SMITHFIELD WARTHOGS RUGBY FOOTBALL CLUB (original) (raw)
HORSES AND FOOTBALL DO NOT MIX
Smithfield club history – written & researched by Sean Fagan
Newspapers carry reports of Rugby being played in Smithfield as early as 1908. The town briefly had a formal club in the mid 1930s, but it wasn’t until the early 1960s that the groundwork to establish the Warthogs began. Talks in 1962 led in February 1963 to the formation of the Smithfield Rugby Union Club under the Parramatta District.
Staff from both Fairfield Boys and Hurlstone Agricultural High Schools were in attendance and encouraged the club’s founding as an opportunity for its boys.
“After lengthy debate it was decided that the club’s playing colours would be black jersey with white collar and black shorts. Socks would [be] black with white tops.” [The Biz, Fairfield]
Junior teams were fielded, along with U18s and U21s. Smithfield played home matches at Fairfield Showground on the inner field within the trotting track (kindly bestowed the title of ‘Bossley Bush Oval’).
The first games proved a major hazard as horse training continued around the playing field. Some seriously dangerous incidents eventuated and injuries to the footballers and spectators were only averted by good luck.
Smithfield Warthogs (Sean Fagan, 1982 colts)
The club called on Fairfield Council who quickly banned the trotting from continuing while the rugby games went on, citing:
“There have been hair-raising experiences where children have been involved while horses are racing around the track … Horses and football do not mix.”
Smithfield won its first premiership title in 1965 when the U16s team defeated Westmead 5-3 in the grand final of the Parramatta junior competition.
The club also celebrated its biggest victory to date in late May 1966 when the U20s lowered the colours of a previously undefeated Eastwood rugby club with 3-0 win.
In 1967 (possibly earlier) Smithfield’s senior teams had changed their playing strip to bottle green jerseys with a band of sky blue and white.
Smithfield Warthogs team 1967 – Judd Cup. Pictured are (standing): T. Camileri, A. Higgins, G. Giluear, T. Giezeicamp, G. Kimberley, T. Hogue, K. Paull, M. Bradford, G. Wright; (seated): J. Zanoki, R. Pearn, G. Koualeuski, A Turner, R. Glover, G. Brae; (absent): P. Hankey, D. Mawer. (Source: The Biz newspaper, 7 Sept 1967)
John Kellaher who was a player at Smithfield came up with the name the Warthogs. A number of the original players were members of the Era Surf Club in the Royal National Park and adopted Era’s colours for Smithfield.
By 1968 the club had ten teams for players from 8 to 20 years old, plus three senior grade teams. A proposal put forward by the club to Fairfield Council that year resulted in the Smithfield garbage tip being redeveloped into sports playing fields, now Brenan Park, which became the home ground.
The Merrylands RFC annual report for 1972 noted that Smithfield won the final of the ‘South Harbour’ conference of the Grose Cup. The Warthogs also hosted during the season its annual Keg Cup knock-out competition.
The club won ‘The Reliance Club Shield’ in 1974 for Second Division club champions under the NSW Suburban Rugby Union competitions.
The success resulted in Smithfield the following season being granted entry into the Sydney district club Second Division competition which included among its clubs Bankstown, Canterbury, Dundas Valley, Hawkesbury Agricultural College, Hornsby and Mosman.
In 1982 the Warthogs moved to a permanent home field with a grandstand at the newly built Rosford Street Reserve in Smithfield.
By that time the club were a mainstay of the Second Division competition, which in the early 1980s included at various times matches against Sydney University, Eastern Suburbs, Northern Suburbs. Drummoyne, Campbelltown, Port Hacking, St George, Hornsby, Mosman and Penrith.
Smithfield vs Penrith Emus – grade trials 1983, Rosford Street Reserve. (Source: Rugby Weekly, issue #1, 1983)
The 1982 season closed with an appearance at the Easts Rugby 7s (Canberra) tournament. An insight into the Warthogs’ spirit was provided by a report in The Canberra Times on the clubs that had accepted invitations to enter:
So has Smithfield. But in a delightful letter it was made quite clear that the club expected that its participants would take a much more direct interest in the extracurricular activities. It was to the extent that the club asked to be drawn against Randwick in the first round “so as to be rid early of the playing obligations and enable the enjoyment of a rugby week end”.
In 1986 Smithfield were dropped to Third Division as player numbers began to fall away. A dispute in Sydney club rugby before the start of the 1987 season ended the division system (promotion/relegation) and left the Smithfield club on the outer.
The club re-emerged in the NSW Suburban Rugby Union’s Division Four competitions and gained trophies in their debut season, winning the 1987 Jeffrey Cup (first grade) and Noice Cup (second grade).
In 1990 Smithfield won the McLean Cup (for first grade champions in Third Division) and followed as joint-premiers in 1991 with Rockdale. The club won the Walker Cup (Third Division) in 1992.
By the middle of the 1990s the club had disbanded. The demise of the Warthogs occurred silently and unseen amidst the tumult of the arrival of open professionalism to rugby.
New money had come into the sport but none of it filtered into the lower grade amateur competitions and Sydney’s outer suburbs, reinforcing the theory that the game’s big wigs had little interest in anything west of Concord Oval.
Smithfield ‘Warthogs’ vs Mosman ‘The Whales’ – Colts rugby first grade c.1982-83 @ Rosford Street Reserve
(c) 2012 – Sean Fagan. https://sfaganweb.wordpress.com/ The author played in Smithfield Warthogs lower grades, colts and Rugby 7s teams 1980-84.