CATS GREAT HOOKER RENFREY FAREWELLED:
ASK those who knew Cats legend Russell ‘Hooker’ Renfrey and they will tell you about a “cheeky larrikin” with an infectious smile and largerthan-life nature.
Hundreds packed the Barrabool Hills Church yesterday morning to farewell a man who, even in death, continues to put a smile on their faces.
It was not a typical funeral. There were more smiles than frowns, and more laughter than tears. He was loved by his family and he was loved by his club — the Geelong football theme (Hooker’s favourite song) boomed through the room as his coffin left the church.
Cats chief executive Brian Cook spoke of a man who was always up for a bit of banter.
Mr Cook held up a copy of the Geelong Advertiser’s back page tribute to the footy great, telling the crowd it would have made Renfrey’s year.
“He would have said, ‘look how good looking I am, I wish they could have run it earlier’,” he said fondly.
“He rarely played a bad game — in fact, he told me he never played a bad game.”
The crowd would later be told how Renfrey’s family placed that Addy tribute edi- tion in his coffin with him, because he would love how handsome he looked.
Renfrey’s grandson Raith Pearson told the congregation about his grandad’s Thursday night antics at the Gold Diggers Arms pub in Newtown in that same corner chair each time.
“You could set your watch for the time that white Mercedes would show up and in came Hooker on his cane and immediately the mood changed,” Mr Pearson said.
“You could tell everyone was drawn to him as he moved himself over to his chair and picked up his glass.”
That was, of course, until the same car pulled back up a couple hours later and his now late wife, Iva, would tell him, “that’s your last one!”. Mr Pearson said you had never seen anyone who used a walking cane move so quickly.
H He was as a two two-time time premiership player with the mighty 1951 and ’52 Cats and inventor of the ruck rover position, according to his teammate and long-time friend John Hyde and Mr Cook — well before young Ron Barassi came along. He was the man who has his own “Hooker” bar at Kardinia Park and made sure Geelong had the best facilities for past players of any AFL club. But above all else, Renfrey was a husband, a father, a grandfather, great-grandfather and close friend. Mr Hyde was more than happy to share some of the trouble young Renfrey used to get up to with his beloved football brot brothers, drawing more th than a few laughs along th the way. “After, we would ha have footy shows where pe people would entertain us (and) he always th thought the Catholics ha had the best shows, so he felt he should join the C Catholics because they kn knew how to entertain,” he said “But then we went on a footy trip and Reg H Hickey got all of us out of be bed and made us go to ch church and that was the fin finish of Hooker.” Many of the surviving members of that group of footballers sat in the front row of the church, forming a guard of honour as Renfrey was given a hero’s farewell, one last time.