Members only after 4pm – Mick learns his place in golf

By Peter Owen

MICHAEL O’Connor, rugby legend and now passionate golfer, was spending a northern hemisphere winter playing rugby league with St Helens. With him was Paul ‘Fatty’ Vautin, his Manly captain and good mate.

The two Aussie larrikins had just finished 18 holes at Royal Birkdale, outside Liverpool, where two years later their countryman Ian Baker-Finch would claim the 120th British Open title.

As golfers, Fatty and Mick weren’t quite in IBF’s class; nor did they attract the same sort of veneration.  After a few post-game drinks, the lads found themselves in Birkdale’s plush snooker room, where they put down their tankards and reached for a cue.

“Members only after 4pm,” droned a pompous member as he entered the sanctuary. “You two will have to leave.”

The mists of time have clouded the specifics of the response, but whatever it was, and by whom it was said, it was enough for Fatty and Mick – two of the most decorated players to have represented Australia on a rugby league field in the past half-century – to be shown the door and invited to never return.

That story, recalled with a quiet chuckle, was one of the reasons Michael O’Connor fell in love with golf, a game that tests a person’s skill, integrity and commitment, and unearths characters that become part of golfing folklore.

“You can play (golf) against anybody – it doesn’t matter how good or bad they are. The handicap system makes you equal.”

Michael’ O’Connor’s ability as a footballer – a dual international in league and union and a NSW State of Origin legend whose kicking skills still send shudders through Maroons fans – is well known. Not so widely recognised is his talent at golf.

Mick, who has been a resident of Noosa, on Queensland’s Sunshine Coast, for the past 25 years, first took up the game on that fateful journey to northern England in late 1988 and early 1989. 

He and Vautin were Manly team-mates and had signed up with St Helens for the season, partly for something to do, partly for the money – but mostly because it just sounded like good fun.

“We trained on Tuesday and Thursdays and played on Saturdays,” Mick said. “That was it – we had nothing else to do.”

So they turned to golf.

“Fatty had played a bit and was quite good, but I’d had only an occasional hit,” he said. “The first time I was invited to play in a corporate golf day over there I had a fresh air swing on the first tee.”

But he persevered, and with his natural athletic ability and refined hand-eye coordination, he was soon hitting balls down the centre of northern England fairways.

He borrowed a set of clubs from team coach Alex Murphy, and Fatty and he became regulars at the Ashton-in-Makerfield public links and, when they could get on, at the more exclusive Grange Park Country Club.

“It is a lovely course but some of those English members and officials could be real sticklers for protocol,” Mick recalled. 

“Fatty used to wear his socks on the outside of his long pants to keep out the cold, and he was reminded several times that such a thing was not allowed at Grange Park.”

When Mick settled at Noosa after his league career was over, he joined Noosa Golf Club, or Tewantin-Noosa, as it was then known.

“The first handicap I ever had was 13. Now, all these years later, I’m still on about that – so I guess I’m a slow learner,” he said. “But I do think I’m a much better golfer now.”

He usually plays in Noosa’s Tuesday Club event with a group of mates, and joins another group of buddies at Noosa Springs on Thursdays for a competition off the resort’s tough
black tees. He’s a member of both clubs, and usually fits in a third round each week if he can.

“I love golf,” he said. “It gets me out of the house, it’s always a challenge because you always want to improve, and I love the social aspect.

“You can play against anybody – it doesn’t matter how good or bad they are. The handicapping system makes you equal,” he said. “And, really, you’re playing against yourself every time.

“After playing sport in a team environment all my career, it’s really enjoyable to get out there and be entirely responsible for what you do.”

Mick and his wife moved house a couple of years ago, and for some time shared their home with their daughter, son-in-law and new grand-daughter Raina.

“She’s just wonderful, and it’s given us so much pleasure having her around and watching her grow,” Mick said. “Better even than golf.”

FOR THOSE WHO DON’T REMEMBER

MICHAEL O’Connor, now 62, is regarded as one of Australia’s best dual international footballers – perhaps the best of all. During a stellar career, these were some of the highlights:

1977-78: Toured Europe and Japan with the undefeated Australian Schoolboys, a superb rugby side that included the Ella brothers, Wally Lewis and Chris Roche.

1979-82: Represented the Wallabies 13 times, winning back – and then retaining – the Bledisloe Cup.

1983-89: Played 78 games for St George, 115 for Manly and 18 for St Helen’s. In total he scored 94 tries, kicked 317 goals and landed 11 field goals.

1985-90: Played 18 times for the Kangaroos, scoring 17 tries and kicking 65 goals.

1985-91: Represented NSW in 19 State of Origin matches, scoring 11 tries, kicking 52 goals and one field goal. In his first match at Lang Park he scored all NSW’s 18 points – two tries and five goals.

2008-14: Head coach of Australia’s Rugby 7s side, taking the team to a silver medal in the 2010 Commonwealth Games.