DARREN MONCRIEFF
Saturday 17 March 2012
BILL DEMPSEY is regarded as one of football's true legends: a tough-as-nails defender on the field and a gentle giant off it.
Today marks the four-time WAFL premiership player's 70th birthday and his former club West Perth will honour the champion in its round 1 match against Subiaco.
What better time then to take a look back at a remarkable career.
Dempsey, who won the Simpson Medal for best afield in the then Cardinals' thumping of East Perth in the 1969 Grand Final, came to the club via the Northern Territory.
He is an inductee into both the AFLNT and WAFL Halls of Fame and he holds the record as the longest serving Indigenous West Perth player with 343 league games (second only at the club to Mel Whinnen's 371 games).
Legend status was bestowed upon Dempsey by the AFLNT in 2010.
Such was his durability, he would return to the NT and play during the wet season.
Originally a Darwin Buffaloe in the NTFL, Dempsey played in two of the club's premierships, 1958-59 and 1959-60, before heading interstate to join West Perth.
He added to his Top End club premierships at the Buffaloes in 1967-68 when they went through the season undefeated.
Dempsey was among the first Northern Territorians to play for another State at the elite level when he made his debut for Western Australia against Tasmania in 1963 and he would go on to play 13 more games for WA.
In 2005, he was named in the back pocket for the AFL Indigenous Team of the Century, a selection he had earlier won in the same position for West Perth's Team of the Century in 2000.
AboriginalFootball@westnet.com.au
Last Modified on 17/03/2012 00:22