St George Saints
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- This article is about the football (soccer) club. For the rugby league team, see St. George Dragons or St George Illawarra Dragons.
The St George Saints are a football (soccer) team from the Southern Districts of Sydney, NSW, Australia, playing in the NSW Winter Super League & other Soccer NSW competitions. Their home ground is St George Soccer Stadium, located on the grounds of Barton Park, in the suburb of Rockdale.
The club was formed shortly after the end of World War II by Hungarian migrants & was originally known as Budapest. In the 1960s, led by pioneering football administrator Alex Pongrass, it became one of the first ethnic clubs in NSW to search for a district to call home & it chose the St George district. It later became known as St George-Budapest before shortening its name to St George some years later. They opened a licensed club, named Soccer House, in the suburb of Mortdale in 1968. In 1969 Frank Arok, the first full-time coach in Australia was appointed, serving two stints as coach, the last ending in 1983 when he left to coach the Socceroos. In between Arok's two stints as coach, Rale Rasic was coach, coaching the club at the same time as he was coaching the Socceroos. In 1972 the club was invited to an international club tournament in Tokyo, Japan. It won & to this day it remains the highest ever international achievement by an Australian club side.
Such was the dominance of St George in those days that up to 10 players on the national team would be comprised of St George players. In 1974 the team set a record for the most players from any one club side on a World Cup team when 5 of their players were on the Australian side that started against East Germany in the World Cup that year in West Germany, including the vice-captain of the side, the late Australian footballing legend Johnny Warren. Another notable player (albeit at a lower level), was football commentator Les Murray. Together with Warren they would become known as "Mr & Mrs Soccer" & would become the faces of football in Australia through their commentary work on SBS Television.
In 1975 the meeting to establish the Australian National Soccer League took place at the licensed club, with representatives from all founding clubs, including Sydney City Hakoah president & Westfield founder & chairman Frank Lowy. The competition started in 1977 & it won the competition in 1983. They played in the league until the 1990/91 season. Since then they have played in state competitions. In 2005 the side was controversially axed from the new look Vodafone New South Wales Premier League & took legal action against the decision along with the Bonnyrigg White Eagles, but were unsuccessful.
[edit] Notable Former Players
- Matthew Bingley
- John Filan
- Andy Harper
- Les Murray
- Manfred Schaefer
- Robbie Slater
- Johnny Warren
- Attila Abonyi
[edit] References
- By the Balls - Memoir of a Football Tragic, Les Murray. ISBN 174051355. Published 2006 by Random House Australia, 20 Alfred Street, Milsons Point, NSW, 2061, Australia.
