John Coleman (Australian Footballer) - The Instant Sensation

The Instant Sensation

The 1949 season was a make or break time for the budding forward. He again trained with Essendon, but was frustrated by many of the senior players who ignored his leads. Coleman's potential was noted by a number of other clubs and Richmond made an attempt to sign him. However, Essendon finally saw the light and selected him for the opening round match against Hawthorn.

From his first match, when he not only kicked a to-this-day unbeaten record of twelve goals on debut — his 12 goals in the first home-and-away match of a season also equalled the Essendon record set by Ted Freyer, against Melbourne on 27 April 1935 — but he also kicked a goal with his first kick, Coleman was the star player in the game, which was experiencing a boom in the immediate post-war years.

Standing 185 cm tall, with a pale complexion and slight build, the 20-year-old Coleman did not appear at all imposing. He looked listless as he stood in the goal square, often a metre behind the full-back, with his long-sleeved guernsey (number 10) rolled up to his elbows.

Then, with explosive speed, Coleman would slip the guard of his opponent and sprint into open space on the lead or leap onto a pack of players to take a spectacular mark.

This innate ability to make position and his prodigious leap immediately caught the public imagination. He needed few opportunities to influence the outcome of a game.

Later one of his team-mates, ruckman Geoff Leek recalled one of his 1949 marks:

One day at Essendon I went for a mark but ended up a launching pad for Coleman. His feet just touched my shoulders and he took a mark with his boots above my head. Coleman did not climb up packs. He got to those amazing heights with a spring. I am nearly 6ft 5in and Coleman jumped over my head, not once, but often. He did not leap sideways like an Olympic jumper, but straight up. And don't forget he had to grab the ball when he got there and land safely —Miller, Petraitis & Jeremiah, 1997, p.32

He usually converted from most of his set shots by way of long, flat punt kicks. Notwithstanding this however, he was also an excellent drop-kick. Ted Rippon, Coleman's former business associate and vice-president of the football club, recalled that Coleman had kicked 14 goals in a match in Perth against a WA side, and six of those goals had been drop-kicked against the wind.

Coleman capped his brilliant debut year in storybook fashion: he booted his one hundredth goal in the dying moments of a record Grand Final win over Carlton. He remains the only player to kick one hundred goals in his first year.

The next year, 1950, was his most prolific season, with Coleman kicking 120 goals (his feat of kicking more than 100 goals in consecutive seasons had only been matched by Collingwood's Gordon Coventry, South Melbourne's Bob Pratt, and Collingwood's Ron Todd, and all three of those had done it much later in their careers when they were much older, far stronger, and much more experienced), despite missing one match with the flu, and being a major factor Essendon's premiership win over North Melbourne.

North Melbourne back pocket Pat Kelly said he would never forget playing against Essendon in round 17 . The Herald's Alf Brown wrote: Ten years from now I will remember that glorious mark John Coleman took in the last quarter of the Essendon North Melbourne game. North in a great fighting finish, drew within eight points of Essendon. Coleman, in an effort to lift his side, dashed down the field to take a spectacular mark about 70 yards (i.e., 65 metres) from goal. Kelly was in the pack over which Coleman soared. Admiring, and still astounded, Kelly told me after the match: "I looked up for the ball and all I could see was a set of football stops. They were Coleman's. He'd jumped clear over my head." Kelly is 5ft 10in (i.e., 178 cm). —Miller, Petraitis & Jeremiah, 1997, pp.47–48

Essendon had already beaten North Melbourne in the Second Semi-Final 11.14 (80) to 11.11 (77) when, in driving rain, and with 30 seconds remaining, and with North Melbourne three points in front, North Melbourne's Jock McCorkell unexpectedly punched a ball that was already rolling out over the boundary line back into play just before it crossed the line, Coleman pounced on the ball, and passed it to Ron McEwin in the goal square. McEwin kicked the goal, and Essendon won by three points. Essendon had only lost one match during the season.

In an unexpectedly one-sided Grand Final (many had thought that North Melbourne could win), with a rain lashed third quarter, North Melbourne "went the knuckle", rather than playing football, and specifically targeted the Essendon players Dick Reynolds, Ron McEwin, Bill Snell, Bert Harper, Ted Leehane and, of course, Coleman. Essendon won the Grand Final 13.14 (92) to North Melbourne's 7.12 (54) in front of a crowd of 87,601.

Opposition coaches and full-backs stopped at nothing to curb Coleman's influence. In a one-on-one duel, close-checking, spoiling defenders fared best, but few could outrun him, and certainly no one could match him in the air.

Often pitted against two, or even three, opponents, Coleman's equilibrium could be upset by needling, jostling and physical contact which often happened behind the play. Coleman's sometimes fiery temper ensured that he never backed away from a confrontation.