The foundations of Kadina Football Club

KEITH BAILEY

Football had its start in Kadina in June 1878 when a meeting was held at the Kadina Grammar School to discuss the formation of a club.

No doubt the game had existed unofficially in the town for some years prior to this. Obviously the younger miners had played the game, or versions of it, to let off steam after their arduous and hazardous work underground – the love of sport was inherent in their Cornish background, and a cricket club had existed as early as 1853.

The officers elected at this inaugural meeting were, Mr. D.G. Sands, the local postmaster, as President: Mr. W. Roe Bayley, who ran a private school in Elwing St, as Secretary: and Mr. J. Brown, Treasurer. Mr. R. Letheby was appointed captain of the club, and the following were listed as members…. J. Anthony, J.N. Birks, S. Berriman, J. Bails, Mr. Cranston, W. Ford, F. Gaskell, W. Hocking, H. Hammond, H. Ockenden, R. Phillips, W.S. Phillips, E. Parnell, W. Rendell, W.R Stevens, J. Secombe and B. Tonkin. The club was to be called the Kadina Football Club, with entrance fee being set at 5/- per member.

The club resolved to send a letter to the Kadina Corporation asking for permission to erect goals and to play on the southwest corner of the parklands, facing the Wallaroo Road (the area is now part of the sporting complex, situated alongside the Army Drill Hail, and used as a hockey oval). Later this became a stone reserve and became uninhabitable because of the numerous small holes dug for roadmaking and building stone. This uneven surface was still visible when the complex was established in recent years, and graders had to be used to level the ground for the hockey oval.

The letter was cordially received by the councillors and permission was granted. The first game was organised to take place on Wednesday, July 17, 1878 at 2.30pm. And what a game it was! Heavy rain had fallen and the unprepared ground was awash with water, which, before the game had been in progress for long, turned into a mud patch. Portion of the existing park lands fence served as a goal one end, while two cairns surmounted by old kerosene tins were used at the other.

Two sides were picked from the enthusiastic supporters who were present and the game commenced. “Pell mell was soon the order of the day”, according to the report in the Wallaroo Times. No colours were worn by the players so that it was difficult to tell one side from the other. Not that it would have mattered as players were soon covered in mud and unrecognisable to both spectators and umpires alike.

There are no details of who played in this historic game but results of the muddy encounter were given two goals to one.

By September of that year the administration of the fledgling sport in the area has obviously got their act together and some sort of control had taken place. Intertown matches were organised between teams from the neighbouring towns of Moonta and Wallaroo, however, it was to be another ten years before an official Y.P. Football Association was formed.

The first “outside” match in which the young Kadina team was involved was against Moonta at Moonta, twenty players a side, with Mr. Pleass in charge. Kadina had scored a “behind goal” when it was discovered that another player in pink knickerbockers (Moonta’s colours) had joined the side, making 21 players in all. Kadina immediately objected, and Moonta, embarrassed by the presence of the illegal man, offered to let them take on an extra player to even things up! As they had only brought twenty men with them, Kadina chose a Wallaroo man to make up the number, but Moonta objected to this move whereupon Mr. Pleass ruled that there should only be the regulation twenty men a side, and the interloper should retire from the field. Moonta then refused to play and the match was declared in favour of Kadina.