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the
TERRY, NEALE, ANTHONY AND CHRIS DANIHER
The story of football’s favourite family
About the Danihers
After a combined 752 VFL/AFL senior games
spanning three decades, the Daniher boys are
still involved in footy. Terry continues to excel as
a country football ambassador and has his own
cleaning services business. At the start of 2009,
Neale took up the position of football operations
manager for the West Coast Eagles. Anthony’
s
professional life is the management of Daniher
Property Services, although his connection with
football remains strong through his son, Darcy,
being drafted to the Bombers in 2007 under the
father-son rule. Following in his father’s footsteps,
Chris is farming and keeping Ungarie Football
Club alive.
About the author
Adam McNicol grew up on a wheat and sheep farm
outside the tiny town of Manangatang in north-west
Victoria’s Mallee region. While trying to get a kick
with the Manangatang Thirds he realised playing
football was not his forte, so he took to writing
about it instead. Since completing a journalism
degree at Melbourne’s RMIT University
, Adam has
spent most of his time reporting on bush footy for
The Age and working as a television sports reporter
with Channel 10. He lives in Ballarat.
Jacket design: Phil Campbell
Front jacket photograph courtesy of Newspix
Back jacket photograph by Monty Coles
BIOGRAPHY / AFL
the
TERRY, NEALE, ANTHONY
AND CHRIS DANIHER
On 1 September 1990, four brothers made
Australian Rules history by playing together for the
one team, the Essendon Football Club, something
that is unlikely to ever happen again.
Terry, Neale, Anthony and Chris Daniher grew up
in a tiny Riverina town where they played footy
on Saturdays and Rugby League after mass on
Sundays. They reached the elite level in an era
when tobacco sponsorship and a few beers with
the opposition after a game were the norm. It was
a time when Jim Daniher could throw a teenage
son into a trade deal and Kevin Sheedy and Edna
Daniher could conspire to make a dream come true.
But it wasn’t all plain sailing: injuries cut short
a promising career, trading between clubs was
largely unregulated, South Melbourne Football Club
was shunted off to Sydney and coaching changed
dramatically.
This is the action-packed story of the period when
Aussie Rules went national and football became big
business, seen through the eyes of an unassuming
bunch of blokes from the bush. It’s about how the
Danihers endeared themselves to footy fans and
became part of football folklore.
‘They say nostalgia is the most powerful drug in the universe.
If so, this book should be banned.’
KEVIN SHEEDY
DANIHERS
DANIHERS
DANIHERS
the
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DANIHERS
the
TERRY, NEALE, ANTHONY AND CHRIS DANIHER
as told to Adam McNicol
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First published in 2009
Copyright © Terry, Neale, Anthony and Chris Daniher and Adam McNicol 2009
Photographs on pages (ii) and (viii) by Adam McNicol.
Photographs on pages 14, 22, 36, 72, 104, 138, 186, 214, 200 and
pages 1 and 8 of the picture section are from the Danihers’ private collection.
All other photography of images used in the endpapers and picture section is by Greg Elms,
taken from Edna Daniher’s scrapbooks of her four sons’ football careers.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted
in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including
photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system,
without prior permission in writing from the publisher. The Australian
Copyright Act 1968 (the Act) allows a maximum of one chapter or 10% of
this book, whichever is the greater, to be photocopied by any educational
institution for its educational purposes provided that the educational
institution (or body that administers it) has given a remuneration notice
to Copyright Agency Limited (CAL) under the Act.
Allen & Unwin
83 Alexander Street
Crows Nest NSW 2065
Australia
Phone: (61 2) 8425 0100
Fax: (61 2) 9906 2218
Email: info@allenandunwin.com
Web: www.allenandunwin.com
National Library of Australia
Cataloguing-in-Publication entry:
Daniher, Terry.
The Danihers: the story of football’s favourite family / Terry Daniher … [et al.] ;
as told to Adam McNicol.
1st ed.
ISBN 978 1 74175 651 7 (hbk.)
Includes index.
1. Daniher, Terry, 1957– 2. Daniher, Neale, 1961–. 3. Daniher, Anthony, 1963–.
4. Daniher, Chris, 1966–. 5. Essendon Football Club–History. 6. Football players–Victoria–History.
7. Football teams–Victoria–History. 8. Australian football–History.
Other Authors/Contributors: McNicol, Adam, 1978–
796.336099451
Jacket design by Phil Campbell
Text and picture section design and typesetting by Pauline Haas
Jacket photograph (back) by Monty Coles
Jacket photograph (front) courtesy of Newspix
Printed in Singapore by KHL Printing Co Pty Ltd
1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2
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FOR MUM AND DAD
WE WOULD NOT HAVE BEEN ABLE TO DO ALL WE’VE DONE
WITHOUT YOUR LOVE, SUPPORT AND PATIENCE.
with thanks from your boys
‘TO SUM UP THE DANIHERS.
FOUR INGREDIENTS. SPIRIT, FANTASTIC. PASSION,
UNBELIEVABLE. LOYALTY AND TRUST, IMPECCABLE.’
kevin sheedy
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CONTENTS
Introduction: The road to Ungarie 1
1 Daniher country 8
2 The pride of the district 15
3 You play anything when you’re young 23
4 Something a bit special 37
5 A young bloke coming through 44
6 A kid named Terry Daniher 49
7 Fair dinkum about footy 58
8 A born leader 73
9 Knockin’ around with blokes 82
10 Making life a bit more interesting 94
11 Just another Daniher 105
12 The Iceman 115
13 The best player in the club 130
14 All the glitz and glamour 139
15 This time it’s different 153
16 Fingers crossed 164
17 Loyalty 177
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18 Following in your brothers’ footsteps 187
19 Hard, tough and talented 199
20 Pitching in and having a go 208
21 Doing the old home town proud 215
22 In footy you just get on with it 234
23 Grin and cop it 243
24 You’re the bloody coach, mate! 252
25 A fork in the road 262
26 Foot y 101 277
27 Family ties 291
28 A bit of the old, a bit of the new 299
29 Sermons laced with hope and energy 308
30 Footy sucks sometimes 322
31 The new generation 333
Football career statistics 342
Author’s note 344
Acknowledgements 348
Index 352
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Jim Daniher
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INTRODUCTION
THE ROAD TO UNGARIE
O
ur hire car’s headlights briefly illuminate a sign by the roadside.
From the top it reads Ungarie 42, Condobolin 105, Lake Cargelligo
115. A smile creeps across Neale Daniher’s face. ‘When we see the name
Ungarie we know we’re almost home.’ The outskirts of West Wyalong
disappear as the last rays of sunshine fade. It is May 2008. We are in
southern New South Wales, 550 kilometres from Sydney and around
600 from Melbourne.
More than six hours earlier, I collected Neale and his teenage
son Ben from the family’s large home in Melbourne’s leafy eastern
suburbs. We drove north, passing through Shepparton and the Murray
River town of Tocumwal. Discussions flowed, mostly about footy. It
was a Monday morning and Neale expressed his relief at not dreading
the day, like he had after a loss when coaching Melbourne. Instead,
he could watch the season unfold without the stress of having his job
continually on the line. He could simply enjoy the game again. Neale
had even joined the media. Before we set off he appeared on Neil
Mitchell’s popular radio program on 3AW, discussing the weekend’s
results. As it happened, the Demons were the story of the day. Less
than 24 hours before, they had staged a remarkable comeback from
51 points down to beat Fremantle at the MCG. Ben was delighted with
the result. Despite his dad parting ways with the club, he still loves
the Dees.
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[...]... for the Daniher story to be recorded The tale will focus on Neale and his brothers, Terry, Anthony and Chris, and their remarkable achievements The time is right to consider the tremendous opportunities bequeathed by their parents’ hard work Throughout their lives the boys have been doers Now, more than a decade since Chris, the youngest, retired from the AFL, it is time to take a breath and ponder the. .. intermission at Lampard’s picture theatre The theatre now stands empty Back then, floods were the norm Every couple of years the Humbug Creek would inundate the town Now the meandering watercourse rarely breaks its banks Only the Rural Transaction Centre, a one-size-fits-all bank branch, post office and Internet facility, looks alive and modern 6 THE DANIHERS Further up the street, the two-storey Central Hotel... new side of his father Ben listens quietly Jim will barely take a breath until we head back to Melbourne three days later The following day we take Jim for a drive Remarkably, there is no sign on the outskirts of Ungarie proclaiming the town as the home of the Danihers and Jim likes it that way First stop is the footy ground, where Terry, Neale, Anthony and Chris began their careers and where Jim ran... the father of Terry, Neale, Anthony and Chris arrived Named after his father, Jim 12 THE DANIHERS junior would become a local sporting legend in his own right, as would Leo, born in 1930 The fifth born, Joan, tragically died at three months of age Terese rounded out the family when she entered the world in 1934 Despite their new family commitments, the Daniher family continued to strongly support their... two fellas and he was going cross-ways across the field He threw the ball on his boot and it THE PRIDE OF THE DISTRICT 17 went straight up and through the goals That was the turning point of the game Never forgot that.’ Celebrations involved warm beer (fridges were an unaffordable luxury) and a dance at the local hall The Danihers were all among the most influential players Footy in the Northern Riverina... get Rules in there,’ he remembers ‘I went to the butcher shop, the café, the little shop, the store and pub and said the bloody headmaster wouldn’t let us go in and coach kids Within ten days he was ringing us up and saying, “She’s right.” They’re like bloody politicians.’ The new generation of Danihers was much like the old Sport dominated their lives At school, Terry and Neale lived for the breaks... blokes, the Danihers never dreamed they would achieve such a feat After all, in the 93-year history of the VFL and AFL, never before had a quartet of brothers run out in the same team As the boys sat in the change rooms, ice-packs on their sore limbs, their knockabout demeanour suggested they might have just played for Ungarie at an oval ringed by cars rather than screaming fans In their country drawl, they... kudos to the Daniher name And given the players that would emerge in the ensuing decades, the code has plenty to thank him for Jim, Jack and Leo CHAPTER T WO THE PR IDE OF THE DISTR ICT T he sons of Jim Daniher senior were a fearsome trio on the football field Jack, Jim junior and Leo wore Ungarie’s unique black and white horizontal stripes from their early teens until they could barely walk The boys... World War II, all three brothers had finished school and returned to the family farm, although Jack would later move into town and pursue a new career as a shearer In 1946, when Ungarie’s team took the field for the first time in five years, the Danihers immediately established themselves as key players In particular, Jim became the one to watch The tallest of the 16 THE DANIHERS trio, he was skilful,... they said the occasion had been ‘t’riffic’ and a ‘bloody good show’ They had capped a remarkable journey, one that began in Ungarie, their tiny home town, surrounded by Rugby League territory, amid the dusty plains of western New South Wales But the Danihers were a football family long before Terry, Neale, Anthony and Chris became household names In the early part of the 20th century, when the VFL was . for the Daniher story
to be recorded. The tale will focus on Neale and his brothers, Terry,
Anthony and Chris, and their remarkable achievements. The. folklore.
‘They say nostalgia is the most powerful drug in the universe.
If so, this book should be banned.’
KEVIN SHEEDY
DANIHERS
DANIHERS
DANIHERS
the
Daniher
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