Neil Kerley - Personal Life

Personal Life

Neil Kerley is the son of Laurie and Lillian (née O'Brien) Kerley and is the second of the couple's 6 children (brothers Michael, Ronald, James and Brian as well as his sister Jennifer. His father died at the Daw Park Repatriation General Hospital in Adelaide on 21 February 1945, the day after Neil's 11th birthday. Laurie had fought in the AIF in World War I and also in Egypt and Crete in World War II. His mother Lillian, after struggling for years as a single mother, finally moved to Adelaide later in life and died in 1992.

While coaching North Whyalla in 1955, Neil Kerley met a local girl Barbara Gordon. The pair were married on 25 February 1955 at the St Teresa's Catholic Church in Whyalla and have three children (Donald Jr, Robyn and Gail). In a story told by Kerley in the book Knuckles by Jim Rosevear (2003), at one of his first training sessions in charge of Central District during 1988, Kerles told his players during a break that sitting in the grandstand watching them was a woman who knew as much about the game of football as he did and that he would be informed in his way home (a 45 km drive from Elizabeth to the couple's home in Bellevue Heights) who had trained well and who hadn't. Kerls was referring to wife Barbara who had learned a thing or two about Aussie rules football in her 30+ years sitting on the sidelines watching her husbands teams play. Over the years Barbara was often able to inform Neil of things that happened during training or games that he had missed, something he greatly valued during his coaching career.