AT A GLANCE
Born: Highett, April 30, 1952.
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Wife: Morag.
Children: Julian, Octavia and Gabriel.
Education: Highett Primary School before going to Sandringham Technical School.
Sporting Highlight: Playing in premierships with Richmond in 1973 and Prahran in 1978 and winning the under 15 best and fairest award with East Sandringham.
Stephen, we'll talk about your AFL career shortly. But before we go down that path, I would like to chat about your time with Cobden in the Hampden Football Netball League. What years were you the non-playing coach there?
I was non-playing coach for the 1988 and 1989 seasons.
The reason I coached Cobden goes back to the fact that we were sick of being in Melbourne.
We were familiar with Wye River and liked that part of the world.
I had spoken to people at the AFL and they said Cobden was looking for a coach.
We ended up buying a property just outside of Colac at Barongarook.
I went to Cobden and spoke to Basil Hammond. He was a top man, who was a dairy farmer.
Our children were young. I decided to take up the job as non-playing coach for two seasons.
I was to be paid $7000 a season.
Colac got wind that I had spoken to Cobden, so Colac offered me $14,000 a season, but I declined.
I'm a man of my word and had told Cobden I would be coaching them so I did the job.
The funny thing is if I had taken up the Colac job, it was only five minutes from our Barongarook home but it took 45 minutes to get to Cobden.
What was your first impression coaching Cobden in 1988?
To be very honest with you, it struck me straight away, I found the Cobden people to be very humble.
They were terrific, hard-working people. Salt-of-the-earth types.
The young juniors would be working on the dairy farms; they were all just good country type of people.
I had come out of the city and really noticed the difference in the people.
What's your main memory coaching Cobden?
I would have to say Bill Askew's 300th game.
We played South Warrnambool and the whole town of Cobden was buzzing with excitement for Bill. He was a great player.
We had some very talented players at Cobden back in that era. Players like Jim Rohan, Colin and Brendan Hammond, Peter Rohan, Damien and Anthony Darcy.
Sadly, they never played their best in my era. I think I may have been too harsh on them because I had come out of the AFL. I probably trained them too hard.
I got a phone call from Grant Thomas in 1990. Grant was coaching Warrnambool at the time and was very successful. He was a great coach.
Grant phoned me and asked if I wanted to be his assistant coach for the Hampden league interleague side. Ian 'Lefty' Wright was the other assistant. I had a great time in the job. Lefty had a great calming influence over Grant and me.
We went on to win the interleague premiership, defeating Ballarat in 1990.
I must say it was one of the highlights in my time associated with the Hampden league.
You mentioned that you thought Grant Thomas was a great coach. He went on to coach St Kilda. What was your opinion of his coaching ability after he finished at the Saints?
I think Grant could have taken St Kilda to a premiership if they had stayed with him. His record considering all things was very, very good in the AFL.
Grant had the ability to get all the players on his side.
Stephen, in your time as the coach at Cobden and being an assistant coach of the Hampden interleague side you would have seen some good players. Can you name a couple?
There were some excellent players in the league back in that era.
I always thought players like Colac's Damien McCarthy was very good, so was Warrnambool's Roy Sutherland and South Warrnambool's Stephen 'Shorty' Anderson, but there were also plenty of other top players.
I was asked to join the executive of the Hampden league by president Mike Chennell for the 1990 season. They made me the vice-president of the league but I was at war with other members of the executive from a very early stage.
I had said I thought it was wrong that Warrnambool had the home ground advantage of playing the grand final at the Reid Oval.
Camperdown had played Warrnambool at the Reid in two of those grand finals,and I thought it was unfair.
The debate between the executive and I went on for a few months and in the end I walked away.
It was sad the way it all finished up but the executive was run by school teachers and public servants who couldn't see the bigger picture.
Let's go back to the 1973 VFL premiership. Richmond defeated Carlton to win the flag by 30 points and you played on the half-forward flank for the Tigers. The side consisted of household names including Royce Hart, Dick Clay, Rex Hunt, Robert McGhie, Kevin Bartlett, Ian Stewart, Kevin Sheedy and Neil Balme. Who was the best Richmond player that you played with?
I've got to say Kevin Bartlett. He was a champion player - just have a look at his record in grand finals.
If he played in today's footy he would have won four Norm Smith medals for the best player on the ground.
Ian Stewart was also a wonderful player and a great bloke.
Kevin Sheedy would be a modern-day Dustin Martin in today's footy.
Tom Hafey was our coach back in 1973. He was firm but he was kind to his players. He was a wonderful person.
My career at the elite level ended in 1974 when I broke my leg in a game against Hawthorn.
What do you do with your life now?
I'm still a passionate Richmond fan and I tune pianos.
I've played and tuned pianos for most of my life.