CLAREMONT - Part Two: 1942 to 2008

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The improvement in fortunes, when it came, was hardly seismic at first, but ultimately the club's achievements in 1964 probably exceeded even the wildest expectations of the most optimistic of its supporters.  After claiming the wooden spoon in 1962 and 1963 Claremont undertook the apparently desperate measure of appointing a complete outsider as coach in the shape of former East Fremantle rover Jim Conway.  The move was far from universally popular, but Conway soon had his charges playing competitive, if hardly spectacular or even consistent, football.  By the end of the minor round the Tigers had scraped into the finals in 4th place (see footnote 5) but it would have taken a very brave person indeed to wage money on their going on to lift the flag, or even progressing any further.  In this context Claremont's hard fought 10.13 (73) to 8.13 (61) 1st semi final defeat of Subiaco was probably perceived as little more than an unexpected, if gratifying, bonus by most of the club's supporters.  However, when the club followed this up a fortnight later with a 9 point win over Perth in the preliminary final expectations among the Tiger faithful soared.

The 1964  grand final presented the Australian public, which traditionally identifies with and affirms the underdog, with a classic 'David and Goliath' scenario.  Claremont, which had not participated in a senior grand final since 1940, was given little serious chance of upsetting minor premier and perennial finalist East Fremantle, which was aiming to secure the 22nd senior flag in its history.  Old East had contemptuously brushed aside Perth's challenge in the 2nd semi final to the tune of 43 points, having earlier vanquished Claremont by a similar margin on the teams' last meeting in the minor round.  A near record crowd of 45,120 turned up at Subiaco Oval on grand final day and many would have derived enormous satisfaction from witnessing the underdogs, whose skipper Kevin Clune had won the toss and elected to kick with the aid of an appreciable breeze, dominate early proceedings.  Indeed, had the Tigers players managed to kick straighter the match might have been virtually over by quarter time.  As it was, Claremont led by 25 points, 4.9 to 1.2, but by half time East Fremantle had edged into a 2 point lead and things were beginning to look ominous.  The 3rd term - so often the decisive phase of a match - did not on this occasion prove conclusive, and at three quarter time there were only 5 points in it as Claremont led 10.13 (73) to 10.8 (68).

The final quarter saw the two sides matching one another stride for stride and score for score.  Twenty three years on George Grljusich recalled the closing moments of a game with one of the most dramatic climaxes in  history:

"I'll never forget that game.  I was covering the game for ABC television and (former Claremont and Geelong champion) George Moloney was my expert comments man.  It was well into the time-on period and Claremont were down by 8 points.  They needed 2 goals to win and at that point Moloney conceded defeat.  But (East Fremantle's) Norm Rogers who had been a tower of strength at centre half back suddenly cramped up and Claremont centre half forward Ian Brewer broke loose to kick 2 angled goals which gave Claremont victory.  Claremont had fought back gallantly......... When Moloney had conceded defeat I, too, was sure that it was going to be East Fremantle's victory."  (See footnote 6)

October 9-11 1971 saw the staging in Perth of a mini carnival, the Channel 7 Rothmans Cup, to commemorate the career of one of Australian football's all time greats, Graham 'Polly' Farmer.  Claremont was one of eight clubs to participate in the carnival where it was successful in defeating North Adelaide and Port Adelaide to qualify for the grand final where it lost to Hawthorn.  Matches were played over two thirty minute halves.

Former St Kilda player Verdun Howell was appointed senior coach in 1972 and it was widely felt that, with the wealth of talent available to him, he should prove eminently capable of overseeing a genuine premiership assault.  Among the large number of highly talented players at Howell's disposal were: Graham Moss, arguably Australia's finest ruckman of the '70s; Bruce Duperouzel, a highly talented rover; Russell Reynolds, a muscular utility player; and former Victorians Colin Tully (92 games with Collingwood - perhaps best remembered for his prodigious kicking), Daryl Griffiths (123 games with St Kilda), Robert Greenwood (Essendon - 62 games), Peter Hines (12 games with Footscray), and John Evans (St Kilda - 14 games).  This combination of local skill and Victorian grit inspired a superlative home and away season which brought 18 wins from 21 games and firm premiership favouritism going into the finals.  During the run up to September Howell allegedly intensified the players' training routine in a bid to augment fitness; however, in the view of some the actual effect of the change was the exact opposite of what was desired in that the team succumbed to fatigue whilst hard earned skills were diluted.  Whatever the actual cause, the Tigers' displays in the major round, when faced by the power, vigour and conviction of Mal Brown's East Perth, were, by the standards set earlier in the year, anemic and disordered.  They succumbed to the Royals in both the 2nd semi final (by 17 points) and grand final (by - given that they managed only 16 scoring shots to the opposition's 26 - a somewhat flattering 15 points) causing many supporters to question Howell's coaching methods.  Such criticism seems a mite unfair when you consider that Howell had inherited a talented but notoriously inconsistent team and transformed it into a genuine, if ultimately unsuccessful, flag contender.

Despite having such a galaxy of talent at his disposal only once, in 1981, was Moss successful in steering Claremont to a premiership.  That year the Tigers went on a scoring spree, accumulating an Australian record 3,352 points during the minor round, and in the process producing some of the most spectacular football ever seen in Western Australia.  No fewer than five Claremont players managed 50 or more goals for the season, and for once the dazzling skills and formidable scoring did not abate once September arrived.  The Tigers needed to play just two finals to secure the flag, downing Swan Districts by 27 points in the 2nd semi, and edging out South Fremantle by 15 points in a free-flowing roller coaster of a grand final which saw the southerners effectively kick themselves out of contention with a 6.12 2nd term.  Claremont's Gary Shaw, a Queenslander, won the Simpson Medal for best afield, with Graham Moss, Phil Krakouer and Steve Malaxos also prominent.

Winning a state league premiership has, since the 1980s, been something of a two-edged sword, as along with the premiership cup and all the attendant glory of winning a flag goes an inevitable and almost immediate exodus of key players to the V/AFL.  Thus it was that the Tigers in 1988 embarked on their premiership defence without a nucleus of half a dozen of their most noteworthy performers from the previous year, but despite this they remained very much the team to beat, finishing the minor round atop the ladder once again, and overwhelming Subiaco in the 2nd semi final by 25 points.  Such a performance emphasised the depth of talent at Claremont Oval and bore testimony to the effectiveness of Neesham's coaching methods, and the innovative 'chip and draw' style of football on which it was based (and which Neesham himself, allegedly, had pioneered) (see footnote 8).  Unfortunately, the Achilles heel of this particular style of football was its occasional tendency to come undone under pressure, a tendency which, unfortunately for Claremont, was all too graphically illustrated in the 1988 grand final which Subiaco won with ease.

An uncharacteristic slump to 7th place in 1992 was only a temporary hiccup as Claremont surged back to pre-eminence the following year with a solid 13.14 (92) to 8.14 (62) grand final defeat of East Perth.  The player drain did not abate, but neither did Claremont's dominance, or at any rate not quite yet.  The club contested the grand finals of both 1994 (lost narrowly to East Fremantle) and 1996 (won a thriller by 2 points over East Perth), before the attrition of talent finally started to have an impact.  From 1997 to 2003 the Tigers tended to struggle somewhat, both on and off the field of play, and there was even intermittent talk of a merger with Subiaco, a prospect which only the most soulless among football supporters could regard with anything other than extreme unease.  The sport of Australian football needs clubs like Claremont (and Subiaco) every bit as much as it needs the West Coast Eagles, or Essendon, or Collingwood.  Indeed, without the likes of Claremont, Subiaco, Central District, Norwood and so forth, the likes of West Coast, Collingwood, Essendon, Adelaide etc. could not exist, and neither, arguably, would the sport of Australian football.

Thankfully the 2004 season brought a modicum of long overdue improvement as the Tigers mounted a legitimate challenge for the flag.  The fact that that challenge was ultimately de-railed in somewhat conclusive fashion on grand final day was arguably attributable almost entirely to the fact that Claremont's opponents, Subiaco, had enjoyed a substantially richer recent finals pedigree.  The same could not be said a year later, however, and the Tigers' 56 point capitulation to South Fremantle in the 2005 grand final could not really be regarded as anything other than a major disappointment.  

In 2006, the Tigers' bid to reach a third successive grand final was scuppered in heart-breaking fashion by their 2005 nemesis, South Fremantle, who edged home in the preliminary final by 3 points, 16.13 (109) to 16.10 (106).  A year later, the Tigers seemed well on course to claim an eleventh senior flag when they topped the ladder after the home and away rounds and proceeded straight to the grand final on the strength of an impressive 16.13 (109) to 14.10 (94) defeat of reigning premiers Subiaco in the 2nd semi final.  However, when the same two sides fronted up a fortnight later it was the Lions who proved to have all the answers as they led at every change en route to a comfortable 15.13 (103) to 9.8 (62) success.

Over recent seasons only Subiaco had displayed greater consistency than Claremont, but in 2008 the wheels fell off in quite spectacular fashion for the Tigers, who managed just 6 wins from 20 games for the year to avoid the wooden spoon only on percentage. Whether this was merely a temporary blip remains to be seen, but for the time being at any rate Claremont's more or less perennial flirtation with premiership honours is over.

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Footnotes

5.  The distance between finals qualification and September mothballs was, arguably, as narrow as the goalpost against which West Perth's John Vuckman sent his shot from point blank range in the dying moments of a game against Perth in the penultimate round of the home and away season.  Had Vuckman kicked truly then the Cardinals, and not Claremont, would have participated in the 1964 major round.  Back to Main Text

6.  Quoted in 'the 1987 WAFL Grand Final Football Budget', 19/9/87, page 11.  Back to Main Text

7.  Namely the Victorian (later Australian) Football League, the Western Australian Football League, and the South Australian Football League.  Back to Main Text

8. Neesham later employed much the same methods, with a moderate degree of success, during his stint as Fremantle's inaugural AFL coach between 1995 and 1998.  Back to Main Text

9.  In the 15 season period from 1987 to 2001 Claremont contested 8 WAFL grand finals for 5 flags.  Next best, in order, were East Fremantle (4-3), West Perth (4-2), East Perth (3-2), South Fremantle and (4-1), and Swan Districts (1-1).  Perth did not contest a grand final during this period.  Back to Main Text

10.  From 'The West Australian', 22/9/91.  Back to Main Text