When Brett “Angel” Duke runs out onto the ground next Saturday for the game against Moreton Bay it will be to play in his 250th game for the Noosa Firsts and will join the other two Noosa Legends who have achieved that milestone – Warren “Buster” Bunney (325) and Aaron “AJ” Jaques (255).
Brett joined Noosa Australian Football Club in 1995 when he and “Evil” moved to Noosa from Tongala in northern Victoria. Rob Taylor, Brett’s coach in the 1995 Under 15s, wrote the following about Brett in the Juniors Yearbook …. ”Brett’s performance didn’t improve enormously during the year, simply because he was good at the start and good all the way through, but his reliability and willingness to work hard and take on any opponent did contribute to the improvement of the teams improvement….. He thoroughly deserved the Most Consistent Award.”
In 1996 and 1997 he was awarded the Best Team Man award by the club and his coaches both commented, in the Yearbooks, on Brett’s consistency and contribution to the team.
Brett was a member of the Noosa Tigers U16 premiership side in 1996, when they beat Cooloola, and 1997, when they beat Alexandra Hills. In 1996 and 1997 he was selected in the Sunshine Coast Representative teams and in 1997 was selected in the Queensland Country side after a fine performance in the Country carnival. Brett finished off season 1997 by being awarded the Best on Ground trophy in the Grand Final by the QAFL.
First Senior game with the Firsts was played in 1998 as a 16 year old and played with the Tigers until the end of season 2002, apart from a stint with the Subiaco Football Club in W.A. in 2000. He moved to the South Warrnambool Roosters for a year in 2003 and came back in Noosa in 2004, staying until 2012, when he went to Yeronga for a year (and, Angel tells us, picked up their Best and Fairest award}, and back to Noosa in 2014 .
During his seventeen seasons playing for Noosa Brett has many achievements and the ones we know of include:
1999 – Best and Fairest Runner Up
Played in drawn Grand Final against Redlands
2000 – Most Consistent Trophy
2002 – Most Consistent and Leading Goal Kicker (45)
2004 – Leading Goal Kicker (23)
2005 - Senior Captain
Best Utility Trophy
2006 - Senior Captain
2008 - Best Utility Trophy
2010 - Member of the 2010 premiership side
2011 - Member of the 2011 premiership side
Awarded the Ray Poulter Medal for the Best Player in the Grand Final
2012 - Granted Honorary Life Membership of the Noosa Football Club.
We spoke to Richie Lyons who moved to Noosa the same year as Brett and Troy Duke and he shared some of his memories of playing and hanging out with Brett.
He recalls that Brett, as a junior, mainly player centre half back, using his left foot coming out of the back half. He was a great one on one player; hard and tough. Even though he didn’t look like it in his younger days he could run all day, and still can.
During the 1997 Grand Final against Aspley, Angel and Richie were on top of the Yeronga Clubhouse watching the game with Benji Maher and Ashley Trompf who were commentating for the video coverage. During the game they would run down and get them beers.
While he wouldn’t go into any details the whimsical smile on Richies face tells it all when he spoke about the 1998 Senior players trip away when Brett, Troy and he, as 16 year olds, went up with beach with the senior playing group. The smile was there again when he mentioned their 1999 players trip away, this time to Cairns.
As an insight to Angels relaxed manner we offer THIS PHOTO of his unique relaxation regime which he adopted early in life, although we are not sure if he still uses it.
For lots more photos of a footballing Angel CLICK HERE.
Thanks to Phil Duke, Evil Duke. Camille Hendrie and Diane Leavis for the photos.
Last Modified on 02/08/2016 08:41