A football genius

By Brad Sinclair

IN AFL circles, the name Peter Hudson is one of the most celebrated figures in Australian football history.

In 129 games for Hawthorn, he kicked 727 goals, at an average of 5.64 goals per game, ahead of John Coleman (5.48) and Tony Lockett (4.84).

At all levels, in 356 games, he booted an amazing 2,092 goals at an average of 5.88 goals per game.

Recently, I had the luxury of visiting Peter at his Mornington Peninsula home in Victoria with Dan Eddy, the author of his new book: A Football Genius, The Peter Hudson Story. We spent three hours talking about his incredible journey.

With Bob Pratt, Hudson shares the VFL/AFL record of 150 goals kicked in a single season.

In 1999, he became the 15th player elevated to Legend status in the Australian Football Hall of Fame.

Growing up in the 1960s in Tasmania, the major league of VFL in Victoria seemed a long way from where he played senior football as a 16-year-old with Upper Derwent in Tasmania’s Southern Districts Football Association.

Father and son played in a premiership in 1962, with Peter kicking 124 goals in 20 games at the club and representative level.

The following year, he found himself at New Norfolk in the Tasmanian Football League (TFL).

Over the next four seasons, Hudson amassed

465 goals in 92 games and was courted by most VFL clubs. However, he ultimately chose Hawthorn, securing the then-largest contract in the game’s history.

Hudson made the move to Hawthorn in the VFL in 1967 as a 21-year-old, and he said it was a significant milestone.

“The move was an enormous one back in that era, and I was intimidated by the lifestyle in Melbourne,” he said.

He topped the 100-goal mark in his second season and had a very philosophical approach to kicking goals from that year.

“If I could kick 100 one season, why couldn’t I kick 120 the next year with improvement and then why couldn’t I then kick 130 and so on,” Hudson said.

It was an approach that was to prove correct as in his fifth season, a premiership year for the Hawks; he topped the goalkicking list with 150, a record that still stands today, equal with South Melbourne’s Bob Pratt.

“I honestly cannot remember anything of that day and have watched the game since, and it seems foreign to me,” Hudson said.

“At one stage, I had a shot at goal from only 10 metres out and kicked into the man on the mark, St.Kilda’s Barry Lawrence, something I never usually did.

“I used to be so pedantic about making sure I didn’t kick into the man on the mark, but on that day, in one of the most important kicks I’ve had, I did.

“But I truly didn’t know where I was.”

Hudson is so humble about his life and career that he added that he was actually glad he tied the record with Pratt and didn’t beat it.

“As the years have gone on, I feel really comfortable holding it with Pratt; I went to his funeral, and it was a feeling that is hard to explain, but

I was just so glad that I didn’t break his record,” he said.

If like me, you’re old enough to remember Peter Hudson, I’m sure you would agree he was held in the same regard as a movie star or rock singer, yet sitting with him at his house, I was astounded by his humility.

He is and, I really believe, will always be the greatest goalkicker of all time.