1958 NSWRFL season explained

Year:1958
Competition:New South Wales Rugby Football League
Teams:10
Count:5th
Mpcount:5th
Matches:95
Points:3050
Attendance:1030272
Top Points Scorer: Harry Bath (225)
Top Try Scorer: Eddie Lumsden (18)
Prevseason Link:1957 NSWRFL season
Prevseason Year:1957
Nextseason Link:1959 NSWRFL season
Nextseason Year:1959

The 1958 NSWRFL season was the 51st season of the New South Wales Rugby Football League, Australia's first rugby league football competition. Ten teams from across Sydney competed for the J. J. Giltinan Shield during the season, which culminated in a grand final between St. George and Western Suburbs.

Season summary

Having been wooden spooners in 1955, Wests embarked on a massive spending spree to recruit internationals Harry Wells, Kel O'Shea, Arthur Summons, Dick Poole, Darcy Henry and Ian Moir over a five-year period. The fruits of this labour began to show in 1958 when they finished in second place for the minor premiership and posed a challenge to St. George in the finals.

Harry Bath was the competition's leading goal scorer in 1958, with his St George teammate Eddie Lumsden the leading try scorer. Bath shattered the Dragons club's point scoring record with 225 season points from three tries and 108 goals.

Nineteen-year-old Reg Gasnier, later to be honoured as one of the Australian game's Immortals, made his Third Grade debut in 1958 and was immediately noticed, regularly scoring length-of-the-field tries.

The 1958 season also saw the retirement from the League of future Australian Rugby League Hall of Fame inductee, Clive Churchill.

Ladder

width=20 abbr="Position×" width=225 Teamwidth=20 abbr="Played" Pldwidth=20 abbr="Won" Wwidth=20 abbr="Drawn" Dwidth=20 abbr="Lost" Lwidth=20 abbr="Points for" PFwidth=20 abbr="Points against" PAwidth=20 abbr="Points difference" PDwidth=20 abbr="Points" Pts
1 St. George181602480187+29332
2 Western Suburbs181206379263+11624
3 Manly-Warringah Sea Eagles181116291251+4023
4 Newtown181008297252+4520
5 Balmain181008254273-1920
6 North Sydney18909279322-4318
7 Eastern Suburbs188010244252-816
8 South Sydney186012246391-14512
9 Canterbury184113207276-699
10 Parramatta183015202412-2106

Finals

The developing Western Suburbs side which would become such a force at the beginning of the 1960s, was already building around the class of internationals Keith "Yappy" Holman, Harry "Dealer" Wells, Kel "Twigs" O'Shea along with their hard men Neville "Boxhead" Charlton, Mark Patch and fiery nineteen-year-old Peter Dimond. With a simple game plan of "retaliate first", the Magpies' aggression in the semifinal stunned St George who were coming off a coasting run through the end of the season. In spite of having beaten Wests twice in the regular season, the Dragons were mauled by them 34–10 in the major-semi final with Dimond dominating his opposite five-eighth Peter Carroll and forcing the Dragons to a sudden death final against Balmain for the right to defend their title.

The lessons from this loss sat heavily with St George – how an early forward onslaught designed to knock the spirit of the rival pack could determine the course of the entire game. For the next eight years, in all of their finals appearances, the Dragons would play a deliberate tactic of giving the opposition the ball in the first fifteen minutes and setting about demoralising them with brutal defence.

HomeScoreAwayMatch information
width=17%Date and timewidth=17%Venuewidth=11%Refereewidth=7%Crowd
Playoff
align=left Newtown4–15align=left Balmain19 August 1958Redfern Oval10,430
Semifinals
align=left Manly-Warringah10–22align=left Balmain23 August 1958Sydney Cricket GroundDarcy Lawler27,985
align=left St. George10–34align=left Western Suburbs30 August 1958Sydney Cricket GroundDarcy Lawler38,857
Preliminary Final
align=left St. George26–21align=left Balmain6 September 1958Sydney Cricket GroundDarcy Lawler39,132
Grand Final
align=left Western Suburbs9–20align=left St. George13 September 1958Sydney Cricket GroundDarcy Lawler62,283

Grand Final

St. GeorgePositionWestern Suburbs
  1. Brian Graham
  1. Darcy Russell
WG2. Bernard Kelly
3. Harry Wells (c)
CE6. Darcy Henry
5. Don Malone
4. Peter Dimond
HB7. Keith Holman
13. Mark Patch
12. Ken Kearney (Ca./Co.)12. Bede Goff
11. Neville Charlton
SR10. Bill Carson
9. Jack Bowman
8. Doug Jones
Coach Vic Hey
In an effort to negate Peter Dimond, Saints dropped Peter Carroll for the Grand Final, selecting lock and hard hitting defender, Brian Clay at five-eighth. From the kick-off, the record crowd saw a furious St George team lay into Wests. High tackles and punches were the order of the day and referee Darcy Lawler penalised the Dragons seventeen times to Wests seven.

Wests were unable to counter the onslaught which saw a ruthless Dragon defence advancing upon them at every opportunity although the score remained close for most of the match. Eventually with the Magpies subdued, Norm Provan and Bob Bugden cut loose, with Provan scoring two tries and Bugden snatching an intercept try near the end. Saints won the fight, and the match. For eighty minutes Clay was all over Dimond who ended the match dazed and bleeding.

The Sydney Morning Herald described the match as the most “savage” game of the season.

St George 20 (Tries: N. Provan 2, Bugden, Lumsden. Goals: Bath 4.)

Wests 9 (Tries: Russell. Goals: Russell 3)

Player statistics

The following statistics are as of the conclusion of Round 18.Top 5 point scorers

width=50 Pointswidth=200 Playerwidth=30 Trieswidth=30 Goalswidth=30 Field Goals
205 Harry Bath3980
176 Darcy Russell2850
146 Brian Carlson10580
144 Ron Willey4660
124 Gordon Clifford0620
Top 5 try scorers
width=50 Trieswidth=200 Player
16 Brian Allsop
15 Eddie Lumsden
13 Jack Fifield
13 Peter Dimond
12 Darcy Henry
12 Kevin Considine
Top 5 goal scorers
width=50 Goalswidth=200 Player
98 Harry Bath
85 Darcy Russell
66 Ron Willey
62 Gordon Clifford
58 Brian Carlson

Great Britain Lions Tour

See main article: 1958 Great Britain Lions tour. From May until August, the Great Britain Lions toured Australia and New Zealand. In Australia they played the three Test Ashes series against Australia as well as games against various sides including Sydney Firsts, New South Wales and a Sydney Representative Colts side that featured a young Reg Gasnier.

The team was coached by Jim Brough and was captained was Alan Prescott.

Note: Other than the Ashes Tests, only games in NSW listed

Game Date Result Venue Attendance
1 18 May Great Britain def. Southern Districts 36–18
2 21 May Great Britain drew with Western Districts 24–24
3 24 May Great Britain def. Newcastle 35–16 21,126
4 28 May Great Britain def. Northern NSW 27–17
5 31 May Great Britain def. Sydney 20–15 48,692
6 4 June Great Britain def. Riverina 29–10 6,000
7 7 June Great Britain def. New South Wales 19–10 52,963
8 14 June def. 25–8 68,777
15 5 July def. 25–18 33,563
17 13 July Great Britain def. NSW North Coast 56–15 5,541
18 19 July def. 28–26 68,720
?? 14 August
?? 17 August

External links