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Socceroos of yesteryear


Shahanga
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I was wondering, anyone on here seen Ray Baartz play? @johnno cpfc or @jw1739 maybe? He was a little before my time, but Rale Rasic rated him as arguably our greatest ever player and there’s no doubt the ‘74 squad were set back by his sudden retirement (after the delayed impact of a karate chop from a Uruguayan player in a “friendly”, basically he had a stroke).

I’m wondering, how good was he?

(I can’t recall Warren ever talking about him, but Johnny never focused on the past too much)

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@Shahanga Yes, did actually see Ray Baartz play a very long time ago. Would have been the second half of 1968 or first half of 1969 when I was in Newcastle NSW and playing (I use the word loosely) for Merewether-Carlton. I think the match might have been at Wallsend. IIRC Baartz was playing one level above our club, in the top NSW league.

It's all a bit vague now. It was the era of "wogball" of course. I don't remember Bartz specifically, but as a "new chum" or (more often) "Pommy bastard" what struck me was the physicality and pace of the game as played here, and the hard grounds. I was a crap footballer from English village football really, but here you had almost no time at all to control the ball before you were clobbered in what was 9 times out of 10 an illegal tackle. I lasted half a season before "retiring."

The modern game is so different from those days that I doubt the value of comparisons.

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On 01/07/2020 at 9:36 PM, Shahanga said:

I was wondering, anyone on here seen Ray Baartz play? @johnno cpfc or @jw1739 maybe? He was a little before my time, but Rale Rasic rated him as arguably our greatest ever player and there’s no doubt the ‘74 squad were set back by his sudden retirement (after the delayed impact of a karate chop from a Uruguayan player in a “friendly”, basically he had a stroke).

I’m wondering, how good was he?

(I can’t recall Warren ever talking about him, but Johnny never focused on the past too much)

I never saw him play, but growing up in Newcastle I certainly knew his name.

"Bartzy's got it all! Bartsy's got it all! Bartsy's got it all for sure! Ray Bartz!"

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