Dick Condon
Richard Patrick Condon (19 March 1876 – 27 December 1946) was an Australian rules footballer who played for Collingwood and Richmond in the Victorian Football Association (VFA) and the Victorian Football League (VFL) across two decades in the 1890s and 1900s. Talent Condon was a highly skilled player, a wiry and tenacious man of greater than average height (5'11"; 180 cm), with great speed, brilliant evasive skills, and an outstanding capacity for reading a game. He played mainly as a follower. Condon is widely credited as the man who contributed the most to the development of the stab kick, which—once the specially designed "blunter" Sherrin Match II football was introduced into the VFL—became the central feature of Collingwood's pattern of play. An 18 August 1905 newspaper report, referring to Condon as "that fiery football genius", described his coaching style as a "combination of brimstone oratory and skilful tactics". Physical skills In physical terms, Condon was an extremely flexible and well-balanced player. He was able to pick the ball up from the ground with either hand, kick place kicks, punt kicks, drop kicks, and stab kicks with either foot, and handball with either hand. Abrasive nature Condon was far from well-balanced in terms of his threshold for violence (which was directed at his own teammates as often as his opponents), his short temper with club officials and umpires, his view that things must always be seen from his own perspective, his intolerance of failure, and his propensity for continuously abusing umpires, all of which were continuously displayed throughout his long career. Lifetime suspension Halfway through the 1900 season, Condon was appointed captain of Collingwood. In his new role as captain, he gave the umpires an even harder time. He abused field umpire Bill Freame on 7 July 1900 continuously throughout the match against South Melbourne at the Lake Oval after a number of decisions went against the Magpies, and he was suspended for three weeks by the VFL. Two weeks later, whilst still under VFL suspension, he got into a fist-fight with teammate Arthur Robson in the middle of Collingwood's three-quarter time huddle; the pair had to be restrained by the umpires, teammates and Collingwood club officials. On 1 September 1900, during Collingwood's second round-robin finals match against Geelong at the Corio Oval, Condon became so upset with the umpiring of Dick Gibson during the last quarter of the match that he lost his temper and signalled for his teammates to follow him off the Corio Oval, demanding that the Collingwood match committee order the Collingwood players from the field. After umpire Gibson threatened to report the entire Collingwood team for bringing the game into disrepute, the Collingwood committee refused to do so, and instead ordered Condon and the team to either return to the field, or be expelled from the club. At that stage Collingwood was a point ahead of Geelong, but Condon's behaviour so unsettled his team that it did not score again, and lost to Geelong 6.8 (44)