John Nicholls: Happy 72nd Birthday!
Career : 1957-1974
Debut : Round 1, 1957 vs Hawthorn, aged 17 years, 250 days
Carlton Player No. 708
Games : 328 #
Goals : 307
Last Game: Round 17, 1974 vs South Melbourne, aged 34 years, 348 days
Guernsey No. 2
Height : 189 cm
Weight : 105 kg
DOB: August 13, 1939
Premiership Player: 1968, 1970, 1972
Captain: 1963, 1968*-1971
Captain-Coach: 1972-1974
Coach: 1975
Best and Fairest: 1959, 1963, 1965, 1966, 1967
All Australian: 1966, 1969 (Captain)
Carlton Hall of Fame
Team of the Century: Ruck
AFL Team of the Century / VFL AFL Legends
One of the truly great players in the history of VFL/AFL football, and the man widely regarded as the finest ruckman ever to play the game, John Nicholls led the Carlton Football Club to two Premierships as captain, and a third as captain-coach, in a celebrated playing career spanning 18 seasons.
‘Big Nick’ was a skilful and inspirational on-field leader, as well as a fierce protector of his team-mates. He played his first senior match before his eighteenth birthday, and was retired – against his will – by the Carlton committee just 17 days before he turned thirty-five. In between, his career was packed with glory, controversy, heart-break, and just about every individual and team honour the game could provide.
It all began for John Nicholls in 1956, when Carlton won a tussle with Geelong to recruit his older brother; Don. The Nicholls boys hailed from Maryborough in central Victoria, where Don was a star centreman, and his bigger, barrel-chested brother was already playing senior football at the age of fifteen.
Don Nicholls adapted quickly to life in Melbourne, and to VFL football. Fifteen solid games in his debut season won him Carlton’s Best First-Year Player Award, and focussed attention from a number of other clubs on his 17-year old sibling. In the summer of that year, John joined Don in Melbourne, where he eventually gave in to the urgings Carlton coach Ken Hands, and agreed to play for the Old Dark Navy Blues.
By his own admission, at first Big John was not particularly confident of his ability to play at elite level. But under the encouragement and inspiration of his captain Ken Hands, he was a quick learner. In 1957 he emulated Don by also collecting the Blues’ Best First-Year Player trophy – the first of many honours as he quickly developed into one of the game’s most powerful and skilful ruckmen. Although not overly tall at 189 cm, he was a solid 105 kg at his peak, with huge, tree-trunk legs and brawny arms.
He wasn’t particularly quick across the ground, but he was an intelligent reader of the play, a strong mark, and an accurate deliverer of the ball by hand or foot. When resting forward he was a reliable kick for goal inside 50 metres. He jumped high for a man of his bulk, and was an exceptional palmer of the ball at boundary throw-ins or centre bounces. As his career progressed, he became the master of one-on-one duels, because of his ability to quickly assess his opponent’s strengths and weaknesses. Although he preferred to palm the ball with his left hand, he was almost impossible to counter. He attacked the ball from any angle, using his right arm to fend off his opponent, while turning his body to direct the ball with his left.
More so, ‘Big Nick’ radiated authority. A steely glare from those intense blue eyes across the centre circle intimidated many opponents. And if a game became overtly physical, and more than insults started flying, the Carlton boys stood tall when Big Nick was there to fly the flag. Former team-mate Ian Collins once said; ‘he was the finest player you could ever meet. He could control a game, and he had an intense hatred of being beaten. If he had to flatten someone, he would.’
Max Ellis: Happy 78th Birthday!
Career: 1956
Debut: Round 2, 1956 v Melbourne
Carlton Player No.: 700
Games: 2
Goals: 0
Last game: Round 3, 1956 v St Kilda
Guernsey No. 21
Height: 170cm
Weight: 70kg
DOB: 13 August 1933
Recruited from South Bendigo and aged 23 on his senior debut, Max Ellis wore guernsey 21 in his only two appearances for the Blues in 1956.
Alex Way: Happy 86th Birthday!
Career : 1944 – 1948
Debut : Round 2, 1944 vs Hawthorn, aged 18 years, 273 days
Carlton Player No. 590
Games : 32
Goals : 27
Guernsey No. 4
Last Game: Round 10, 1948 vs South Melbourne, aged 22 years, 310 days
Height : 180 cm (5 ft. 11 in.)
Weight : 78 kg ( 12 stone, 4 lbs)
DOB : 13 August, 1925
Premiership Player: 1945
The nephew of former Blue Jack Way, Alex Way was a capable and clever centre half-forward from Coburg Rangers. He was recruited by the Blues in 1944, but had managed only sixteen senior matches (mainly as a half-forward flanker) before he was a surprise inclusion in Carlton’s fabled 1945 Premiership team.
Way got his chance at Grand Final glory when his volatile team-mate Fred Fitzgibbon was suspended for striking during the Blues’ great win over Collingwood in the mayhem of the previous week’s Preliminary Final. Although Alex hadn’t played in the senior team for a month at that time, he and Charlie McInnes were chosen to replace Ron Hines and Fitzgibbon for the decider. Jim Mooring (who warmed the bench against Collingwood) joined the starting line-up as second rover, Way went to a half-forward flank, and McInnes took Mooring’s place as 19th man.
Because the MCG was unavailable (it was being used as a transit centre for American troops) an enormous crowd of almost 63,000 crammed into Princes Park on the Saturday afternoon of September 29, 1945, and witnessed one of the most infamous games of football ever played. Promoted as the ‘Victory’ Grand Final to celebrate the end of World War II, it degenerated into a rolling brawl after quarter time, as players on both sides went at each other with fists, elbows, knees and boots.
Sadly, the overt violence of that day has since overshadowed Carlton’s monumental achievement. Ninth on the ladder after seven rounds of the season, the Blues won thirteen of their last fourteen matches – including two of the toughest finals ever played – and beat the hot favourites South Melbourne by 28 points in the decider. No team before or since has faced a harder path to the Premiership.
A few minutes before half time on that remarkable afternoon, men from both teams were already dazed and bloodied. The Swans were kicking with a strong breeze and clinging to a narrow lead when South’s full-back Jim Cleary took an uncontested mark in his own goal square. Looking up, Cleary saw two team-mates out in space on the northern side of the ground, and kicked long toward them.
But just as the ball arrived, Way threw himself between the pair to take a juggled mark. He played on, and speared a neat foot pass to ruckman Ron Savage, who immediately handballed over to Mick Price, and the Carlton rover’s goal put the Blues in front at a pivotal moment in the game. Although South managed another major themselves before the main break, their lead was only two points by then – and Carlton’s spirits lifted. The Blues had held the Swans in check with the breeze, and it was our turn next.
That passage of play, and others like it leading up to Carlton’s triumph, marked the pinnacle of Alex Way’s career. He enjoyed another reasonably successful season in 1946, playing 12 games for 6 goals, but thereafter became a regular with the Reserves.
His last appearance for Carlton came in round 10, 1948, when he pulled on his number 4 guernsey and ran out onto the Lake Oval to play South Melbourne one last time. The Blueboys certainly sent Alex off in style (Ray Garby and Fred Davies both kicked 5 goals) as the Blues knocked over the Swans by 41 points.
Thanks to the Blueseum for player pics and bios.