Steve Folkes, as a player, coach and trainer, was as Canterbury Bulldogs as it gets
THE last time the Bulldogs won a premiership and Steve Folkes wasn’t involved as a player, trainer or coach was in 1942 — they don’t come much more Canterbury than that.
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THE last time the Bulldogs won a premiership and Steve Folkes wasn’t involved as a player, trainer or coach was in 1942 — they don’t come much more Canterbury than that.
A Bankstown junior, Folkes played his entire first grade career with Canterbury, mainly as a super fit backrower, and appeared in 245 matches from 1978 to 1991.
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He played in all six of Canterbury’s grand finals from 1979 to 1988, starting each of them and winning four. Folkes and Steve Mortimer are the only players to appear in all four victories.
Folkes also managed nine matches for New South Wales from 1986 to 1988, with the first of those series marking the inaugural whitewash in State of Origin history.
That 1986 season was a winner for Folkes from start to finish — he was one of Canterbury’s best in the 4-2 grand final loss to Parramatta, won the Origin series with the Blues and made his Test debut in the mid-season series against New Zealand before earning selection on the Kangaroo Tour which went through England and France unbeaten.
All told, Folkes played five Tests for Australia, the last coming in 1988.
After retiring at the end of 1991 with 245 games to his name, the most of any Bulldogs player at the time and still the third highest total in club history, Folkes served as a trainer and lower grade mentor until former teammate Chris Anderson ended his tenure as coach at the end of 1997.
In his first season at the helm, Folkes’ Bulldogs scraped into the 10 team finals series in ninth spot courtesy of a one-point win over Illawarra in the final round of the regular season.
What followed was one of the greatest playoff runs in Australia sporting history. The Bulldogs won four matches in a row, all as outsiders, to claim an unlikely grand final berth against Brisbane.
Back-to-back extra-time victories over the reigning premiers Newcastle and arch rivals Parramatta secured the 1998 Bulldogs as a history-making team, with the 32-20 win over the Eels coming after Canterbury trailed 18-2 with 11 minutes remaining.
Folkes became one of the few coaches in premiership history to steer a team to a grand final in his first year as a coach, but the brave Bulldogs couldn’t compete with a star-studded Brisbane side and went down 38-12.
The Bulldogs returned to the finals two of the next three years but seriously challenged for the title again in 2002 — a 17 match winning streak, the second longest in premiership history had the club positioned as raging hot premiership favourites.
A series of massive salary cap breaches tore the heart out of the Bulldogs, as they were stripped of 37 competition points and relegated to the wooden spoon.
However, Folkes managed to pick up the pieces and took the club to a preliminary final in 2003 before winning the grand final in 2004 with a 16-13 victory over the Roosters. Folkes was named coach of the year.
It remains Canterbury’s most recent premiership.
From there, Folkes took the club to another prelim in 2006 before missing the finals in 2007 and 2008, the final season ending in tough fashion with the wooden spoon and he was let go by the club.
After he was let go, Folkes worked as strength and conditioning coach for the West Indies team before returning to rugby league with stints at Wests Tigers and St George Illawarra which was followed by a three-year tenure as coach of the Jillaroos.
Folkes had been appointed as coach of Group 6 club Moss Vales Dragons this season.