Windy Hill Brawl 50 years on: The stories and aftermath of Essendon and Richmond’s wild afternoon

Ahead of their clash at the MCG on Saturday night, GLENN MCFARLANE relives the infamous Windy Hill Brawl between Essendon and Richmond 50 years ago.

Sometimes all it takes is the smallest of sparks.

A flicker of aggression. A few angry words. A perceived injustice. Or an act of retaliation.

Combine all four, and that spark can ignite into a roaring wildfire.

That’s what happened on a wild afternoon at Windy Hill 50 years ago this weekend when Essendon and Richmond ‘almost went to war’ in one of the darkest on-field moments in the history of VFL-AFL football.

It was Round 7, 1974.

In a match forever branded ‘the Windy Hill Brawl’, players and officials traded punches and barbs in an emotionally charged few minutes after the halftime siren.

Amid the chaos were policemen on foot and horseback, umpires aiming to drag players apart, and even a six-year-old kid who had been separated from his family and had innocently followed one of the policemen onto the ground.

Players, coaches, fans and officials get involved in the infamous 1974 Richmond and Essendon fracas at Windy Hill. Richmond team manager Graeme Richmond (middle, in suit and tie) is pulled away. Tiger Wayne Walsh is pictured behind Richmond's right shoulder, teammate Bryan Wood is far left, while Bomber Laurie Moloney (wearing No. 34) is far right. Identifiable players in the scuffle are, from left, Ian Stewart, Paul Sproule (wearing No. 6) and Ken Fletcher.

On the same day that Gough Whitlam won a second term for a government that would abruptly be dismissed 18 months later, a young Essendon team captain-coached by Des Tuddenham took on Tom Hafey’s reigning premiers Richmond.

As Tigers official Graeme Richmond – who would play a big part in the melee – would say years later: “Essendon under Des Tuddenham were starting to fire up a bit and we needed to improve our position on the premiership ladder. So, we went out to Essendon with a view that we were going to win at any cost. And any cost is putting it mildly.”

What followed was “an unseemly riot”, as a VFL probe called it, in front of 24,376 fans.

Five decades on, the recriminations have long been settled – and a number of the protagonists would become firm friends – but in the aftermath of the maelstrom each club blamed the other for the wild scenes.

And while no match-day reports were made, the VFL launched an investigation the next week, handing out several suspensions with police charges also pending.

Some of the participants are sadly gone; others have been reluctant to pour more fuel on the fire. But this masthead has tracked down some key figures to get an understanding of what sparked one of footy’s biggest brawls.

One thing is certain – Richmond big man Mal Brown was a part of the fuse, even if the man himself was playing down his role this week.

“I’m not sure if I am still suffering from concussion or whether I’m just following Dan Andrews’ comment of ‘I can’t recall’,“ Brown joked.

But the WA great, playing only his seventh game in his sole year at Richmond that day, conceded a clash between him and Essendon’s Graeme ‘Jerker’ Jenkin right on halftime played its part.

“There was a free kick awarded to ‘Jerker’ Jenkin; everything went ballistic after that,” Brown recalled. “I was standing above him … I think I just fell over the top of him.”

One account suggested that Brown may have applied a ‘squirrel grip’ (connecting with Jenkin’s groin), which he denied.

But Jenkin, having heard that incorrect account in 2010, contacted the Herald Sun, saying it had been the other way around.

“I had (the football) and Mal came over and dropped his knees on to me twice – you know what he was like – so I grabbed him by the nuts. He started yelling out a bit,” Jenkin said in 2010.

As the standoff started to simmer, Brown headed towards the visitors’ rooms, but sensed two figures coming in his direction.

The Battle of Windy Hill. Picture: You Tube

One was Essendon runner Laurie Ashley, the other was Bombers reserve John Cassin, still wearing his dressing gown.

Ashley abused Brown for dropping his knees into Jenkin. One account has it that he said: “You’re a filthy player’; Cassin recalls it as: “You big smart-arse.”

Brown’s retaliation was swift. Ashley would say at an investigations hearing – and in the media later – that Brown gave him a backhander.

Brown told us: “All I could see was Johnny Cassin running around the boundary with his shock of blonde hair, looking like he was Batman in his dressing gown.”

Cassin recounted this week: “Brown started it, that was the simple thing.”

“I was walking off the ground with Laurie and he said something like ‘You big smart-arse’, and Mal gave him the biggest backhander you’ve ever seen.

“I thought ‘S***, he got Laurie, he will get me next’. So I just jumped on him, put him in a headlock and dragged him to the ground and held on for dear life.”

What was going on around them quickly descended into chaos. Players and officials, some in plain clothes, congregated in a mass of tension and testosterone.

Essendon fitness adviser Jim Bradley had been sitting on the bench, monitoring forward Ken Roberts, who was making his return from a knee injury.

He saw the incident between Brown and Ashley unfold and went to help out.

Here’s where the story blurs again.

Some Richmond players, including Kevin Sheedy, claim that many of the Tigers believed Bradley was a spectator running onto the ground.

“It looked like people had come over the fence in their street clothes and that lit Graeme Richmond’s fuse,” Sheedy claimed.

Kevin Sheedy was one of the Richmond players who thought Jim Bradley was a fan. Picture: Getty Images

Bradley rushed to Brown and he let fly. But within moments the fitness adviser was knocked out after being hit from two different sources, leaving him with a broken jaw, a few broken teeth, and concussion that required hospitalisation.

He would tell The Sun the next day: “(Laurie) Ashley went to ground and a Richmond player bent over him. I ran at the Richmond player and tried to drag him away. A Richmond player ran in and knocked me to the ground and someone jumped on me.”

A subsequent VFL investigation found Bradley had been struck by Richmond’s 17-year-old schoolboy Stephen Parsons – in his third game – and then several times by Graeme Richmond.

“He (Bradley) got knocked out cold by Graeme Richmond,” Cassin said.

Ken Roberts, who kicked four goals in the game, added: “Sheeds always reckons Graeme Richmond thought he (Bradley) was a spectator. I don’t know whether Graeme knew Jim or not. But there was no doubt it was a cheap shot.”

Years later Richmond, who died in 1991, said of the incident: “All hell broke loose. Bodies flew from all angles. I spun around just in time to see a civilian lean across Mal Brown and give him a whack.

“You can understand that when you’ve been involved in football as I’ve been for so long, you took great exception to unauthorised people … a bloke showing up out of the blue, taking to one of your players, was not on. So, I took off in hot pursuit of this particular fellow. I wasn’t to know he was actually an Essendon official.”

Essendon’s Barry Grinter was a serving policeman and was furious at seeing Bradley lying prostrate on the ground, so he chased Parsons.

Ken Roberts saw Grinter tackle Parsons: “He ran and grabbed his arm up the back, like he was ready to arrest him.”

Richmond official Neil Busse tried to drag Graeme Richmond away from the brawl. In the years ahead, Busse would become chairman of the league tribunal.

Ron Andrews was a 19-year old in his second season with Essendon.

“I was actually halfway up the race … a few of the players said ‘there is a fair bit going on out there’,“ Andrews said.

“So I went out and she was on for young and old.

“I could see Graeme Richmond on top of Jimmy Bradley with his arms pinned, punching him in the face. I said ‘S***, that’s not right’.

“Jimmy was basically unconscious. It was almost over by the time I got out there, but ‘Whale’ (Richmond big man Brian) Roberts happened to roll over. He was on his hands and knees and I thought ‘Bingo’. I had no intent to do any damage to poor old ‘Whale’. It was one of those spur of the moment things.

“I saw an opportunity and ‘bang’. I thought I am here now, I might as well do something. I might as well try and square up.”

More frantic scenes of the Windy Hill Brawl.

‘Whale’ Roberts would say later that he felt as if he had been kicked by the police horse, which was an attempt to stick with the players’ code at tribunal hearings.

Andrews and Roberts would later become mates.

As Richmond officials tried to usher Roberts off the ground to seek medical assistance, he was struck in the eye by a “flying beer can’.

Players from both sides were pelted with cans and bottles, almost all aimed at Richmond footballers.

Ken Roberts said: “It probably only lasted five minutes but it felt longer. The bottles and the cans kept coming from over the fence.”

Sheedy, who grew up a Bombers supporter, was Richmond through and through at the time.

He and teammate Kevin Bartlett were among the first players into the visitors’ race, until he heard the commotion.

“KB and I were halfway up the race, I said to him ‘Are you coming back?’ He said ‘No, I’ll get a headstart on the drink and the food’,” Sheedy said this week.

“He watched the brawl from inside. I said to him: ‘You can’t leave them, Browny is in trouble’, so I went back. But by the time I paraded around like a dancer, it was all over.”

There are those who believe if Sheedy had been involved in the stoush a few minutes earlier, it might have changed the course of Essendon’s history.

The man who would be appointed Bombers’ coach seven years later, leading to a 27-season, four-premiership career, conceded this week that if he had thrown some punches, he might never have got the Essendon job in 1981.

Ken Roberts is certain of that: “I have always said Kevin (Sheedy) knew what he was doing that day, I reckon in the back of his mind he was already thinking about coaching Essendon.”

“It was the first time he had ever walked away from a fight.”

As Mal Brown was escorted towards the visitors’ race, he raised his two arms up in a victory salute, infuriating the Essendon faithful.

More cans were thrown, and Richmond’s Kevin Morris emptied a bucket of water on angry Essendon fans from the dressing rooms.

The battle was over, but the war wasn’t.

In the Bombers’ rooms, Tuddenham delivered one of his typically inspiring speeches to his players.

“I missed most of the action out there,” Tuddenham recalled. “I had been at half forward and was walking back to the rooms when a trainer said to me: ‘Quick, get back on the ground. There’s a big fight on’. But by the time I got back, it was almost over.

“At halftime I said to the boys, ‘let’s get out there and even things up’.”

Richmond led by 10 points at the break and in a tight and tense second half, still had that same margin by game’s end.

Richmond ended the game with the four points.

Such was the angst, there were no post-match drinks which was almost unheard of in those days.

Graeme Richmond told the Tigers: “I advise you to get dressed quickly and get out of here. Go back to Richmond and enjoy our own company. Let Essendon stay here.”

The Sunday Observer headline the next day blazed: ‘Horror Brawl!’ with the story saying: “Richmond won’t play at Windy Hill. That is, until Essendon makes sure visiting players are protected from attacks by spectators. Richmond officials, white with anger, issued this ultimatum.”

Essendon president Allan Hird, grandfather of future Bomber great James, fired back: “Essendon was not initially responsible for the fracas. I am confident I can prove that.”

Such was the outcry that the VFL called an extraordinary meeting with investigations officer Jack Chessell tasked with bringing several charges.

At the subsequent hearing – which was held in camera with the players and officials from the two clubs kept in separate rooms – Laurie Ashley was banned for six weeks for abusive language; Jim Bradley received six weeks for assaulting Mal Brown; Ron Andrews copped six weeks for assaulting Brian Roberts; Stephen Parsons was outed for four weeks for assaulting Jim Bradley; and Mal Brown was banned for a week for his hit on Ashley.

The hearing lasted so long that Brown took advantage of a vacant phone at VFL House, making more than 30 calls to family and friends back in his hometown of Perth, saving him some money.

John Cassin was the only person acquitted. He said this week it might have been because no one recognised him in his dressing gown.

The VFL also suspended Graeme Richmond from holding any official role until the end of the year as well as handing him a $2000 fine.

A police investigation also saw Richmond and Parsons charged, but both were cleared when their cases went to the Magistrates’ Court.

Graeme Richmond, former Richmond team manager. He is pictured leaving City Court after the hearing in which he was involved in hitting Essendon Football Club fitness adviser James Bradley while he lay on the ground, causing a broken jaw.

The VFL dropped Graeme Richmond’s fine after the Tigers official took out a Supreme Court writ against them.

The Tigers went on to win back-to-back premierships later in the year, with some suggesting the ‘us against them’ mentality manifested itself even more after the Windy Hill Brawl.

Mal Brown missed the 1974 grand final. The judiciary had caught up with him.

After escaping with only a one-game ban from the Windy Hill Brawl, he was outed for four matches for throwing the ball back aggressively at umpire John Sutcliffe in round 20, which cost him a premiership medal.

Exactly a decade after that wild 1974 day at Windy Hill, Essendon finally tasted premiership success again, thanks to a guy named Sheedy who transformed the Bombers into a ruthless, relentless club much in the mould of Richmond during its power years.

Originally published as Windy Hill Brawl 50 years on: The stories and aftermath of Essendon and Richmond’s wild afternoon