Jim Tucker 22/06/2022

At 94-years-old, Glynn Gauld still has vivid memories of playing at the old  Bottomley Park where pieces of glass and tin would rise from the landfill it was  built on.   Gauld is one of the oldest living Tigers. He started playing with Easts as an  enthusiastic young fullback in 1950 when the club’s first jersey was gold with a  red-and-blue “V”.  He was there when the Tigers enjoyed their first humble clubhouse, the “Old  Green Shed”, which was built on what was then known as National Park.  “Where we played was on an old garbage tip so the ground was...

Jim Tucker 16/06/2022

It says it all about the character of John Bremner as a devoted Easts man that he continued coaching even when undergoing intensive cancer treatment.  A cap concealed his hair loss in the jubilant premiership team photo of 1999 at Ballymore where “JB” was smiling proudly out of the spotlight in his understated way.  When he died prematurely at just 55 in 2002, he’d been coaching just a week before he passed away.  When you see names on a trophy, young players have every right to ponder “what mark did they leave?” to deserve it. Rarely are winning deeds far removed...

Jim Tucker 24/05/2022

Victorious Easts winger Ricky Nalatu stood at the bar in a tiger costume and watched the tears of grown men in their 60s. Of course, he was in costume. It was that sort of crazy, once-in-a-rugby-lifetime night in the clubhouse at Bottomley Park to celebrate the club’s maiden first grade premiership. Just hours early at Ballymore, Easts had held firm in a tense 18-16 finish to beat Souths in the 1997 grand final to claim the Hospital Cup. The moist eyes belonged to former players, some from the very foundation years of Easts in the late 1940s and 1950s. There...

Jim Tucker 04/05/2022

There is far more history to the Paul Mooney Cup than anyone playing in the latest Easts v Wests clash will realise. The worthy symbol of contests between the two clubs is named after a rare figure who had a major influence at both.  Paul Mooney was Easts’ first Wallaby as a fast-striking booker for two Tests against Fiji in 1954. He played over 100 games for the Tigers from the later 1940s through the ‘50s and held the record for most first grade games at one point. As a youngster, he tuned his hooking technique on with an unusual...