marked Test winger, George Ambrum. His Brisbane club debut came in a match against the Des Morris captained Easts’ side at Lang Park.
“(Test hooker) Brian Fitzsimmons put me through a hole on the blindside, and I scored a try right in front of the Frank Burke Stand,” Quinn recalled. “It was a great feeling, but it was all down to ‘Fitzy’, who saw something I didn’t. Bob Fulton had talks with Brothers that year, about coming to Brisbane as a captain-coach in ’73. He actually spoke to me and said make sure you stay here, son.”
Quinn played centre alongside Bowen (North Queensland) product, Murray Schultz in the 1974 grand final, with Wayne Bennett at fullback. Valleys, with Holloway as coach and Quinn’s old Cannon Hill Stars’ teammate, Alan Beauchamp on the wing, won a try-less match 9-2.
In 1975, Brothers finished out of the finals, but in 1976 they were back in contention, finishing third, and then advancing to the preliminary final, only to be beaten 18-10 by eventual premiers, Wests.
“I played under some fine coaches before I moved to Sydney, and the BRL was a tough competition,” Quinn said. “In 1972 I had Col Weiss at Brothers, and he taught me about the importance of putting in the hard work at training, whether it was the physical stuff or skills. I had seen Col play for Australia against the Poms at Lang Park in 1970, when I played a curtain raiser for Combined Catholic Colleges. Col, who was a blacksmith, used railway sleepers as weights. He practiced things like the chip over the top. Nothing he achieved came by chance.
“Paul Broughton (Brothers’ coach in ’74) was always looking for something better, for something different to get over the opposition. ‘Garbo’ (Muir) helped me enormously. Sometimes it was just the little things he would say to you on the side.”
At St George in Sydney, Quinn’s centre partner was Robert Finch.
“I was lucky, in my career, to have had top blokes alongside me,” Quinn said. “In Brisbane I had the likes of Murray Schultz and Paul Beauchamp. Murray was so dependable, and so was Robert Finch. ‘Finchy’ was also a great sledger. One of the best. That 1977 St George side was such a good defensive outfit, and we never thought of defeat. We had great self-belief and we knew we could get ‘Parra’ in the replay.”
Quinn was back in a representative jersey in 1980 – the Sky Blue of New South Wales – for a match against his home state at Leichhardt Oval, when his opposing centres were Chris Close and Mal Meninga. Kerry Boustead, Rod Morris and John Lang were the other Queenslanders in the NSW side.
Less than 48 hours later, Quinn was on the plane to New Zealand, with the Frank Stanton coached Australian team. Quinn, a controversial omission from the 1978 Kangaroo tour of Britain and France, played all five provincial games across the Tasman, and played wing in the Second Test at Carlaw Park, Auckland, which Australia won 15-6, to wrap up the series 2-0. Quinn replaced the injured Kerry Boustead, with Stanton electing to stick with Greg Brentnall as Mick Cronin’s centre partner.
“Against Central Districts in Wellington, I was up against a young bloke they said was the great Maori hope,” Quinn said. “I knocked him out early in the match, and these blokes in bikies’ colours started giving me heaps, and it looked as if they would come on to the field. The touch judge was looking nervous, and I must admit to being a bit worried myself. The game was willing, and I got involved in a couple of stoushes. When I was walking back into position, one of the ‘bikies’ yelled out: ‘Hey 2. You’re all right’
“In the same match, Rohan Hancock, straight out of the bush at Warwick, took on big Test prop, Whetu Henry and finished at least square.”
Quinn enjoyed the touring life, rooming with Mick Cronin, and getting to see new places.
Bitter rivals at club level, Rod Reddy (St George) and Ray Price (Parramatta) were deliberately kept apart when it came to room allocations, but acted as professionals, representing their country.
“Tom Raudonikis used to bait ‘Rocket’ and ‘Pricey’,” Quinn said. “On the field, ‘Rocket’ could certainly dish it out, but he never complained when people got their own back.”
After the tour, Quinn was chosen in the centres for Queensland for the inaugural State of Origin match at Lang Park, but had to withdraw after dislocating his shoulder. He had to wait until 1982 to get his chance in Origin, in the first ever series, with stand-alone matches held in 1980 and ’81. The pressure was on the Maroons after they had lost the first match in 1982, at Lang Park. The return match was back at Lang Park and Queensland were being written off in many quarters, with the Blues, under the astute coaching of Frank Stanton, primed for the kill.
Quinn was partnered with Gene Miles in the centres, and their rivals were Steve Rogers and Brad Izzard.
“We won 15-7 and their only try was scored by Izzard,” Quinn recalls. “I was filthy that I missed him. I actually lost sight of the ball. I had worn glasses since I was 15. In the night games, I used to get headaches from concentrating. Barry Beath (former St George forward) nicknamed me ‘Mr Magoo’.”
Injury forced Quinn out of the decider at the SCG, which Queensland won 10-5, with Wally Lewis man of the match and future Test centre, Tony Currie making his debut for Queensland, off the bench.
In 1983, St George signed Wallaby centre, Michael O’Connor, and Quinn played several games alongside him, but also played in the second row, and twice captained the Dragons.
Glandular fever sidelined Quinn in 1984, and it looked as if his career was over, but ‘super coach’, Jack Gibson persuaded him to play with Cronulla in 1985.
“The Sharks had a good young side, with blokes like Andrew Ettingshausen and Mark McGaw coming through,” Quinn said. “I played one game against St George in reserve grade, and (Saints’ prop) Robert Stone asked me as I took the field, whether it was going to be ‘on’ or not. I said I held no grudges and it would be hard, but fair.”
Quinn was offered a second year at Cronulla, and there was the option of going to England to play with Barrow. But he decided to concentrate on life after football, although he could never divorce himself entirely from the code.
He coached Brothers’ colts back in Brisbane in 1992 and ’93, and recommended a young prop to St George, but didn’t hear anything back. His name was Shane Webcke.
“Shane would have gone,” Quinn said. “He wasn’t committed to playing with the Broncos, despite what some people think.”
In 1994 Quinn coached Wynnum-Manly first grade in the BRL.
His working life has taken him from sheep branding at the Cannon Hill sales yards, to driving brewery trucks and sand trucks; to working in finance and insurance; to being an area manager for IXL, and then Carlton and United Breweries. Working in the liquor industry saw him rub shoulders over the years with Mark Shulman, Penfolds’ general manager, who was halfback in the 1977 grand final. Graham was devastated when Mark passed away in February, 2022.
When he looks back on his football career, Quinn has few regrets, but feels deeply for men such as Col Weiss, Brian Fitzsimmons and ground breaking indigenous winger, Lionel Morgan who played for Australia from Wynnum-Manly in 1960.
“The AFL acknowledge their old stars so much better than we do,” Quinn says. “The kids in Victoria know who the players are when they are paraded around on grand final day. They know all about them.
”Weissy’ and ‘Fitzy’ played in a tough era for Queensland, and it would have been nice if they could have had a chance to play alongside some of the stars who had moved to Sydney, like Arthur Beetson, John Wittenberg and Dennis Manteit.”
Quinn experienced the best of both worlds, having played in the old inter-state series and Origin.
This is an updated version of an article I wrote for Family of League magazine, after interviewing Graham at Helensvale in 2021. I played at Brothers in 1976 but my only first grade match was the round 1 Amco Cup win over Penrith at Lang Park, a match Graham missed through injury.
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