Herewith a transcript of a recent ACS members’ meeting, addressed by Prof. Steve Georgakis, author of Towards a Theoretical Understanding of Australian Colonial Sport: British Nationalism and Schools (Springer, 2026). It’s available as a podcast and on YouTube:
Rodney Ulyate: Good evening, everyone. I say “good evening” because our guest is based in a time zone in which it is now evening. Good morning to most of you. And whether you’re watching this live or catching up later through the recording, we’re delighted to have you with us.
Before we begin, I’d like to extend my thanks to those who have helped to make this event possible—in particular to Peter Hardy, Rick Finlay, Huw Nathan and Pete Griffiths, without whom we really wouldn’t be gathered today in this way.
I now have the great pleasure—the very great pleasure—of introducing our guest speaker, Dr Steve Georgakis.
Dr Georgakis joined the University of Sydney in 2002, and has since established himself as a leading figure in the fields of physical education and sport in schools; also in teacher education and in the history and sociology of sport. He’s the author most recently (and most saliently for our purposes today) of Towards a Theoretical Understanding of Australian Colonial Sport. It’s a highly readable volume, in which he offers a fresh framework for interpreting the development of sport in Australia during the colonial period. He draws on case studies ranging from school football to community sports like horse racing, yachting, lawn balls and cricket, and on the basis of those furnishes a very compelling account of sport as a vehicle for cultural continuity and national ideology in Nineteenth-Century Australia.
If he’s free, I invite you to join me in quite literally muted applause for our guest, Dr Steve Georgiakis.
Steve Georgakis: Thank you. Just some very quick background information. I’m a great lover of cricket. I played cricket growing up. I run a course at the Sydney University, and we took 200 of our students this evening into the Sydney Cricket Ground, including a couple of English friends of mine who were out here for the Ashes Test series.
When I was writing on and examining Australian sports history and sociology, I was influenced by the narrative that the playing of cricket was somehow always a demonstration of the rise of Australian nationalism. I always found it a little bit difficult to comprehend, because when you read the general historians of Australian history, they talk about a very, very long period when much of Australians’ examination of who they were was strongly linked to Britishness. Against this, however, there were a couple of these sports historians who made a career out of saying that cricket was the first stage of Australian nationalism. And that was always perplexing, because it went against the grain. So I had some unfinished business.
Another thing that I was always fascinated by was the link between cricket and what I call “sport as education”—this concept of sport having a central role in the independent boys’ schools of Sydney.
The supervisor for my PhD was an education historian called Professor Geoff Sherrington, and he always argued that the independent boys’ schools were a complete transplantation of the independent boys’ schools in England—as you know them, the English public schools—and that cricket was central to the curriculum.
But sports historians have never really grappled with cricket played in the schools. They never have. They’ve just looked at the commercial elite-level cricket, which was obviously reported in the press. So that was another element to this.
So after COVID, I started really examining our history, looking at it from a colonial perspective. And the more I read about cricket in the colonial period, the more I started to realise that the story was incomplete. There were a lot of things that were missed.
The first thing that was missed was the schools. I trace the playing of cricket in Australia back to the first real male educational institution that we had in the colony of New South Wales. And that was the old Sydney male orphan school. So I started doing some research on that.
And with a bit of hard work and grit, I worked out that the first native-born cricketers were these boys that had emerged from the Sydney male orphan school. It was very clear. They went there in 1818, and some of them stayed there for six or seven years. And then in the early 1830s, they formed the bulk of this very famous cricket team called the Australian Cricket Club. It was very clear that they were the boys who had learned how to play cricket at this Sydney male orphan school. So that is, I think, something that I’ve come up with which will perhaps change the way that cricket is viewed in this country.
I then went back and had a look at the early commercial exchanges of cricket in Sydney. They start off in 1826. The military and the various regiments start to play some games with cricketers from the mother country. There were a couple of very famous publicans at the time—Richard Driver senior is one, Edward Flood another—who came to the conclusion that if you really wanted to generate interest in commercial sport, you needed to have some kind of a narrative. So I suspect they said, “Well, a great way of generating some interest in commercial cricket is setting up matches between the home country and the native cricketers.” And in about 1832, cricket really took off around that kind of narrative.
So I came to the conclusion that the establishment of the Australian Cricket Club was not really about the emergence of some kind of Australian nationalism. These were clearly commercial endeavours. And I think that’s something new to the Australian colonial sporting story—the insight that we’ve misunderstood this Australian Cricket Club.
Why did these cricket matches emerge in 1826? Well, the answer is very, very simple: From about 1810 up until 1826, horse racing is central to sport in the colony, and it becomes so big that it is moved from Hyde Park in Sydney, and taken out to Randwick. They build a custom-made racecourse there. And of course, there’s the emergence of other racecourses as well.
What happens after horse racing leaves Hyde Park is that there’s no real sport going on. And that’s where cricket, I think, fills the void, the space left by the horse racing. Of course, there must have been a real appetite for these matches, because every match was advertised and reported in the media. And they spoke about the stake—£20, even £50 per match. It was about generating business.
Now, in 1832, as I said, they’re already playing cricket in the schools, the private-venture schools, and somebody in The Sydney Morning Herald decides to advertise that the Sydney College is playing against St James’, and that we all should go down to watch. Now, that match was reported in the media, and it seems to have generated a bit of controversy. There must have been some issues with a school match being promoted as an opportunity to gamble. So the following day, the editor of the newspaper comes out and says, “This is a game of cricket, and we need to support it, but it’s not for money.”
So it’s very clear that in 1832 there are two types of cricket that are going on: There’s the cricket in the community, which is about commerce and money and gambling; and there’s also the cricket which is being played in the schools.
So what’s my final conclusion to all of this? Whether it was the school cricket that was going on, or whether it was the cricket in the wider community, it was all about these individuals demonstrating their Britishness. It had nothing to do with Australian nationalism whatsoever. That’s what I believe.
The other thing that Australian sports historians really didn’t look at was the important role that the military played in all of this. As I said, this evening I went out with the students to the Sydney Cricket Ground, and we had a bit of a discussion about the Sydney Cricket Ground, but I said to them that it was the military that had built the cricket ground. They even called it the Military Ground.
How does all this happen? It happens because in 1854, there’s a new barracks which is built in Paddington. The previous barracks was on our main street, which was called George Street. It was built in 1810—well, it was built a little earlier, but by 1810 it had walls around it. But the city was getting so big and so commercial that there was pressure on them to move the barracks to a new location. And what they did was they moved it to Paddington, where it still stands today.
Now, below the barracks, a very famous colonel called Bloomfield—he was a sort architect there—had requested fields for a shooting range and also a cricket ground. And of course, that’s now our Sydney Cricket Ground, and the shooting range is now the site of the stadium next door, Allianz, which this evening was hosting a soccer match between Sydney FC and the Western Sydney Wanderers.
Overall, then, I’ve come to the conclusion that there were two types of cricket that were going on. That’s the first point. The second point is that, regardless of the type of cricket that was going on, it was really just about demonstrating Britishness. And, of course, for some reason, Australian sports historians have really neglected the important role that the military played, not only in the sport of cricket, but also all of the other sports as well.
Are there any questions?
Peter Hardy: Steve, thank you very much for joining us. We were curious earlier as to whether you’d been at the Sydney Derby tonight and had to nip home early?
Georgakis: Yes, we took the international students there, and don’t tell anyone, but I had some money on Sydney FC. We left at half time, and the good news is that I think they’re up 3-1. So it’s a good night, but I should have left about five minutes earlier.
Hardy: Well, thank you for breaking into the game anyway. It’s appreciated, because it was a good win by the sounds of it. But if I can just summarise what you were saying there: The clubs were created by a combination of British migrants and the military, essentially. Is that fair?
Georgakis: All our sports have a military foundation. All of them. Captain Piper organises the first boat races in about 1818 at Sydney Harbour as commercial pursuits. He becomes so wealthy that he buys an entire part of Sydney, which is now called Point Piper, and where the houses are worth hundreds of millions. So there’s a link there. There’s clearly a link with the military and horse racing—not only in Sydney but across the different colonies. It’s very clear the military was heavily involved.
We’re colonised in 1788. The British arrive here with Governor Phillip. By 1810, Governor Macquarie is sent out to clean everything up. It’s a mess. He’s a military man, and he arrives on January 1, 1810. By mid-October he’s already designated an area that he calls Hyde Park. He chisels it out and says that this will be used for recreational purposes.
In October he also organises the first horse races. It’s very interesting to me. Horse racing is obviously about the officers, the elite, the rich—that’s clear, we all know that—but Macquarie also allows the lower classes to have some input. They’re able to view the races, and even to gamble on them. Like I said, it was the 73rd Regiment which organised those horse races. And it was unheard of then; there were hardly any horses in Sydney at the time.
If you look at other horse racing in Australia, it’s also done by the military and ex-military people. They form the first turf clubs. They form all the major racing in the various colonies. That’s very clear. Boating, rowing and yachting are also very important, because that’s how people move around the harbour, and they become big sports, too.
Alongside that, in the schools, there’s cricket, transplanted from the English public-school system. The military are always playing cricket. They play inside the George Street barracks, and then in 1826 they emerge at Hyde Park.
But it never really takes off. That’s the important thing. From 1826 until 1832, there are scattered references to games, but nothing much happens until Edward Flood takes over the Australian Hotel, and Richard Driver takes on another hotel. (I’m sorry, I’ve quite forgotten the name of it.) They get together, I think, and say, “Look, how are we going to make this work?” And they come up with the concept of the British versus the natives, and it generates a lot of interest.
The military still plays matches, but I suspect there were issues with gambling that I can’t understand, so they don’t take part in the big high-stakes games. This continues, and more clubs are established. Now, there are more clubs for two very good reasons. First, more free settlers are arriving, more British immigrants familiar with cricket. So, of course, these take up cricket. Second, a lot of the local players have already been playing cricket in the schools, and now they continue playing in the community.
The prime example I can give is the Gregory family. In the colonial period of
Australia, they really stand out. The tour guide today at the Sydney Cricket
Ground mentioned their name three or four times. The grandfather, Edward
Gregory, was an orphan, and from his knowledge of cricket, picked up at the
orphanage, we have this dynasty of Gregorys who go on to captain New South Wales. So there’s a clear example.
The point I’m making is that what sports historians misunderstand about cricket in Australia is that it is learned in schools. You don’t learn it as a twenty-year-old. If you miss that critical period of learning it in school, you never develop an appetite for the game. My kids missed out, unfortunately, and they have absolutely no interest in cricket at all. That’s an important part that people like Richard Cashman and other sports historians never understood. They were always dismissive of it. But what do we know? We know that schools like St Peter’s College in Adelaide, Hale School in Perth, Melbourne Grammar, Scotch College—they were the nurseries of cricket.
And not only that: In the late 1850s and 1860s, it was the schools that first played Aussie rules. That’s another thing completely missed. It infuriates me. Phil Heads, the tour guide today, whose father was an amazing rugby league historian, and who is a lovely guy himself—he opened up the Sydney Cricket Ground for us, and he looked at the ground and said, “Well, as you know, the Sydney Swans play here, and Australian rules football was a game invented to keep cricketers fit.” Well, that’s rubbish. It’s nothing like that. Football emerges in Australia because it’s big in the schools back in Britain. And we need to prove we’re also British, so it’s no surprise that football is the next big sport played in the schools.
So we have this tradition of football in the winter, cricket in the summer. But the
central point I want to make is, who are the players then playing in commercial cricket? They are the boys who had learned to play, back in England or here in Australia, in the independent boys’ schools. And that, I think, has been a major oversight on the part of Australia’s sports historians.
Couple of questions about that?
Ulyate: Yeah, I suppose I have one: Why have the schools been overlooked? They don’t come up at all in Prof. Mandle’s foundational text. There is, as you say, very little about them in Richard Cashman’s great book—his otherwise great book—Paradise of Sport. Is it because they’re viewed as a lesser form of sporting endeavour, by definition unprofessional, because played by boys?
Georgakis: I don’t want to be repetitive, but like I said, when I was in that history society, I was listening to them talking, and I was thinking: Where did Bradman learn to play cricket? Why is it that all of these players from the Norwood Cricket Club went to Prince Alfred College?
Now, the question is: Am I a smart person? My answer would be that I’m okay, I think. I’ve got a pretty critical mind. Are Richard Cashman and Mandle smarter than me? The answer is yes. So they would have known this was the case. Of course they would have known. They would have read the work by people such as Mangan, who wrote about cricket and football taking place in the English public schools. They would have known that these schools in Australia were more British than those
schools.
My answer—and I hinted at it in the book—is that it went against their narrative. Their narrative was always that popular sport was working class, and it was about Australian nationalism. Mandle was there, looking at issues of Australian nationalism. I think they got it wrong. To be honest, I believe they must have known that they got it wrong, but it went against their narrative.
I also believe this because of Tony Collins, whose work really changed my whole perspective. I read his stuff and thought, “Oh my God, he’s got the answer!” Of course Australian-rules football was a demonstration of Britishness! There was no such thing as Australia at that point; how could it be “Australian”? These guys simply came up with some rules to make the game a little more commercial. That’s all that happened.
There were a couple of people in the founding of Australian-rules football who were heavily involved in the football being played at Melbourne Grammar and Scots College. Clearly the schools football emerged before the community football. But to admit that Melbourne Grammar, Scots College and others were central to the founding of Australian-rules football gets you into a lot of trouble. They went after Tony Collins when he started writing about Australian-rules football as a demonstration of Britishness. But Tony was completely right.
I communicated with him out of the blue a couple of times. I said, “Dear Tony, you don’t know me, but I’ve read your work, and you’re 100% right.” We had some correspondence, and he encouraged me to publish the book I eventually published. But even he never looked at the schools when he wrote about Australian-rules football. He just said it was a demonstration of British nationalism, without really examining the role schools played. I think I’ve done that in my book, and I thank Rodney for picking up on that theme.
Among the people I’ve spoken to about this is the famous spinner Greg Matthews. I had chats with him about it. I went to the pub with him, bought him a beer, and spoke about my thesis. He got very angry. He said, “What are you talking about? We’ve always hated the English. It can’t be right. Australian cricket is about Australianness!” Now, this may have been true of his era, but clearly in the earlier ones it wasn’t about that at all.
Ian Chappell was a fanatical Australian, always very anti-English. But I remember when I was doing my research a few years ago, he was on the radio saying how he travels back to England now, and has found the graves of his ancestors. It was really touching. All this got me reflecting on it a bit…
Ulyate: I suppose I’d invite further questions. If no-one has one, I do. Yes, Brian?
Brian Sanderson: It’s very interesting. I was thinking it’s a bit like the Irish and the Americans. They started cricket through the military, and then they gave it up because it was British, and they didn’t want that; they wanted to be separate. Australians have gone the other way, really. Is there any particular reason why that is the case?
Georgakis: Look, I love my history. As I said, I started looking at soccer in Australia in the context of “ethnic soccer.” Australian sports historians argued that when immigrants came to Australia and played soccer, they were maintaining their ethnic background. Now, that may have been true for a couple of groups, but when I looked at it more closely, I realised they were actually doing exactly what “Australianness” was about, which was playing sport.
During the period of mass immigration, someone like my father was not going to be loyal to the Queen. But you had to bring people together somehow, and in the 1950s the decision was made to use sport as the institution to unify a much more diverse population. I’m the son of a second-generation Greek, and yet I’m as Australian as you can possibly be. Now, what made me Australian was the playing of sport. It assimilated us, whether we were boys or girls. It was the great definer.
In the colonial period, it’s very clear that if you wanted to succeed, you had to involve yourself in British institutions. That’s very clear. Edward Flood, who established the Australian Cricket Club, became mayor of Sydney, and grew very wealthy, was the illegitimate son of an Irish convict. To answer your question: The British come here, and they don’t want another US. And so they say, “Well, okay. How are we going to keep everyone British?” And I think what they decide to do is they make sure that they use certain institutions to keep people British.
Another example from the colonial period is the establishment of bowling clubs. By 1900, there were 117 clubs with liquor licenses, most of them sporting clubs, including a number of bowling clubs. The Irish came here, and I think what happened was they came to a decision a little bit like my own father did fifty or sixty years ago. He said, “Look, I could be a proud Greek, but actually I want to have success in this country.” And I think that’s what they did.
To make it in our world, there was a code that needed to be adhered to. It involved going to school and knowing how to play sport. Our entertainment revolved around going to the races, going to play and watch football, and playing and watching cricket. So sport became the institution that defined Britishness in Australia. All of these people of influence were in some way associated with sport. That’s very clear.
Now, the military are always going to be central to this because, really, they are the definers of the society. They set the parameters. Governor Macquarie, who was here from 1810 to 1822, set us on that path. The Sydney Cricket Ground is located on something which is called the Sydney Common, and he sort of carved out the area and said, “You’re not going to develop this area. This will eventually be somewhere where we can have recreation going on.”
In 1810, Macquarie’s son was at the age of going to school. I can’t tell you how old he
was exactly. Macquarie would have known that his tenure at Sydney was coming to an end, but his son had that one year where he went into school. He wrote a letter to the Sydney Lumberyard and said, “Dear Whatever, can you make twelve dozen bats? Once my son leaves the school, the bats will belong to it.” So he sets it in motion.
The 73rd Regiment, which was involved in the horse racing here, had already been racing in India. So sport becomes that institution which is really privileged. It’s where the connections are made, allowing you to make it in Sydney society, provided you’re able to manoeuvre yourself in that commercial world. That’s what I think.
So my point to you is that clearly the US was lost, and there was the anxiety that they needed to keep this as British as they possibly could. They come to Sydney first, and then they go to Tasmania. Why Tasmania? They go to Tasmania because there’s a great fear that the French are manoeuvring for Tasmania. So they set up shop there.
The horse races take place in Sydney in October 1810. Soon afterwards, they
take place in Hobart. In 1854, why does Bloomfield advocate for a cricket ground and a shooting range at the barracks? He does so because there’s a directive in the British Empire that all garrisons and barracks need to have cricket grounds built. It’s very clear. Who’s the threat in 1854? Well, the threat is the Russians. So they start preparing for maybe a Russian invasion, but they want to hold on to Australia.
What always amazes me is how many regimental soldiers ended up serving in Australia. The number was very small. The British came here and took complete control of the land by simply advocating and mandating their institutions. That’s what I’ve come up with.
Ulyate: Well, thanks, Brian, for an excellent question. And thanks, Steve, for an excellent answer, not least because it’s answered a question that’s long puzzled me: Australia, of course, had and has itself a substantial Irish population. It’s always surprised me how thoroughly that population, which you wouldn’t think predisposed, bought into the phenomenon you describe. Four of Australia’s inaugural Test cricketers had Irish backgrounds; Australia’s first great sports journalist too was Irish to the core…
Any other questions? Okay. Well, I think I have one to conclude.
You take another dig, both in your presentation here and in your book, at what’s been called the radical-nationalist tradition of Australian historiography (into which, of course, Mandle and Cashman’s work fits very snugly). It’s difficult to square the idea of sport in colonial Australia as a vector for British nationalism and cultural hegemony with the idea that it fostered any sort of republican sensibility, which seems to be the assumption that tradition makes.
Why do you think the radical-nationalist tradition has been so persistent, if not in academia—and I think it still is pretty persistent there—then in the popular conception?
Georgakis: Australian nationalist or British?
Rodney: Well, you’ve emphasised that sport in colonial Australia was a vector for British race-nationalism, as it were, whereas the old radical-nationalist tradition tends to assume that it gave rise to federation and a kind of republican sentiment; made Australians aware of themselves as Australians, as opposed to exported Brits…
Georgakis: At the end of the Second World War, there was a massive Gallup poll. I think in those days they were quite authoritative; they were real polls. This was the late 1940s, before the influence of mass migration to Australia; it was still quite an Anglo-Celtic/British country. They asked the people, “Do you feel British, or do you feel Australian?” And seventy per cent of the people felt that they were more British than Australian.
So, what is Federation? I mean, Federation is Western Australia, with all its mineral wealth, perhaps becoming an independent nation, right? Australia’s full of 50,000 or 60,000 people of Chinese background. So Federation is a way of Australians becoming Australians, but in many ways it’s also keeping the nation more British. I mean, the first policy that’s invoked is the White Australia policy. If you’re saying you’re becoming a republic and open to having an Australian type of nationalism, well, you’ve thrown out a significant number of your non-white population.
What do we do in 1915? It’s quite extraordinary: People, en masse, go and fight for the Empire. That’s a fact. What happens in 1885? We organise troops to go and fight in Sudan. So they got it wrong. They got it wrong.
I still think using nationalism is a very good way of understanding our society. People talk about Irish nationalism in the colonial period. The truth of the matter is, the two biggest Catholic schools, the two most important Catholic schools, were rugby-playing schools in Sydney. They wanted to fit into the establishment. They weren’t interested in establishing Gaelic football or playing other forms of football. They were telling the rest of society that we were trying to be a part of it all. So I think sometimes people make too much of this issue.
Just finally, before I go: As you know, my background’s Greek. We have relatives all over the world, in the US, in South Africa, in all of these places. And when we get together, we have this amazing rivalry between ourselves, and the rivalry has always manifested itself in sport. Rivalry in sport—booing an opponent who’s English—is not new. It’s simplistic to say, “Well, see, we wanted to be Australians. This was the first sign of Australian nationalism.” I think it’s the complete opposite. It’s you telling the home country that you are British.
Melbourne must have been richer than London in the 1860s and 1870s. And they demonstrate their Britishness by setting up all these magnificent sporting fields, including the Melbourne Cricket Ground and the horse racing. So I think they got that wrong. I really do.
Now, where does Australian nationalism really come in? I think it comes in quite late, and it comes in when it’s very clear that the British are no longer coming here in large numbers. There’s a lot more diversity in the community, but it’s still sport which is the signifier, the institution which generates the nationalism.
And that happens clearly in the 1956 Olympic Games. We finished fourth in the world. Okay, that’s impressive. But what is even more impressive is that at all of the different school levels, including the public and the private, it’s that institution of sport which is promoted as being this great assimilator. You play sport in school; if you’re good enough, you play for the elite clubs at the senior level. But you involve yourself in club sport; you go to the races, you gamble. And it’s these institutions which initially made you British, but ultimately were used for Australian nationalism.
Ulyate: All right. Well, I think that’s a very provocative and interesting note on which to end. I’m sure everyone’s got places to be. I’m sure you’ve got a bed to get to—
Georgakis: Nah, I just need a glass of water.
Ulyate: Okay. Well, I myself have an appointment with Old Deuteronomy and Rumpleteazer and other confections of Andrew Lloyd Webber, so I need to be going myself. Thanks again for your time, Professor, and thanks to everyone for attending. Please do send your feedback to the membership secretary if you have any suggestions as to future guests, structure, etc. And I hope we all meet again soon. Goodbye, everyone.
