My mate 'Catchy' was the greatest halfback I ever saw

When the news came through Friday that Wallabies legend Ken Catchpole had died at age 78 after a long illness memories flooded back.

Born three weeks apart, the first time we met was in 1951, when Catchy was playing rugby in the Coogee Prep first XV and I was playing five-eighth for Mosman Prep.

Catchy seemed to be in five places at once – if he wasn’t making a break, he was firing off bullet passes to his number ten or coming from nowhere with a diving tackle to stop a Mosman try.

Just after half-time he had his ear torn from the top to halfway down. His father was understandably upset and wanted his son to go to hospital to have the deep wound stitched – his ear was just hanging.

“No way,” said Catchy, “We’ll do it when the game is finished”.

And that’s exactly what he did after his ear was reattached to his head with sticking plaster.

I can’t remember the score, but Catchy was the difference – a big difference in a big scoreline; he was simply brilliant.

We met again six years later when Catchy was at Scots and I was at Kings.

We were the number ones in the GPS tennis final at White City and Catchy won the first eight points in a flash to lead two-love. Somehow I managed to find his measure to win the next 12 games and the final, so we ended our school careers at one apiece.

[latest_videos_strip category=”rugby” name=”Rugby”]

But rugby fans didn’t have to wait long for his brilliance to shine through at senior level.

After spending 1958 in the Randwick colts, where he was an obvious standout, Catchy walked into the club’s first-grade side, and he won his first NSW cap in 1959 and his first Wallaby cap in 1961.

The latter should have been in 1959 too, but when he debuted for his country he was 21 years and 354 days old, and he was not only captain but coach as well, defeating Fiji.

Needless to say, Catchy was magnificent.

His 26 games for NSW and 27-cap Wallaby career – 13 as captain – came to a shuddering halt in 1968 at the hands of All Black Colin Meads at the SCG.

Catchy’s leg was caught in a ruck and Meads walked off with the other, ripping Catchy in half from his groin to well up his spine – a horrific injury that thoroughly deserved a red card.

The referee was Dr Roger Vanderfield, the boss of Royal North Shore Hospital, who knew exactly the enormity of Catchy’s suffering – and did nothing.

Those of us at the ground that day have never forgiven Meads nor Vanderfield for the parts both played in ending the career of the greatest halfback to ever play international rugby.

In an interview with Catchy six years ago, in the Green and Gold Greats series for ABC NewsRadio, I asked him how he felt about the career-ending incident.

“Lordy, you know the story: what happens on the field, stays on the field,” was his reply without a hint of anger.

Nothing but a smile. That was Ken Catchpole, not only a legend but a big man in the short body of a halfback.

(Rugby Australia)

Regardless of his shortened time in the gold jersey, the recognitions flowed, and they kept flowing.

In 1985 he was inducted into the Sport Australia Hall of Fame, in 2003 he was among the inaugural five inductees into the Rugby Australia’s Wallaby Hall of Fame, in 2013 he received the double of the World Rugby Hall of Fame and he was one of the five inaugural inductees into Inside Rugby magazine’s Invincibles – the rugby equivalent of the rugby league Immortals.

Catchy, Col Windon, Mark Ella, and David Campese were the four, all from the Galloping Greens of Randwick.

Throw in an officer of the Order of Australia medal, a statue at the SCG and the Ken Catchpole Medal for the best and fairest of the Sydney Shute Shield competition – Catchy deserved every accolade.

He read the game so well, his passing was as good as it got, and if his five-eighth, Phil Hawthorn, was being harassed by breakaways, Catchy would dive-pass 30 metres – all passes of every description were spot on for Hawthorn to run onto – smack into his belly button.

And even though there wasn’t much of him, Catchy was a devastating defender, as he proved in South Africa by dive tackling big Bok centre John Gainsford into touch at the corner post.

Everything about him was right off the top shelf.

There was only one Ken Catchpole, and he will be sorely missed.