| Year: | 1928 |
| Competition: | New South Wales Rugby Football League |
| Teams: | 9 |
| Count: | 8th |
| Mpcount: | 1st |
| Matches: | 59 |
| Points: | 1597 |
| Top Point Scorer: | Benny Wearing (94) |
| Top Try Scorer: | Tony Redmond (9) |
| Prevseason Link: | 1927 NSWRFL season |
| Prevseason Year: | 1927 |
| Nextseason Link: | 1929 NSWRFL season |
| Nextseason Year: | 1929 |
The 1928 New South Wales Rugby Football League premiership was the twenty-first season of Sydney’s top-level rugby league club competition, Australia’s first. During the season, which lasted from April until September, nine teams from across the city contested the premiership, culminating in a final between Eastern Suburbs and South Sydney.
The season of 1928 was infamous for the Earl Park riot. In a St George home game 21–3 victory over Balmain, Tony Russell of Balmain became involved in a running feud with George Carstairs, the St George captain.
Referee Brannaghan began to lose control of the match when he sent off St George forward Harry Flower early in the second half but allowed Balmain players to stay on the field. After a later incident between Russell and Carstairs resulted in the latter being knocked unconscious and Brannaghan merely cautioning Russell, the crowd's aggravation grew and the situation escalated.
The Earl Park crowd took matters into their own hands by storming the field in an attempt to injure Russell. Police arrived and intervened using handcuffs, batons and fists but not before Russell was badly beaten by the crowd. He suffered leg and head injuries and was put into the same ambulance as George Carstairs where it was reported that Russell attempted to assault Carstairs and ambulance officers had to intervene to restrain him.
A week later, a NSWRL investigation blamed crowd violence and not the players or officials for the disturbance.
| width=20 abbr="Position" | width=175 | Team | width=20 abbr="Played" | Pld | width=20 abbr="Won" | W | width=20 abbr="Drawn" | D | width=20 abbr="Lost" | L | width=20 abbr="Bye" | B | width=20 abbr="Points for" | PF | width=20 abbr="Points against" | PA | width=20 abbr="Points difference" | PD | width=20 abbr="Points" | Pts | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | St. George | 13 | 12 | 0 | 1 | 1 | 200 | 98 | +102 | 26 | |||||||||||
| 2 | Eastern Suburbs | 12 | 11 | 0 | 1 | 2 | 192 | 116 | +76 | 26 | |||||||||||
| 3 | South Sydney | 13 | 8 | 0 | 5 | 1 | 216 | 152 | +64 | 18 | |||||||||||
| 4 | North Sydney | 12 | 6 | 0 | 6 | 2 | 157 | 149 | +8 | 16 | |||||||||||
| 5 | Sydney University | 13 | 6 | 0 | 7 | 1 | 184 | 176 | +8 | 14 | |||||||||||
| 6 | Western Suburbs | 12 | 4 | 0 | 8 | 2 | 174 | 206 | -32 | 12 | |||||||||||
| 7 | Glebe | 12 | 4 | 0 | 8 | 2 | 94 | 149 | -55 | 12 | |||||||||||
| 8 | Balmain | 13 | 4 | 0 | 9 | 1 | 180 | 236 | -56 | 10 | |||||||||||
| 9 | Newtown | 12 | 1 | 0 | 11 | 2 | 112 | 227 | -115 | 6 | |||||||||||
Heading into the finals, top placed St. George and Eastern Suburbs were in top form, with St. George losing their only match in round 3 and Eastern Suburbs losing to St. George in round 7 of the 14-week competition. With Saints and Easts finishing on 26 points each, no playoff for the minor premiership was staged to award a right of challenge in the finals,[2] thus negating the good work done by both sides during the premiership rounds and ultimately providing an easier route than otherwise for Souths to take the title away from both minor premiers.
In the semi-finals, Eastern Suburbs beat fourth-placed North Sydney to make the final, whilst South Sydney beat St. George, whom they had lost to 9–8 just three weeks earlier.
| Eastern Suburbs | Position | South Sydney |
|---|---|---|
| Arthur Toby | FB | Alan Righton |
| Les Steel | WG | Benny Wearing |
| Larry Hedger | CE | Jack Why |
| Nelson Hardy | CE | Harry Finch |
| Vic Webber | WG | Reg Williams |
| Gordon Fletcher | FE | Harry Kadwell |
| Joe Busch | HB | Jim Breen (c) |
| Arthur Oxford | PR | Harry Cavanough |
| Dick Brown | HK | Alf Binder |
| Harry Kavanagh | PR | David Watson |
| Tom Fitzpatrick | SR | Edward Root |
| Sam Bryant | SR | George Treweek |
| George Harris | LK | Oscar Quinlivan |
| Coach | Charlie Lynch | |
The second stanza started no better for Easts when Hardy took the ball close with the line wide open only to see his pass dropped. Harry Kadwell struck back for Souths who went to a 16–0 lead before the floodgates opened – Cavanough scored from the next kick-off and then Kadwell crossed again. Easts’ only try of the match was by Steel under the posts and was the last of the match with the bell sounding shortly after. Thus the Rabbitohs took their fourth successive title and become the first club to achieve this feat.
South Sydney 26 (Tries: Harry Kadwell (2), George Treweek, Reg Williams, Oscar Quinlivan, Harry Cavanough. Goals: Benney Wearing 2, Oscar Quinlivan 2)
defeated
Eastern Suburbs 5 (Tries: Les Steel. Goal: Arthur Oxford)