VFA and Port Melbourne legend Fred Cook dies at age 74

The great Victorian Football Association goalkicker Fred Cook has died in a nursing home in Bendigo.

“Fabulous’’ Fred Cook with his Puma boots in 1980.

AT its peak in the 1970s, the Victorian Football Association had a cluster of players who became household names, their deeds amplified by Sunday TV broadcasts that attracted large and devoted audiences.

But there was no more captivating or charismatic figure than Port Melbourne full-forward Fred Cook, who died today at a nursing home in Bendigo.

He was 74.

In football-mad Melbourne, Cook’s public profile was larger than most league players.

He had a column in the Sporting Globe, was a regular on radio, appeared on Channel 7’s World of Sport and was in demand on the speaking circuit, often accompanied by his great mate Sam Newman.

The hundreds of goals he kicked for Port Melbourne underpinned a popularity that opened many doors for him off the ground.

But he squandered whatever he made, descending into a drug habit in the 1980s and ultimately doing jail time.

Few sporting stars fell harder or deeper than the man his adoring supporters called “Fabulous Fred’’.

Fred Cook hamming it up with another great Port goalkicker, Bob Bonnett.

There was no redemptive element to his decline either; even as he faded into obscurity and his senior years he fought a battle with drugs.

He must have said it 1000 times: “I didn’t use yesterday, I haven’t used today and I probably won’t use tomorrow.’’

Cook played 33 games for Footscray from 1967-69 and had the potential to play many more. His teammates from the Dogs noted that he marked the ball as well as anyone in the game.

But Cook clashed with official Jack Collins over his attendance at a players’ gathering at the home of Bulldogs great Charlie Sutton.

Dropped to the reserves, he stewed. Hearing of his disenchantment, VFA club Yarraville came calling with a lucrative offer that he could not refuse.

Fred Cook in 1977.

Cook went to the VFA midway through the 1969 season and for the next 15 years was its most magnetic figure.

He jagged the 1970 JJ Liston Trophy at Yarraville, which, despite Cook’s dominance, was relegated.

Not wanting to play Division 2 football, he crossed to Port Melbourne.

A heart attack set him back early in his time at the Borough but when he moved to full forward nothing could stop him.

Fred Cook before a VFA representative match against the SANFL.

Wearing No 5, goals fairly gushed from his Puma boots and helped power Port Melbourne to a string of premierships.

Cook’s season tallies tell the tale: 67 goals in 1973, 58 in 1975, 108 in 1975, 125 in 1976, 125 in 1977, 115 in 1978, 79 in 1979 (when he shared the attack with another great spearhead in Peter McKenna), 112 in 1980, 106 in 1981, 139 in 1982 and 76 in 1983.

He played in the Norm Brown-coached 1974-76-77 flags and the Gary Brice-coached 1980-81-82 successes.

Fred Cook at the Station Hotel in 1985.

Cook finished up at Moorabbin after then-Port coach Warwick Irwin decided to move him on.

The great full forward was taken aback that the club where he played a record 253 games and booted 1236 goals no long wanted him. He got drunk that night at his Station Hotel.

Cook had taken over the Station Hotel towards the end of his career at Port Melbourne, and the bars that had been deserted suddenly filled.

The lunches he put on became legendary, attracting legal figures, bankers, businessmen, police, entertainers and sporting identities.

He also employed topless waitresses and strippers.

But the hotel also attracted a criminal element, including drug dealer Dennis Allen.

Cook always pinpointed the start of his slide to the night he complained to Allen how tired he felt.

Fred Cook and Bob Bonnett at Cook’s book launch in 2014.

He was down to do a sportsman’s night with the St Kilda Brownlow Medal champion Neil Roberts and English fast bowler John Snow but he was struggling with the flu.

Allen whipped out a bag of white powder and a pen knife, and tipped some amphetamines into Cook’s drink. He immediately felt a burst of energy and ready to meet his engagement.

But with a calendar crowded with commitments, he began to lean on speed and eventually his life fell apart.

He also admitted the drugs were a way of replacing the adrenaline rush football brought him, “the buzz in the belly’’.

Fred Cook training with the Bulldogs.

Cook lost everything he owned and resorted to drug dealing and petty crime to get by.

Police eventually caught up with him and he went to jail, the advice of Newman ignored: “If only you would apply to your life the discipline you showed in his football career.’’

In 2016, by now living on the Mornington Peninsula, he was hit by a motorbike and found unconscious in his home, close to death.

Fred Cook with Sally Desmond outside a Melbourne court in 1989.

He was taken to Frankston Hospital and his family was told to prepare for the worst.

But he recovered, after a couple of weeks merrily giving cheek to nurses.

Soon after Cook suffered a stroke that brought on a long stay at the Mornington Rehabilitation Centre. His mobility and speech were affected.

Fred Cook hard at work on a road project on the Mornington Peninsula in 2007.

In 2017 he looked a sick man when Port Melbourne, through former teammate Tony Ebeyer, staged a tribute for him. He was in a wheelchair and his speech was slurred.

Some people were shocked at his appearance. One former teammate wept.

But again he came good, encouraged by his loyal wife, Sally, with whom he had three children, Jarryd, Jordan and Jaimee.

Sally was never far from his side and in the past few days had been fretting over his declining health.

Fred Cook died this morning at Victoria Heights Aged Care in Bendigo.

Funeral arrangements are being made.