Luke Turner and his family are Cardinia through and through, but it didn’t start out that way. A favourite son of the Bulls, he sat down with Gazette sports editor RUSSELL BENNETT to talk about life on and off the field…
Russell Bennett: Now I know I’ve owed you a couple of rounds over the journey, so now’s your chance mate – it’s kind of a must for Beer O’Clock…
Luke Turner: (Gets a couple of stubbies out of the fridge at Cardinia and puts them on the table – another round on him) Let’s see how this goes down. We had a function here last night and I’m still a bit dusty.
RB: Well, let’s start at the beginning. You first played at Tooradin, didn’t you?
LT: That’s right. I was 17 when I moved to Cardinia – Cambo (Bulls club legend Ian Campbell) was the interleague coach. I was keeping in the ones at Tooradin but one day when I put my pads on they told me I’d been replaced by ‘Crackers’ (legendary WGCA keeper Craig Torney), who was coming back from injury.
Bob Taylor found out straight away and tried to get me to Lang Lang, and I signed the clearance but Tooradin knocked it back. Then Cambo got me one day at a footy grand final.
This would have been in 1999. I went to go back to Tooradin for ‘03/’04 but Benny (great mate, and Bulls icon Ben Darose) talked me out of it – which was lucky because we won the flag that year.
RB: So that season that you won the flag you could have easily been back at Tooradin?
LT: Yeah, I’d trained there a couple of times and signed, and I rang Barry (Freeman) and said ‘no, I’m not going’. He said ‘no worries – I didn’t think you would’.
Benny said ‘we’ll just have a few more years of me, you and Doigy and see what happens’.
RB: It was a few more years than that though…
LT: Yeah, it was. Doigy is still going – he’s the captain of the twos.
RB: You had a pretty successful era going for a while here, didn’t you?
LT: Yeah, but it could have been more-so. We won three flags, but lost five (grand finals). We were in the finals every year, pretty much. We fought relegation one year, and the next year we played in the ‘02/’03 grand final against Tooradin – where they beat us.
The year before that we were lucky to score 70 runs (for an innings), but then it all clicked.
RB: Why do you think that was?
LT: Benny (Darose) started coaching and it was just the core group of us that they stuck with, and we brought in a couple here and there. We never really went after anyone – they just wanted to come over. Then later on we got Barf (Neil Barfuss) to play as a marquee, and he enjoyed it so we got him too.
Even Coops (Mark Cooper) – he usually only does one or two seasons and then goes somewhere else, but I think he had six with us.
RB: So the last couple of grand finals you guys won were actually against Koowee?
LT: Yeah, the last two were. We lost to Beacy, Tooradin, and the rest to Koowee.
RB: It’s been Kooweerup, you guys, Pakenham, and Tooradin for a while now at the top of the competition and there’s always been plenty in those games – particularly the ones at the end of a season or in finals. Is it just because you’re such proud clubs?
LT: We’ve always played hard out there. We’ve had a couple of blokes who just annoy people – Patto (Steve Paterson) was the main one. He was very good at annoying people – even me! (laughs).
Straight after games, Benny (Darose) would always tell us to go and have a beer with them and talk with them. Even if they didn’t talk back, he’d still talk to them.
In the end I just think they went after us because we were successful. But then Koowee went that next step and were winning grand finals year after year – we were just playing in them. It got annoying – especially the two at Holm Park (in Beaconsfield). It was exactly the same both years – we batted second, chasing 160-odd having bowled well, and we just couldn’t get there. If you’ve got runs on the board, it doesn’t matter how many you’ve actually made really.
RB: You look at that rivalry now between Cardy and Koowee and it’s still ongoing but in the years or even decades to come down the track you’re going to look at it and see it as a pretty incredible time in the history of the clubs, really, that you’ve kept facing off against each other in those big games so often…
LT: Yeah. It’s changed a bit now, with Koowee. I don’t see it how it used to be.
It’s probably because they keep winning! (laughs)
RB: And mate obviously this is a pretty special season for the Bulls – celebrating 50 years, and the first XI premierships…
LT: Well I’m actually unavailable for the function because I’ve got a mate’s wedding, but I got Cambo (Ian Campbell) to start working on some teams a couple of years ago when I was president.
RB: Am I right in saying him, Trev Hobson, Wayne Snooks, and Dave Webster are selectors of the teams of the decades?
LT: Yeah, they’re picking teams from every decade and then a 50-year anniversary one. They’re trying to work out the years – of eligibility. They said five years, but Mickey Andrews played three years here and saved us from relegation, and left the year we made the finals again. He’s one of the best bats we’ve had – by far – so you can’t not pick him.
If you want any stat on any player, you just ring Cambo. He’s the perfect man for it. He’s up in Bairnsdale now, but even if you ring him up he’ll be able to tell you anything.
RB: President, first XI keeper-batsman, rec reserve member, lawn mower – you’ve pretty much done every role at the club haven’t you mate?
LT: Well once I was president, (partner) Kim was secretary, dad (Garry) was treasurer and mum (Trish) was the cleaner.
RB: But I’ve been told that when you took over the presidency in the first place you weren’t much of a talker…
LT: (Laughs) definitely not, and I’m still not. I hate talking in public – I still cant do it. My speeches at presentation nights would go for about a minute! I end up just scratching my head and going back to sit down. I just can’t handle the attention.
RB: Are Benny Darose and Doigy (Dwayne Doig) the two who come to mind straight away when you think of your team mates?
LT: Well there were five of us who played in those three (first XI) premierships – Patto, Benny, Doigy, Johnny Nooy, and myself.
The thing about Benny is that in big games he just did what he wanted – he was a freak. He loved the occasion.
But without Doigy we would have been stuffed. He called Benny one day and said he might come and play, but no one knew who he was. Seeing him at training, we thought he was going to get smashed. But when someone took to him, he just took it as a challenge. We’d ask him how he was going to get the bloke out, and he’d say ‘bowl the same, and I’ll win’. He did, too. He always had the last laugh.
RB: What sort of a bowler was Doigy to keep to? You hear different people who’ve faced him over the years say it’s not about the spin…
LT: No, it’s not. The ball just dips. He lobs it up, and it drops. You need so much patience to keep to him because you have to wait for the ball to get there.
I’d always get caught up with taking it in front – even at Country Week. You’d know it’s coming and it just seems they’d (the batsman) have so much time to get back, but no one moves. I could pick when it was going to happen.
RB: So they’d just premeditate it and by that stage it’s too late?
LT: Yeah, it’s too late. He came back from Langwarrin with a different ball too – it went the other way. I asked him where that came from, and he’d just said he’d been working on it. I only really watch the ball when it’s halfway down the pitch – I don’t watch it out of the hand. That’s why I was in a bit of trouble with Scotty Pitcher at Country Week because I had to try and work out quickly what was happening! (laughs).
RB: Wait a minute – you’re telling me, as a keeper, you never watch the ball out of the hand?
LT: Never. I just watch it halfway down the pitch. It’s just what I’ve always done, and most of the time I’m not fully crouched down until the bowler is about to bowl anyway. I remember when BJ (Parrott) first came down he asked if I could give him a few pointers. I said all you have to do is see the ball and catch it – it’s that simple. ‘Crackers’ taught me the same thing at Tooradin – there’s nothing to it.
RB: ‘Bowled Doig, caught or stumped Turner’ became quite a mode of dismissal didn’t it? Cambo kept the stats on it didn’t he?
LT: I walked off after one game and he said “what’d you get – five?” and I said “yeah”, and he said “that’s your 300th dismissal”. Cambo made a book for Doigy and I – 180 of those first 300 dismissals were from Doigy’s bowling. The book’s got every batsman, what he made, and how we got him.
RB: Luke, talk to me about an incident back in 2013 – on a job site – that could have easily killed you… From speaking to your mum and dad and a few of your mates, it was a horrible situation but it brought the best out of people didn’t it? People from throughout the community came together…
LT: Yeah, I climbed up a ladder, took the first step on to the roof, and down I went. I can remember climbing up the ladder, but that’s it. I was even about to say: “have you got another ladder? This one’s a bit dodgy” (laughs). It wasn’t the actual ladder though – I just stood off the sheet. It’s weird – you never think about that kind of thing until it actually happens. I still get people asking me, even today, how I’m going – and these are people I’ve never met. A lot of the time I was out of it anyway, I didn’t know what was going on. I just remember waking up and having a tube down my throat and trying to rip it out, but when I woke up (from a coma) and saw everything it threw me big-time. It still does now, really. I was just so surprised with what the league did (raising money), and the clubs too.
RB: As I understand it, those closest to you were told to expect the worst when they saw you in hospital weren’t they? Were they told to say goodbye?
LT: They got the call to bring people in to say goodbye, yeah. It didn’t seem like a drama when I woke up, but then I felt my head, and obviously there was a drama – there was a piece of it missing! (laughs).
RB: Obviously brain surgery is a full-on experience, and you had to wear a helmet afterwards?
LT: Yeah, old Gilbert. I didn’t like wearing it – I always wore a hoodie over the top whenever I could. My head’s too round – it doesn’t look great shaved!
RB: Oh join the club there mate! Why did you name your helmet though?
LT: It was a Gilbert brand helmet! (laughs). It was a rugby helmet. I even had to wear it to bed and (partner) Kim’s hair kept getting stuck in the velcro!
RB: Correct me if I’m wrong, but you and Kim hadn’t been together all that long when the accident happened and the doctors weren’t sure you’d recognise her when you eventually woke up. But you did, so was that a sign that you were going to be ok?
LT: Well my sister was there in the room too. I picked Kim out straight away and my sister after that. Ando and Finchy (great mates Mark Andolfatto and Matt Finch) were there too. Finchy was working away at the time – five weeks on, five weeks off – and when I woke up he was gone. They said to play a trick on him when he first came in and saw me – to act like I wasn’t all there – but I couldn’t do it, I couldn’t keep a straight face! (laughs)
RB: Well it’s funny you should mention those boys, because I’ve had a chat with both Ando and Finchy about this story. Speaking of five weeks, Finchy said there was one point where he came home and you and a mate had a disagreement over whose turn it was to do the dishes and they were just sitting there…
LT: I ended up realising that we had a lot of plates in the house! (laughs). I think mum ended up coming in and doing them because she just couldn’t stand it anymore, but we played a game of table tennis and the loser had to do the dishes… but that went until about 4am and they didn’t get done, so the next day we just added more plates to the pile. They kept building up until mum washed them a few weeks later. When you have five blokes living in the one house…. Look, it’s not good.
RB: You tonned up against Finchy and Tooradin a few weeks back, didn’t you?
LT: Yeah, and he dropped me on two… but he has got me a lot before.
RB: Eight out of 10 times, he says…
LT: Yeah, that’s right – it’s just from paying him absolutely no respect, really (laughs). He was a very, very good bowler though. He was for a long time. It wouldn’t matter if it was uphill, into the wind – he’d always want that ball. Unfortunately I never actually played a game in the ones with him at Tooradin.
RB: Your mum, Trish, was telling me she was pretty much yelling at Finchy to drop that ball the other week – and he did…
LT: God he wanted it though! The keeper could have got there easily in the end. It was a leg-side full toss that I tried to flick and it just went straight up in the air and I just stood there laughing. He could have run me out in the end – I was still up the other end laughing! They just put the ball where I wanted that day, and it was going.
It was weird though – I haven’t trained in two years…
RB: About that – you’re at the Tooradin Sports Club each Thursday during the season instead?
LT: Yeah, that’s right. Benny Darose just won the friggin’ money! There’s a members draw there on Thursday nights and you have to be at the bar within two minutes of your name being called out.
RB: So you don’t train, and you just came in and tonned up?
LT: Well, yeah – I’m actually seeing the ball as well as I ever have, but I just can’t move! Even in the field – I know what I want to do, but the body won’t do it. I’ll go to pick the ball up and I’ll just roll over. Time has definitely caught up with me.
RB: I’ve been told to ask you about that infamous grand final against Pakenham Upper, mate. What happened there?
LT: That was the first one we won – in ‘03/’04. We lost the one the year before, so we knew what it was like to lose, and we just kept losing wickets. We were chasing about 240 and Johnny Grogan and I ended up batting together. I ended up 38 not out and he was nine – batting 11. He apparently edged one… let’s say that (grins).
RB: Did he?
LT: Yeah, he hit it. He came down and told me “I smashed that!”. We got a call that night calling us cheats, and he just said “we won” and hung up the phone.
It just didn’t seem to be going our way. Bezza (Justin Berry) was smashing them and was caught by a blinder on the boundary; Benny (Darose) got given out caught off one that bounced when he was on 58 or so…
RB: And after the game, Johnny Grogan had his own mishap…
LT: Well everyone was worried about the young blokes celebrating because we had Jimmy Glen and Johnny Nooy playing with us and they were 16 or so, so we had to keep an eye on them. Groges was just standing at the bar just downing bottles of whiskey and port. He sat on the bar, and Doigy was standing right next to him – drawing things all over him. He was passed out, really. He rocked back, and cracked his head and he was out. There was blood everywhere.
RB: Obviously they’re very different circumstances, but did he ever have a conversation with you about what happened to you all those years later?
LT: No, I never really talked about it with anyone to be honest. It just happened, and I’m alive – no dramas. It’s just an issue with smell and taste, but I’ve worked that out now.
RB: What do you mean?
LT: Well I’ve got no sense of smell or taste. I’ve got a good and bad smell, but I can’t smell grass or perfume or anything. With taste… beers go down like water, which is a bad thing because it still comes up the same! (laughs).
Ando (who’d just walked in to the clubrooms): We tested the theory with the taste. Just after he got out of hospital, we loaded up a Subway sub with jalapeños and halfway through he said ‘this is hot’.
RB: Do you ever get headaches or anything like that?
LT: Yeah, usually at around 3pm every day. I get these shooting pains for a minute or two, and then they go. I just give my head a rub, and they go.
RB: Do you have any memory loss or anything like that?
LT: Not really. I used to know the lead singers of bands off the top of my head, but now it’s just ‘what’s-his-face’. I think the alcohol would have got rid of most of my memory anyway! (laughs)
RB: Let’s see if you remember this one – your lovely mum told me that you and Finchy were swimming once in a girl’s pool and your boxer shorts ended up in the pool filter…
LT: Yeah, I couldn’t find them. This was about 10, 12 years ago. This girl’s parents were away, and in fact I don’t even know if she was there. Then her mum called one day and said ‘your jocks are here, Luke – they were in the filter’.
RB: Speaking of jocks – I heard when you finally woke up in hospital after your accident, you weren’t wearing any…
LT: No, and I needed them! Benny got sent down to the shops to buy a 10-pack and a t-shirt for me. I think he was running around Chapel Street trying to find jocks for me… Look, I s*** them but they didn’t tell me that was going to happen. I just tried to fart! (laughs)
RB: Speaking of surprises when you wake up – I hear you’ve been known to wake up after a big night with kebab on the pillow next to you…
LT: Yep, it happened in Tassie on a boys trip. We used to go and watch Hawthorn down in Tassie every year, and on the way home you’d walk past a kebab shop. I woke up one morning and it was on the pillow next to me. Benny was awake and just looking at me – I started eating it, and he just lost it!
RB: And while we’re on a roll with all things disgusting, you left a puddle of spew in a bathtub for far too long without cleaning it up?
LT: Yeah, I just couldn’t look at it. It was in the middle of summer and the sun would always hit the window into the bathroom. It just cooked it, and I walked in and I couldn’t do it so I got mum to come up. I moved nine doors up from them at one point, and she’d always come up and clean.
RB: Finchy was telling me you were the skinniest of your mates until you discovered beer…
LT: It was when I left school at 16. I think I was 60-something kilos then, and I think within two years I was about 90. Now I can’t get under 100!
RB: And for most of your life so far, Finchy, Ando and all the other boys thought you might’ve batted for the other team, shall we say…
LT: (Laughs) And I think mum and dad did, too. Even now I don’t think mum is 100 per cent sure about me. I’m a very shy person so I never really spoke to girls very well, so that’s why they thought it.
RB: Getting back to Country Week for a second, I heard your demolished a kilo steak on one trip…
LT: Well I thought it’d be easy, so I had garlic bread before it as well. I knew we had a rest day the next day, and the boys said if I ate it they’d pay for it. I was sitting there eating it and in the end I was just cutting it, putting it in my mouth, and swallowing it with water. Walking out for the next game, I’m on the sideline and someone asked “have you had a s*** yet?”. I hadn’t, so every time I moved you could really hear me struggle. It didn’t come out for two days. The steak was a horrible idea but I would have been right if it wasn’t for the garlic bread.
RB: How much Country Week did you end up playing?
LT: Six years, I think. The main problem on Country Week was Hutchy (Matt Hutchinson). Even when he was playing at Endeavour Hills, he’d still come to Country Week. He even came down to Traralgon one year and he was just an absolute pest. There was one year where I don’t think he slept for the whole week, and he still got the medal. He would have had two hours for the whole week, and he still went out there and dominated.
RB: Who’re the best players you’ve played with? Obviously Benny is one of them.
LT: Yeah, and there’d be Doigy, Coops (Mark Cooper), and in my first game in the ones at Tooradin ‘Big Boy’ (Greg Bethune) was the coach. He was just a freak. He had this perfect action, and he bowled with a two-piece ball in those days as well. He’d move it a mile, but he’d also bowl a short ball and it’d go past the batsman’s chin and I couldn’t reach it behind the stumps. It just kept rising. It was always four byes, and he’d be the one apologising to me! It’s just how he is – he’s one of the nicest blokes you could ever meet. Barf (Neil Barfuss) was brilliant, too, and playing County Week a fair bit you get to play with blokes you usually play against, like Doddy (Jason Dodd from Devon Meadows) and Scotty Pitcher (Upper Beaconsfield). Doddy and I used to room together every year.
RB: So who were the best players you played against locally?
LT: I’d say Simon Cornell from Officer, Matty Davey (Kooweerup), Budgie (Pakenham legend Ben Maroney), and (former Tooradin champion) Tom Hussey. I’d just go and play because of my mates. It’s a stupid game, really. You bloody stand out in the middle of an oval all day! (laughs). I honestly don’t pay attention to cricket – I never even learned the field placings. When I’m fielding, Doigy just points and says ‘stand there’. Mum even bought a clock for me once that had all the field placings on it.
RB: Seriously?
LT: Absolutely. Barf would ask me if one of his fielders was in the right spot, and I’d just say ‘yep’. I wouldn’t have a clue. I had one job to do and that was to go out there and just catch the ball.
RB: What about moments within games that might’ve got particularly heated – any of those spring to mind?
LT: To be honest most of them were with umpires, because I just knew if something was out or not. I had these arguments with them, but I’d always apologise after the game. In the end they knew how I was and they’d say “that’s just Luke”. Even Snooksy had to send me off twice in footy. He yellow-carded me for abusing him, and then gave me votes!
RB: So what’s next for you at Cardinia, mate? Surely you’re playing on beyond this year…
LT: Nope. My legs are killing me. I can’t move – I feel weird out there. I can’t bloody pick the ball up without rolling! (laughs). I’ll always be here. I want the boys (twin sons) to play here when they’re older too.
RB: Would you ever do the presidency again?
LT: I don’t know – things change. It’s been good this year with the young blokes doing a bit more, but it’s very hard to trust them locking the place up after a big night!
RB: Lukey, it’s been awesome to finally sit down over a beer and have a chat – even if I didn’t actually shout you one today either…
LT: Cheers Russ.
