Ken Kearney

At the end of his first club rugby league season back in Australia with St George, Kearney was selected for the 1952 Kangaroo tour.

[4] He went on the 1953 tour of New Zealand playing in all three Tests and the following year represented in the 1954 Rugby League World Cup, the first ever, in France.

The St George committee chose to back Kearney's fine football brain and his advanced strategies on attack, defence and conditioning in choosing him as their captain-coach to go forward.

Following his premiership success with St George as both captain and coach, Kearney was selected as captain-coach of Australia for the 1956 trans-Tasman series against New Zealand with Clive Churchill unavailable due to injury.

Kearney brought tactics and strategy from English rugby league and is often credited with masterminding the St. George Dragons successful run.

He was able to inspire loyalty in his players by leading from the front and to develop a level of fitness and ruthless, mistake free football.

This discipline was the foundation for the famous straight line brick-wall defence that kept the St George team at the top through those years.

[9] On 20 July 2022, Kearney was named in the St. George Dragons District Rugby League Clubs team of the century at hooker.