Violence in sport: FNQ’s ugliest brawls on and off the field
They are the acts of violence that left the Far North sporting community in shock. Following an ugly brawl between supporters of two sports clubs last week, we have taken a look back at the incidents that have marred Far North sport over the years.
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They are the acts of violence that left the Far North sporting community in shock.
On the back of an ugly brawl between supporters of two sports clubs last week, we have taken a look back at the incidents that have marred Far North sport over the years.
From all-in brawls, punch-ups between parents and on-field incidents where spectators have joined in.
These are the stories behind the city’s most infamous sporting brawls.
RUMBLE ON THE RIVER (2020)
Herbert River Crushers president Joe Pennisi was seething after an annual pre-season trial match against the CDRL’s Tully Tigers descended into chaos last year.
After repeated acts of foul play had already left a blemish on the game, a major brawl erupted in the third quarter at the Tully Showgrounds after a Crushers player was collected in a headhigh tackle before copping another shot while lying on the ground.
After the fiery fracas finally fizzled out, the referee made the decision to abandon the rest of the game.
At the time, Pennisi labelled the match “a f****** disgrace”, and declared he wouldn’t be bringing the Crushers back to Tully unless the Tigers could guarantee they were changing their culture.
“We went up there for a trial, so we can have a game of football and a bit of fun, and they came out there like it was World War III,” Pennisi told the Cairns Post last March.
Despite the ugly end to 2020’s clash, the teams played the annual pre-season trial without incident earlier this year.
BULLDOG UP FOR SCRAP (2016)
Centrals Trinity Beach veteran Brian Durbidge copped a lengthy AFL Cairns suspension after a Port Douglas runner was punched amid an ugly brawl that marred the 2016 preliminary final.
Durbidge, who was expected to retire following the Bulldogs exit from the finals, left Crocs player Ross McCrae and runner Glenn Dickson with facial injuries late in the fourth quarter.
Durbidge was red-carded after throwing two punches at McCrae before Dickson entered the fray to try to remove McCrae.
The trainer wore the brunt of Durbidge’s frustration before Centrals’ other runners entered the melee.
The incident was coming for much of the last term of the game as Durbidge was involved in a number of spot fires around the ground before he and McCrae crossed paths.
Crocs coach Brad Cooper believed the incident could have been avoided if Durbidge was red-carded earlier.
“I do not think it is a very good look for footy when a guy is throwing multiple punches and umpires were not getting him off the ground,” Cooper said after the match.
“The umpires knew about this, I told them during the week that this bloke was going to retire and go out with a bang.”
Durbidge was charged with three counts of striking and one of kneeing and received eight weeks on the outer.
HEAT TURNED UP IN STOUSH (2016)
A wild all-in brawl between the FNQ Heat and SWQ Thunder shocked fans at an NPL clash in 2016.
Both benches rushed on to the field to get involved in the fight, which started just as the referee moved to signal fulltime with SWQ Thunder leading 2-0.
The stoush kicked off after Thunder’s Adam Daly punched Heat defender Shimon Watanabe in the face, resulting in a broken nose for the departing visa player.
Bizarrely, the victim of the initial incident received a two-match suspension.
Daly, who received a red card during the game, was handed a six-week suspension, while Thunder teammate Jacob Bigby copped four weeks.
Heat’s Matthew Filip also picked up a red card on the night and served a two-game suspension during the finals, which forced him out of the grand final.
Striker MJ Nkiwane copped four weeks in the most severe penalty of the Heat players for fuelling the eruption of the brawl.
Heat’s Kieran Sanders got a three-week ban while Bronson Koppen was handed two games.
The players chose not to appeal the bans.
MORE THAN 50 INVOLVED (2015)
Fourteen players from two local rugby clubs were handed suspensions totalling 84 weeks after an on-field brawl spilt into the crowd in 2015.
Queensland Rugby Union’s judicial committee issued seven Penrhyn players with eight-week suspensions for their part in the Vico Oval melee, while seven Tablelands players each copped four-week bans.
More than 50 people, including players from both clubs, their benches and parts of the crowd were involved in the vicious melee that lasted around 15 minutes.
Four Cairns police units attended to break up the brawl but the situation had calmed by the time they had arrived.
The incident started after some minor push-and-shove between opposition players following a bungled try in the 65th minute of the Round 21 match.
The brawl spread through spectators with reports prams were toppled and players and spectators “were fighting among women and children”.
The match was called off with Penrhyn leading 12-7.
The incident saw Penrhyn voluntarily withdraw from the 2015 finals series, while both clubs had to show cause to the FNQ Rugby board as to why they should not be punted from the competition the following season.
FOOTY MUMS DUKE IT OUT (2008)
Two footy mums were banned from attending junior rugby league games after the parents got into a punch-up at a game between Edmonton Storm and Central Scorpions.
League officials slammed the women’s behaviour following the 2008 incident.
“It was just amazing, punches were thrown,” an Edmonton rugby league official, who declined to be named, said at the time.
“They were both Edmonton Storm parents. It is just a ridiculous situation that should never have occurred.”
The official said the parents had carried over an argument from the week before and while they did leave the grounds, children followed them to witness the fracas.
“It is just not acceptable in junior sport, we point that out all of the time,” the official said. “We have zero tolerance for violence.”
COACH QUITS AFTER UGLY SCENES (2008)
A junior rugby league coach quit in disgust following a shocking junior footy brawl in a Cairns District Junior Rugby League under-15s match between Brothers and Mossman.
The fight, which occurred during a regular season match at Mossman in 2008, started between opposing wingers but quickly escalated into an ugly melee involving several players and even water carriers. A Mossman player reportedly left the field bleeding from his face.
Officials called off the match and awarded the points to Mossman due to a Brothers’ bench player running on to the field to join the fray.
Mossman coach Roy Zammataro, who had coached local juniors for eight years, resigned in the wake of the incident, citing unacceptable violence.
Two Brothers players were suspended for seven and five weeks, while the injured Mossman player was found guilty but discharged without penalty.
TEEN COPS BIG BAN (2006)
A wild brawl described by onlookers as among the most violent scenes they had witnessed on a football field broke out in the closing stages of the 2006 Cairns District Rugby League under-18s elimination final between Yarrabah Seahawks and Atherton Roosters.
An Atherton player was struck by two Yarrabah players after putting a kick in during the final minute of the match, which was won by the Roosters 48-20.
The incident sparked an all-in brawl during which another Roosters player was knocked unconscious and kicked.
“It was terrifying, seeing your son get kicked on the ground,” the player’s father told the Cairns Post in 2006.
“It took him a week before he was even half-good. I used to play football as well but when I was playing it was always one-on-one, never six-on-one.”
In his report, the referee – an off-duty police officer – branded the brawl one of the most violent incidents he had seen on a football field.
STOUSH IN THE STANDS (2005)
Crowd violence erupted at a football game at Yarrabah in 2005 after fighting flared in the bar area then moved outside the main gates at Jilara Oval.
The sideline melee occurred in the second half of the Cairns District Rugby League A grade match between Brothers and Yarrabah but had nothing to do with the on-field contest.
Then Yarrabah Seahawks president Stephen Canendo took to the airwaves following the incident, pleading with fans not to bring a “personal beef” to a public place.
“We just don’t want people to think the football started it,” he said.
“It had nothing to do with the game. The games were played in great spirits.”
Six men aged between 20 and 40 were charged by police with fighting in public.
The punch-ups were believed to be sparked by a feud between families, and came months after the 2004 semi-final between the same two clubs ended in chaos.
In that match, fans’ tempers reached boiling point minutes from the final siren when Brothers player Tobin McGuiness was sin-binned for a high tackle on Yarrabah’s Kirsten Maloney.
As tempers frayed on the field, emotions spilt over in the crowd, with spectators accused of taunting, throwing projectiles and spitting at players as they left the field.
McGuiness continued to remonstrate with opposition players as he left the field and shaped to punch Maloney as he walked off, with his punishment upgraded to a send off.
While police and security guards were already at the ground, several police reinforcements had to be called and referees and players were escorted from the field.
FNQ SPORT’S DARKEST DAY (2004)
An entire sporting team was suspended for a total of 400 weeks after one of the darkest days in Far North sport.
All 22 North Cairns Tigers players earned suspensions ranging from 10 weeks to five years for their role in a vicious brawl that erupted before their 2004 AFL Cairns grand final clash against Port Douglas, while coach Jason ‘Jack’ Love copped an eight-year ban for bringing the game into disrepute.
Melbourne visitor Dave Allison, who managed AFL greats including Aaron Hamill and Anthony Koutoufides, was in the stands for the clash, and described the scenes as the worst he had witnessed in 40 years of football.
“It’s an absolute disgrace. It was a near-riot,’’ Allison said in 2004.
“I’ve never seen anything like it.”
The violence exploded when North Cairns players advanced towards their opponents immediately after the national anthem.
The spiteful on-field brawl involved all 44 players, as well as officials and coaches from both clubs, and only ended when the umpires rushed to the centre of the field and bounced the ball to start the game.
A junior exhibition match scheduled for halftime had to be cancelled after shocked parents left with their children in tears.
Fights also broke out on the field and in the crowd after the match, with medal presentations abandoned for fear of more violence.
The Tigers won the game, but the league declared the grand final a “no result” and withheld the 2004 premiership.
RUGBY LEAGUE RIOT (1989)
Charges were laid after a ‘riot’ at a Cairns District Rugby League match between Innisfail clubs United and Brothers in 1989.
Police had to call in reinforcements as violent clashes involving players and supporters from the two clubs spread at the ground.
Referee Warren Pitt stopped the game early in the second half because of the brawl.
Brisbane and Sydney first-grader and North Queensland representative, the late Steve Carter, was taken to Innisfail District Hospital and required 17 stitches in a gaping head wound.
“I was king-hit by one player, and then one of his teammates spat on me while I was on the ground and kicked dirt in my face,’’ Carter said in 1989.
“I needed 17 stitches for a cut above the eye which later became infected because of the dirt.’’
He said the incident occurred after he broke from a scrum and nominated a player to tackle.
“I admit I said: ‘The black … is mine,’ but it wasn’t meant as a racial insult,’’ Carter said in 1989.
“If it had been a ginger-haired bloke I would have referred to the colour of his hair. It was a way of telling my team I had the bloke in possession covered.
“Now the black community in Innisfail think I’m racially prejudiced and I can’t walk down the street without copping abuse. I even had some stubbies thrown at me one night.
“Perhaps I shouldn’t have said what I did, but I don’t think it entitled me to a bashing.’’
Originally published as Violence in sport: FNQ’s ugliest brawls on and off the field
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