Former Saint Geoff Cunningham and Collingwood coach Nathan Buckley remember Danny Frawley

Geoff “Joffa” Cunningham was older than Danny Frawley but knew he could play — and that he loved a laugh. One night he asked ‘Spud’ why the club raffle was always being won by the same trio. Plus Nathan Buckley’s emotional Frawley tribute.

Danny Frawley (R), Geoff Cunningham and Tony Lockett relax in the rooms after the 1989 VFL match.

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Back in the late 1980s, Geoff “Joffa” Cunningham was as confused as every other St Kilda player when a trio of their teammates enjoyed a remarkable run of luck in the club’s regular Thursday night raffle.

The winner was always drawn by the naturally gregarious club captain Danny Frawley.

And the prize was always typical of the times: a chook or Victoria Bitter stubbies.

Coincidentally, Cunningham recalls, Frawley was travelling up and down from Ballarat for training sessions with “Plugger” (Tony Lockett) and “Burnsy” (Greg Burns).

“As captain, Danny would read out the winners,” said Cunningham, 60, who played 224 games with St Kilda between 1977-89 and these days lives in Brisbane.

Danny Frawley (right), with Saints teammates Tony Lockett and Geoff Cunningham after a 1989 win.

“For about three or four weeks in a row, he would call out ‘and the winner is, No.41 which is Greg Burns’, or ‘No.38 which looks like Tony Lockett’.

“Of course the prize they won always happened to be the dozen stubbies.

“I got wind of it eventually that the Ballarat contingent kept winning the stubbies. Danny, being such an honest guy, couldn’t lie very well.

“So I asked him one night after ‘Plugger’ had won again and he just broke down laughing.

“It was a good rort while it lasted, those three drinking the 12 stubbies on their way home to Ballarat.”
Like Frawley, Cunningham had been recruited from the rich Ballarat-based region, and while four years older, knew of young Danny after playing football with his older brother Michael Frawley at East Bungaree.

“He was a highly-talented young kid who liked a practical joke and loved a laugh,” Cunningham said.

Frawley enjoys a win with ‘Joffa’ Cunningham, coach Darrel Baldock, Lockett and Nicky Winmar.

“He was always popular and a leader, although when made captain at age 23 he had to learn the process and he did fairly quickly, probably more so when Ken Sheldon took over.

“He was a running and attacking defender in his early days and Tony Jewell used to sometimes play him as a pinch-hitting centre half-forward and he was good at it, until the day he kept Gary Ablett kickless.

“From then on he was a full-back who had the attitude nobody was going to kick goals on him, and not that many did.

“A lot of people die, but I just can’t get my head around how Danny died.

“To think he must have been such a dark place is very, very sad.”

Nathan Buckley with wife Tania and Danny Frawley with wife Anita at the races in 2009.

NATHAN BUCKLEY’S TOUCHING FRAWLEY TRIBUTE

Danny Frawley “just wanted to be loved and needed”, an emotional Nathan Buckley believes.

The Collingwood coach played against Frawley before the former St Kilda captain joined the Magpies as an assistant coach between1996 and 1999, describing him as one of the fittest people he had ever come across.

But he was also one of the greats, Buckley said.

“He just wanted to be loved, and needed, and sometimes for some people you can give all the love you want but it’s not enough, mate. I think that was the thing for Spud,” Buckley said.

“He just wanted to be important to people, he wanted to make people laugh, and that made him a great teammate and it madehim a great captain.

“It made him a great person, because he wanted to make everyone’s life better, and then get that reflected feeling of importanceand being special. I think that permeated through his whole life.

“I really feel for (his wife) Anita. I can imagine how much love that she and the girls have provided for Spud over the years.I’m really feeling for them today.”

Buckley said Frawley — who passed away on Monday — “was a gun” footballer who put some of the game’s top players in the shadeon the training track.

And that was even after he had retired.

“He could have been a big-bodied midfielder — he was one of the fittest blokes that I ever knew, and I didn’t really knowhim until after his career,” Buckley said on SEN.

“I was a 24, 25-year-old midfielder and Shawry (then-Magpies coach Tony Shaw) and he would go for long runs. They’d run with the players and Shawry would want to bust blokes because that’s just what he did, and if there were ever any 400s or 800s, Spud was unstoppable.

“He just set it at 90 per cent and he wouldn’t slow down, he’d just run through the line and be laughing all the while. He was a very fit unit.”

Frawley, who played 240 games in defence for St Kilda, took on the game’s great forwards including Gary Ablett Snr, JasonDunstall, Dermott Brereton and Tony Modra throughout his time in red, white and black, which Buckley believed would have taken a toll that he said was “really unfortunate”.

“He played against some of the best players in the competition and how tough is it mentally when you’re doing everything youcan and they’re still kicking sevens or eights? But the job you’re doing is stopping them from kicking 14,” he said.

“The mental resilience, the toughness but also the toll that takes on a person when you can’t quite deliver to the level.

Frawley the assistant talks to Buckley during a Pies clash in 1997.

“I’m pretty sure that Spud would’ve felt that he was never enough, which is really unfortunate. He’s not the only person, I think it’s a very human thing, but Spud definitely wore it on his sleeve. And I think that endeared him to a lot of people.”

Frawley had been open about his battles with his mental health, following what he described as a mental breakdown in 2014.

Buckley said “Spud” would “find a little bit extra to give when someone would think there’d be no more”.

“When things were dark, when things were bleak, when it looked like all was lost, he was a top bloke that would see that asan opportunity to be the person who could provide more,” he said.

“That was his real strong attribute and it was also his cross to bear, because I think it was done, clearly, to make the placebetter and to assist people, but he also wanted to stand out.

“He wanted to have people realise that he was prepared to do anything that he could for them and to be seen as someone ofimportance and someone special.

“And he never had to do that, because he already was.”

— Lauren Wood