ICON – Player/Coach Inductee
Cooee/Hobart/Launceston/New Norfolk, 1949-1974
PLAYING CAREER (1951 – 1968)
Tasmanian Schoolboys Team 1949, 1951 (Captain + Best & Fairest, 1951)
Burnie High School, 1949-1952 (Runner-Up to Hobart HS for State Premiership, 1952)
13 games for Cooee, 1953
124 games for Hobart, 1954-1961
c. 15 games for Launceston, 1962
75 games for New Norfolk, 1963-1968
State premiership player 1959 (Hobart), 1968 (New Norfolk)
TFL premierships 1954, 1959, 1960 (Hobart), 1968 (New Norfolk)
William Leitch Medal, 1957 (TFL Best & Fairest)
Cooee Best & Fairest, 1953
Hobart Best & Fairest 1957, 1960
18 state games for Tasmania, 1955-1965
Tasmanian National Carnival Player 1956 (Perth), 1958 (Melbourne), 1961 (Brisbane)
29 representative games for NWFU (2), TFL (25) and NTFA (2), 1953-1966
TFL representative team captain 1961; 1963-1966
Selected in Hobart’s ‘Greatest Team: 1947-2002’ (Rover)
Selected in New Norfolk’s ‘Greatest Team: 1947-2001’ (Rover)
COACHING CAREER (1962 – 1974)
Launceston Captain-Coach, 1962
New Norfolk Captain-Coach, 1963-1968; Non-Playing Coach, 1969
Hobart Non-Playing Coach, 1974
New Norfolk State + TFL Premierships, 1968
Tasmania State Team Coach, 1963-1965 (Playing), 1966-1969 (Non-Playing)
Tasmanian Carnival Team Coach 1966 (Hobart), 1969 (Adelaide)
TFL representative team coach, 1963-1966 (Playing); 1967-1969 (Non-Playing)
New Norfolk ‘Greatest Team: 1947-2001’ (Coach)
It’s something of an unwritten rule in football – certainly in recent times – that the truly great players seldom make great coaches; the man we honour tonight as the 23rd Icon of Tasmanian football apparently never got the memo. One of the finest rovers in Tasmania during the 1950s and 60s, he represented the state at three National Carnivals, before turning his hand to coaching with great effect later in his career, the crowning moment coming when he guided a proud club to its finest hour.
Trevor John Leo was born in Launceston on August 29th, 1936 and grew up in Railton on Tasmania’s north-west coast. A subsequent move to Burnie led to Leo attending Burnie High School, and it was here that his prodigious football ability first came to public attention under the tutelage of revered football names such as Rex Batt, Bob Parsons and Ray Stokes. In 1949 Leo became one of a select few 13-year-olds to be named in the Tasmanian State Schoolboys (U15) team, under the captaincy of fellow future champion Athol Webb. Two year later, Leo himself would lead the Schoolboys team at the carnival in Adelaide, while also taking out the side’s Best & Fairest. 1951 would also see Leo take his first steps into men’s football, playing NWFU reserves games with Cooee under the watchful eye of his father Ray Leo, Cooee’s U19s coach and a former player in his own right with Penguin and Latrobe, amongst others. For two years the young Trevor served his apprenticeship in the lower grades, before finally making his senior debut aged 16 in 1953. And what a debut season it was, Leo claiming Cooee’s Best & Fairest award and twice representing the NWFU in intrastate fixtures in a year that confirmed his reputation as one of the most promising young players in the state. So impressive was his form that VFL club Hawthorn attempted to lure him to the mainland for the following season, however Leo, armed with an assurance from the Tasmanian Education Department of fully subsidised university tuition, decided instead to relocate to Hobart. Many TFL clubs naturally chased his services, with Hobart eventually winning the young star’s signature.
Over the following eight seasons, playing and developing under legendary coaches Bill Williams and Mal Pascoe, Leo became an indispensable member of the great Hobart teams of the late 1950s, contributing to TFL premierships in 1954, 1959 and 1960, the ’59 triumph also bringing State premiership success over Burnie. His own individual brilliance was regularly recognised, claiming two Hobart club champion awards despite competition from some equally celebrated teammates, most notably the famous ‘Three Ps’ following division of Dennis Powell, Mal Pascoe and Burnie Payne. Arguably Leo’s finest accolade however came in 1957 when, aged just 21, he was awarded the William Leitch Medal as TFL Best & Fairest; his phenomenal fitness that season played no small part, stemming from a summer training camp as part of his National Service commitments in addition to having taken up professional running. Naturally, Leo’s talent afforded him a swathe of representative honours, being an automatic selection in TFL combined sides and missing only a single Tasmanian state game between 1955 and 1961, including as a member of the legendary 1956 (Perth) and 1958 (Melbourne) Carnival teams; that one match he missed, very unfortunately, was Tasmania’s famous win over Victoria in Launceston in 1960, Leo having lost his top teeth only the previous Saturday.
For all his success as a player, Leo is at least equally venerated for his record as a coach. After initially gaining experience coaching TFL U19 and Seconds sides during his time with Hobart, Leo’s first senior opportunity came in 1962 when a transfer with the Education Department saw him join Launceston in the NTFA. While his one season at the Blues was not an on-field success, Leo learned many valuable lessons from the experience, lessons that would be quickly put into practice as the following season saw Leo appointed to the position of playing coach at all of New Norfolk, the TFL and Tasmania, all three of which he would hold for the next seven years. On the representative front, Leo would guide the TFL side to 9 wins from 15 games and lead Tasmania at the 1966 Hobart and 1969 Adelaide National Carnivals, as well as to a memorable win over Western Australia in Perth in his first year. But it was his record at New Norfolk which has best stood the test of time.
Leo inherited a New Norfolk team at the nadir of their fortunes, their previous two campaigns (1961-62) having netted consecutive wooden spoons and a total of just five wins. With a coaching style he himself described as “not authoritarian, but demanding”, Leo quickly set about stamping his philosophy on the club, valuing players who always gave their best and willingly accepted and put into practice any feedback. In addition, he felt that country players were often equally skilled but possessed less confidence than their city counterparts, and thus focused on recruiting players such as Garth Smith, Bob Lynch and Charlie Goggin to address this issue. No recruit was more transformative however than a young spearhead named Peter Hudson, for whom Leo would be a significant early-career influence. Leo’s methods brought immediate results, New Norfolk finishing only percentage off top spot in his first season at the helm and claiming a further three minor premierships to, for the first time, entrench New Norfolk as a powerhouse of southern football; unfortunately, a series of heartbreaking finals losses – including three separate one-point defeats – meant that it took until 1968 for New Norfolk to reach the promised land, doing so in style with TFL and State premiership wins over North Hobart and Scottsdale respectively. The 1968 triumphs also brought down the curtain on Leo’s illustrious playing career, retiring after more than 250 games of outstanding senior football.
By 1970, the demands of Leo’s teaching career forced him to take the difficult decision to step back from football, a one-season, last-minute appointment as coach of Hobart in 1974 marking his last official involvement. However, football’s loss was education’s gain as Leo continued to excel in the field for many decades, and since 2009 the award bearing his name has been awarded annually by the Tasmanian Skills Institute to the individual “who has made an outstanding contribution to the vocational education and training and skills sectors in Tasmania and/or nationally over a sustained period of at least 15 years.” Leo’s contribution to the sphere of football has also been appropriately recognised in recent decades, with selection in both the Hobart and New Norfolk ‘Greatest Teams’, inaugural induction into the Tasmanian Football Hall of Fame in 2005, and elevation to Legend nine years later. Now at last, Trevor Leo rightfully sits as an equal amongst the highest echelon of champions in our state’s football history, as one of its most passionate, influential and decorated figures.
