'Blood and guts', mateship and glory: Amco Cup heroes reunite

It was half-time during one of Western Division's Amco Cup matches in 1974 and the tough-as-nails front-rower sported the kind of wound you only hear about in tales from years gone by.

Terry Fahey, a 19-year-old winger from Wellington, certainly couldn't believe what he was seeing.

"He came up and he had a split (under his lip) from one side of his mouth to the other and his teeth was all you could see in there," Fahey said.

"He came in at half-time and I thought there was no possible way he could go back on, but he grabbed the vaseline and (wiped it over his face) ... and away we went again and he followed us out.

"I thought 'Christ Almighty, how tough are you?', but that's what it was. It was a bunch of young fellas and a bunch of tough old fellas."

Memorable moments like that don't happen too often in sport. But somehow they seemed to happen in almost every half of footy Western played in 1974.

From taking on Great Britain in one of the most violent games of rugby league ever seen, to downing Penrith in the Amco Cup grand final, the Western Division team was writing one of the greatest stories in rugby league.

In a true underdog story, the bunch of battlers from the bush stunned some of the biggest clubs in the country and one from New Zealand on the way to winning the midweek competition.

Many of the players who wore the famed green jersey that year will come together this weekend to celebrate 50 years since the triumph.

"It's unbelievable. Fifty years, we don't know where the years have gone," Bob Pilon, player of the match in the final against Penrith, said.

"We didn't realise for a few years what it really meant to everyone. Everyone still talks about it.

'"When we played in that final at Leichardt Oval there were 16,000 or 17,000 there and most of them were bush people who'd come down.

"It was amazing."

The Western Division squad featured 24 players that year and even those who didn't feature in the win over Penrith treasure the memories.

Peter Frew is one of those.

"It's hard to believe it was 50 years ago," he said.

"It means a lot ... when we all got together for the first time we didn't really know each other so there was some boding there and (coach) Johnny King pulled us all together.

"Fifty years later now Paul Dowling, who was the captain, still likes to pull us together and we're all best mates."

Frew was the youngest member of the squad at just 18 and he still went to school in Dubbo at the time so his selection came as a surprise.

He was in the middle of science class on a Tuesday when the principal and the secretary from Dubbo CYMS, who Frew played for, came to the door.

"They said 'you've just been picked in the Western Division team to play Great Britain tomorrow'," Frew laughed, looking back on the moment.

That match at Wade Park is almost as famous as the Amco Cup victory itself.

In a truly bruising encounter, a number of scrums descended into brawls and three players were sent off.

"It was blood and guts," Frew said.

"I was in the second-row and I was 18 and the baby of the team and I could hear the punches being thrown in the scrum."

As dark a chapter as that was, it added to the season that was 1974 for Western Division.

But as Pilon mentioned, the side wasn't aware of the magnitude of their achievements.

They were just blokes from the bush who weren't even that focused on the footy at times.

"When we we first went to Sydney we got away from the bush and got to stay in a motel," Pilon said.

"We wanted to win that game so we could get back there and have another trip away. It was a bit disappointing when we had to play Manly at Orange because we'd wished we had a game in Sydney."

They got that other game in Sydney when they returned to Leichardt for the final and captain Dowling scored all of Western's points in the 6-2 win which stunned everyone watching.

"I don't think you'll see another one like it," Fahey said of the achievement.

Of the 24 players who were in the squad, nine have died.

A number of others are battling health issues in their older age and are unlikely to be at Narromine on Saturday when the team comes together to watch the current Western Rams under 16s, 18s and senior side take on the Greater Northern Tigers.

A reunion dinner at the Dubbo RSL will follow.

The dinner is the focus for Fahey as during the day he'll instead be at Tottenham Picnic races for one of his other passions, training horses.

Fahey hopes to win the day's main event, the $10,000 Picnic Cup with his galloper Costas.