Roy Cazaly

Roy Cazaly (13 January 1893 – 10 October 1963) was an Australian rules footballer who played for South Melbourne and St Kilda in the Victorian Football League (VFL). He also represented Victoria and Tasmania in interstate football, and after his retirement as a player, turned to coaching. Known for his ruck work and high-flying marks, he inspired the common catchphrase "Up there, Cazaly!", which became a popular song of the same name, securing his place in Australian folklore.

Roy Cazaly
Cazaly taking a one-handed mark
Personal information
Full name Roy Cazaly
Nickname(s) Cazza
Date of birth (1893-01-13)13 January 1893
Place of birth Albert Park, Victoria, Australia
Date of death 10 October 1963(1963-10-10) (aged 70)
Place of death Lenah Valley, Tasmania, Australia
Original team(s) Middle Park
Height 180 cm (5 ft 11 in)
Weight 80 kg (176 lb)
Position(s) Ruckman
Playing career1
Years Club Games (Goals)
1911–20 St Kilda 099 0(38)
1921–24, 1926–27 South Melbourne 099 (129)
Total 198 (167)
Representative team honours
Years Team Games (Goals)
Victoria 13 (?)
Tasmania 5 (?)
Coaching career3
Years Club Games (W–L–D)
1922, 1937–38 South Melbourne 52 (12–38–2)
1942–43 Hawthorn 30 (10–20–0)
1928–30 City (NTFA) 54 (25-27-2)
1932–33 North Hobart 37 (25-12)
1934–36, 1948–51 New Town 130 (72-56-2)
1941 Camberwell ?
Total 303 (144–153–6)
1 Playing statistics correct to the end of 1927.
3 Coaching statistics correct as of 1943.
Career highlights
Sources: AFL Tables, AustralianFootball.com

Cazaly was one of 12 inaugural "Legends" inducted into the Australian Football Hall of Fame.

Family

Cazaly was born in Albert Park, a suburb of Melbourne, on 13 January 1893. He was the tenth child of English-born James Cazaly and his wife Elizabeth Jemima (née McNee), a midwife and herbalist from Scotland.

Football

Cazaly learnt his football at the local state school, quickly becoming its first-choice ruckman. He tried out for VFL side Carlton Football Club in 1910, but quit the club when he injured a shoulder in a reserves match and could not get the Carlton medical staff to treat it.[1]

St Kilda

Cazaly crossed to fellow VFL side St Kilda and made his senior debut in 1911 during a players' strike, when many of St Kilda's regular senior players refused to play as a result of a dispute with the club's committee over dressing rooms.[2]

One of nine new players in the team, Cazaly played his only First XVIII match for St Kilda against Carlton, at Princes park, on 29 July 1911.

The other new players were: Alby Bowtell, Claude Crowl, Peter Donnelly, Alf Hammond, Otto Opelt, Rowley Smith, Tom Soutar, and Bill Ward — and, including that match, and ignoring Harrie Hattam (16 games), Bert Pierce (41 games), and Bill Woodcock (65 games), the very inexperienced team's remaining fifteen players had only played a total of 46 matches.

He played 99 matches with St Kilda.

South Melbourne

In 1920 he left St Kilda, signing with South Melbourne. He coached that club in 1922, and won South's most consistent player award in 1926.[3]

During the depression of the early 1930s he worked on the Melbourne waterfront and played with waterside workers in a mid-week football competition.

VFL fame

Cazaly was famous for his ability to take spectacular marks despite his small stature and, at South Melbourne, a teammate, Fred "Skeeter" Fleiter, would often yell "Up there, Cazaly", a phrase that would become synonymous with Australian rules football. He initially developed his marking ability by jumping at a ball strung up in a shed at his home, and held his breath as he jumped, an action that he believed lifted him higher. He also possessed the capacity to kick a football over 65 metres. In 2009 The Australian nominated Cazaly as one of the 25 greatest footballers never to win a Brownlow Medal.[4]

Coaching career

In 1928 he departed Victoria and headed for Launceston, Tasmania, before returning in 1931 to coach Preston in the Victorian Football Association.

His subsequent return to Tasmania was punctuated by short stints as non-playing coach of South Melbourne (in 1937–1938), coach of Camberwell (in 1941—at age 48, he was nominally a non-playing coach, but he did strip for a few games late in the season[5]) and non-playing coach of Hawthorn (in 1942–1943) and as non-playing assistant coach of South in 1947.

While coaching Hawthorn, he was reported to have given the club its nickname the "Hawks" as he saw it as tougher than their original nickname the "Mayblooms".

Legacy

He is known to have played 378 senior matches (including 13 interstate matches for Victoria and 5 for Tasmania). Throughout his career he stood at just 180 centimetres (5 ft 11 in) and was incredibly fit. He retired from competitive football in 1941 at the age of 48. Later, he coached (non-playing) New Town to a number of Tasmanian Football League premierships. After his retirement from football, he was involved in many business ventures before his death in Hobart on 10 October 1963. His son, Roy junior, played for New Town after World War II.

The famous line of "Up there, Cazaly" was used a battle cry by Australian forces during World War II.[6]

It is also the name of a song, released in 1979 by Mike Brady and the Two-Man Band.

Cazaly was inducted into the Australian Football Hall of Fame in 1996 as one of the inaugural twelve Legends.

Cazaly's Stadium in Cairns, Queensland, is named after Roy Cazaly. The irony being that Cazaly hated Queensland as a passion and would often tell family and friends that "it should be paved over to build a car park for the MCG."[7]

Notes
  1. Atkinson, p. 83.
  2. "Cazaly's Career born amid crisis", AFL Record: 22, 29 July 2011
  3. The Argus, 14 February 1927
  4. The Australian, 22 September 2009, retrieved 2009-09-22
  5. "Cazaly engaged by Hawthorn". The Mercury. Melbourne. 22 October 1941. p. 10.
  6. "From 1911 to 1920 Cazaly played for St Kilda Football Club, without pay, winning the club's 'best and fairest' award in the last two seasons. In 1921 he transferred to South Melbourne, where he formed 'The Terrible Trio' ruck combination with 'Skeeter' Fleiter and rover Mark Tandy. Though only 5 ft 11 ins (180 cm) and 12½ stone (79 kg), Cazaly was a brilliant high-mark; he daily practised leaping for a ball suspended from the roof of a shed at his home. He could mark and turn in mid-air, land and in a few strides send forward a long accurate drop-kick or stab-pass. Fleiter's constant cry 'Up there Cazaly' was taken up by the crowds. It entered the Australian idiom, was used by infantrymen in North Africa in World War II, and became part of folk-lore" (Counihan, 1979).
  7. "Book List - The Slattery Media Group - Store". books.slatterymedia.com. Retrieved 30 October 2020.

References
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