Wayne Carey

Wayne Carey, known as "The King" or more humbly "Duck" due to his walking style caused by one leg being longer than the other, is regarded as one of the greatest Australian Football League players of all time.

Early history

Born in 1971 in Wagga Wagga, a rural city in southern New South Wales regarded as the frontier dividing "Aussie rules" territory with that of rugby league, Carey played for North Adelaide in the SANFL before joining North Melbourne in 1989 and quickly rising to prominence, winning his club's best and fairest award in 1992 and awarded the club captaincy by coach Denis Pagan in 1993. Playing in the centre half-forward position, Carey was renowned for his strength, height and fitness (abilities exploited by Pagan who instructed the team to kick long to a forward line left open for Carey), he repeated his best and fairest win four times, was selected in the All-Australian team six times (four times as captain), was his club's leading goalkicker five times, and most importantly, led his club to two premierships in 1996 and 1999.

Related Topics:
Wagga Wagga - New South Wales - Rugby league - SANFL - North Melbourne - Denis Pagan

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Carey was picked up after a series of events which would have left the Sydney Swan's recuiting staff slightly red-faced over the course of the 1990s. Greg Miller met with the Sydney's football department to discuss the transfer of a highly rated forward by the name of John Longmire. After that deal was settled, Miller then asked about "the Carey kid". He made them a relatively cheap offer of a $10,000 transfer fee to which the Swans agreed.

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Carey's first few seasons had promised a lot, with commentators earmarking him as a future champion. Yet it wasn't until his first State of Origin match for South Australia in 1992 that Carey really came of age. Playing at centre half forward alongside and against some of the game's greatest, Carey took the game apart in the last quarter taking some big marks and kicking long goals from outside 50 metres. His maturity took leaps from thereon as he was able to match his talent and skill with consistency.

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When Denis Pagan took the coaching reigns in 1993, one of the first things he did was to appoint Carey as the club's captain - the second youngest captain in VFL/AFL history at 21 years of age. Carey took this great responsibility of leading a young team with aplomb, taking them to finals for the first time in many years. He consistently won games off his own boot, inlcuding a game against reigning premiers West Coast at the WACA where he cut Glen Jakovich to shreds and also against the year's premiers in Essendon, playing a dominant final quarter that marked him as an out-and-out champion that belied his relatively youthful age. A testament to his brilliant first year as North Melbourne's captain, Carey was named captain of the All-Australian team - the youngest All-Australian captain ever.

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Carey was well known for his performances in big games, particularly finals. In 1994, after tearing a calf muscle in the final game of the home-and-away season, he faced up to play perennial finalists Hawthorn. A tight contest all day, Hawthorn stepped up to kick a couple of goals with little time remaining. Enter Carey, who called and marked strongly over Hawthorn captain Chris Langford to kick a goal and then another to tie the scores. The match went into extra time, with Carey again kicking the sealer. Still struggling with the calf but with a week's break, Carey limped into the preliminary final against Geelong. Carey immediately stamped his authority on the game with a couple of strong marks and goals in the first quarter. Geelong then took complete control in the 2nd quarter. It was left to Carey again to lift his team out of despair and that he did, in one quarter, playing one of most inspirational finals performances in recent memory, kicking 4 goals and seeing off Tim McGrath and Leigh Colbert. With scores level deep in the final quarter, Gary Ablett would mark and kick the winning goal after the siren, but Carey's performance that day would be remembered by all for many years to come.

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Other dominating performances include his 11 goals 2 behinds (both hitting the post) against Melbourne in 1996. Carey was irrepressible under lights at the MCG this Friday night, seeing off Shaun Smith early, then David Neitz and Anthony Ingerson. Melbourne simply had no answer to his brilliance as Carey took contested marks at will, including a one-hander as Neitz pulled him to the ground.

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Another memorable day for Carey was his 10 goals in a losing team against Essendon in 1999. Carey made a complete mockery of Kevin Sheedy's decision to start Paul Barnard on him, after which Sheedy quickly moved the more conventional match up of Dustin Fletcher to face the might of Carey. But the damage was already done. Carey was on fire again and there was little Essendon could do - except exert their dominance in every other area of the ground. With the ball almost going over the boundary line deep in the pocket at the Punt Rd end of the MCG, Carey, under pressure, picked it up, swivelled on his preferred right foot and kicked the ball on his non-preferred left foot from 25 metres, bending it through the big sticks for one of the most freakish of his 727 goals.

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Despite his widely recognised skill, he was not well-liked by fans of opposing teams, who regarded him as arrogant yet could not deny wanting to have him in their respective teams, as he tore opposition defences apart and left mental scars with some that would last entire careers. Many defenders would confess to having sleepless nights the night before they matched up with Wayne Carey.

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