RUSSELL Ebert's legacy will live on - and not just at the Port Adelaide Football Club.

There is the sound foundation for strong junior development programs Ebert left with the SANFL in the 1990s.

There are the lifestyle and education messages for youth in the successful community programs established under Ebert's stewardship at the Port Adelaide Football Club during the past 15 years.

There are the lives that are enriched for Ebert's work at charities, such as Novita (formerly the Crippled Children's Association of South Australia) for 25 years from 1980.

"Russell took to helping others with qualities that already defined him as a footballer and much more," says three-time Magarey Medallist and fellow Novita ambassador Barrie Robran. "He had more than dedication to the cause; he had sincerity. And sensitivity. He had untiring enthusiasm to make sure we were successful in raising funds for charity."

Famed sportswriter and broadcaster Mike Coward, who watched Ebert in the 1970s while writing for The Advertiser, notes the mark left by Ebert goes much further than Alberton.

"Russell’s legacy extends well beyond his beloved Port Adelaide Football Club; he enriched the game in South Australia and beyond," Coward said.

This is well noted as the tributes to Russell Ebert arrive from afar.

THE TRIBUTES

Team-mates

Russell Ebert came to Port Adelaide as a wild, country recruit and became the club's greatest player ever. But that did not happen simply by natural talent - Russell worked hard at his game.

He not only became a stronger and greater footballer with time at Port Adelaide, he also grew as man. He was selfless and so caring of other people and the football club benefited from all of that.

We just came to expect Russell to do the extraordinary. To play alongside Russell meant to have the game unfold easier for you. If Russell had the ball, you knew what he could and would do with it. As a team-mate, you just had to make position - and Russell would get it to you. 

Brian Cunningham

Russell was bullet-proof to me. He was a great mate who would do anything for you. He did so much for so many people.

Russell is easily the greatest Port Adelaide footballer ever. You could play him anywhere on the football field and know he would bring his team-mates into the game. Ask (Port Adelaide goalkicking great) Tim Evans what it was like to have Russell delivering the ball to you.

Russell had an amazing attitude to life. I will carry that with me. He cared so much for so many.

Peter Woite

 

When I first came to Port Adelaide in 1976 I asked (team manager) Jim Nitschke who wore No.7 because it was my favourite number and the number my dad wore at Minnipa. Clearly, I didn't understand how big Russell was in football, both at Port Adelaide and across the SANFL. I learned quickly ...

Russell made me feel so much a part of the Port Adelaide Football Club. He was so welcoming and we probably got along so well because we big came from the bush. 

As a coach, he had this hunger and professionalism - he wanted to win a premiership.

Russell was such a caring person. He had time for everyone. He was so welcoming with his voice and his passion. He was so loving, he was like my big brother.

He was simply the best.

Greg Phillips

 

To football, Russell Ebert has his name known in every corner of this country. It is always greeted with incredible respect, honour and admiration. And not just for his football ability, but also for how we will remember him as a great bloke.

To our Port Adelaide Football Club, he is an icon - as an icon should be known. Every baby born to become a Port Adelaide fan will know Russell Ebert for eternity. And we will always remembered for how he got us that drought-breaking premiership in 1977 with that most memorable line ...

You can rattle off names that are forever linked with football clubs. Russell Ebert is Port Adelaide.

To me, and to all of my era such as Roger Delaney, George Fiacchi and Rohan Smith, we all grew up with Russell as our idol. We all played in the backyard or at the local oval as "Russell", holding the ball in one hand or doing those one-handed handballs.

Roger idolised Russell so much that he asked to wear his No.7 jumper. Imagine my feelings when I started my first game on the field at Alberton Oval in a forward pocket and looked across to Tim Evans at full forward and Russell in the other pocket. That was an out-of-body experience. I was asking myself, "What am I doing here?" Russell was our idol ... and some of us were lucky enough to see him close hand on the football field as a team-mate.

Tim Ginever 

North Melbourne people are unanimous in their love of Russell. It was a bloody difficult year for Russell as a fly-in, fly-out player arriving from Adelaide for one training session a week on Thursday. We also had so many bad injuries so Ron Barassi had to play Russell in so many spots. But when he was put in the centre, he really showed his wares. 

Russell - even at training - had a great take of the ball. Like all the greats, he did not fumble. He was clean. And he did not miss when he moved the ball on. He was a talent.

Malcolm Blight

North Melbourne, 1979

 

As a team-mate in State teams, Russell was so much fun off the field. He was such a larrikin, a mischievous larrikin rather than a destructive one. 

(But) it was at North Melbourne that I learned it was not just natural talent with Russell. I walked in one Friday night at 8 - we had adjoining apartments with an open-door - and Russell already was in bed to make sure he had the right sleep before a game. And early Saturday morning, he was up early taking a football to the park across the street to hone is skills.

Graham Cornes

North Melbourne, 1979

Those who followed

Russell had an aura, that is why some called him "God". 

He was a pillar of strength, and not just on the football field where he was a bull of a player. He also was the first to give back using his profile as a champion footballer to help many others through his work with the community programs at the football club and charities away from the club. His legacy goes beyond the game of football.

My earliest memory of Russell is through Dad (former player Gary Tredrea) at the football club when Russell was coaching in 1986. And then learning from Russell in the SANFL talent squads that led to our success in the Teal Cup. The messages of working hard, develop quick hands stays with you - as does the words of wisdom and messages of reinforcement Russell would offer when I started in the AFL. He kept you believing that you were on the right path.

Warren Tredrea 

Russell Ebert, known as “God” to most Port Adelaide people, was my junior and backyard hero as I tried to emulate him on a Saturday afternoon listening to Port Adelaide games on the radio in the back garden at our Ferryden Park home.

He was everything I wanted to be. I still talk to my sons - and watch the vision - of how Russ moved, seemingly in slow motion, to evade a pack of four Central District players on the grandstand wing at Alberton Oval. It was absolutely amazing what he could do.

Fast forward a decade or so and my first real encounter with Russell was a losing the under-17 grand final against North Adelaide in 1987. 

As we were devastated by defeat, one of the players took off his jumper and put it on the floor. At that time, Russ was the league coach and was standing in the corner. He calmly walked over, picked up the jumper and made it aware to all of us "that’s not how your treat this jumper, you treat this with honour and respect” -  and always hand it back to the property steward.

That set the tone to all the standards going forward while we were new juniors at Port Adelaide.

This was my first interaction with the great man and one I will never forget.

I was lucky enough to be coached by Russell once, in the 1997 State-of-Origin game between South Australia and Victoria. He installed the State traditions to play for South Australia and, still to this day, it was the fastest game I every been involved. I am proud to have the photo and State jumper on my wall at home.

On a family level, as a father, I’m lucky enough to have had my wife and sons meet Russell, also known as “Herb”. I am lucky to watch my son Jackson pull on the Port Adelaide jumper at league level and live all that Russell installed in me, ensuring the tradition of what it takes to be a Port Adelaide carries forward to a new generation.

Russell is such a caring person. We still remember the time he spoke and messaged Jackson on his pre-season debut against Adelaide earlier this year. This just reaffirmed to all of us what a caring and loving man he is and how he thought of others while going through his own battles.

Russell always will be the Port Adelaide Football Club's greatest every player. We are all so lucky to have met and been in the presence of the great man known as “GOD”.

Darren Mead

Coaches

We saw from the very start how Russell would be successful. We had a very good team when Russell came into it (in 1968). We had to play him in the unfamiliar spot of full forward - and did sensationally there. He could play any position. I think he played in every position.

Fos Williams (in 1982)

 

Russell is a champion to me. He was always fully prepared - on and off the field. As a coach, he was the exemplary player. He was the best player to coach - no doubt.

We have had a lot of champions at Port Adelaide - and Russell was the best of them. 

He was so strong over the ball - and such power in his legs. He rarely fell over; he was perfectly balanced. His influence on the game was phenomenal. He was totally respected by both his team-mates and his opponents.

John Cahill

Club Leaders

As a boy, Russell was a hero to worship.

As a man, a hero to fear.

But at Port Adelaide, he showed me what mattered most to him ... humility and a giving spirit.

Keith Thomas

Port Adelaide chief executive 

Norwood premiership hero

 

I am quite proud we were able to get Russell back to the football club to run our community programs where he made a positive difference to so many lives, as he did during his time supporting the Novita charity.

People will first remember Russell Ebert as the four-time Magarey Medallist. But we should also remember the person - and he was a very good man. He was a genuinely caring person who made the people who came into his left feel important. He definitely took after his mother (Doreen) in that way.

Brian Cunningham

Port Adelaide chief executive 

Russell’s legacy for me is defined by family, football and community.

Above all of his incredible achievements, he was most proud of his family.

His early years growing up in Loxton and the Riverland with his siblings, the impact that meeting his wife Dianne had on his life and then their children Tammi, Ben & Brett. And then you’d see him light up when talking about their families and his grandkids, he was just so proud.

As a footballer, his record is monumental and he is a true legend of the game and I’ll leave others more qualified to talk to that.

But then for me when I think of Russell it’s his impact and care for other people.

His work with Barrie Robran in the early years of Crippled Childrens and now Novita, the Royal Flying Doctors Service and so many more that you never heard about because he didn’t want the recognition. He just wanted to help and give back. He gave so much of his time and always as a volunteer.

He then transformed the community programs at Port Adelaide and just as he was as a footballer he was ahead of his time in this also.

In the office and wherever he went he had this unbelievable presence, and that will never leave me.

The legacy he’s built at Port Adelaide and the joy he’s bought so many people is extraordinary.

Matthew Richardson

Port Adelaide chief executive 

 

During its 151-year history, there have been so many champions of our club and a handful of legends. Russell Ebert stands tall among the legends of the Port Adelaide Football Club. While all the champions and legends played for Port Adelaide, Russell lived Port Adelaide.

David Koch

Port Adelaide president 

 

Before I joined the club as an administrator, I was like every other Port Adelaide fan who saw Russell Ebert as the most outstanding player we knew in our lifetimes. But it was during the Outback Odyssey fundraising trips that I came to know the man. He was a great man not just a great footballer.

Greg Boulton

Port Adelaide president, 1992-2008.

 

Sheer skill, he was among the best with Bob Quinn and Barrie Robran. Russell has dedicated himself to the game. He plays as he trains. He is an object lesson on the training track. He possesses skills everyone else would like to have.

Bob McLean (in 1982)

Opponents

I was opposed to Russell many times – he was very strong over the ball, played short and tall, was a highly effective user of the ball, consummately skilled, superbly fit, always well prepared, football smart, team oriented, courageous and fair; there was no weakness.

Russell was a major figure in Australian football, probably best exemplified by his one year in a very strong North Melbourne side at the age of 30 in 1979. He was arguably North Melbourne’s best player that year.

I have a lasting memory of a young, long-haired, carefree kid from the Riverland in his first year of league football (in 1968).

In life away from football, his wife Diane and family always came first. He had a dry, wicked sense of humour, never sought recognition for his philanthropic work - the extent of which will probably never be known - and when he made a commitment, he always followed through.

Peter Marker

Glenelg captain 

 

I was in awe of Russell. He already was a legend when I was watching football from the boundary. Then, all of a sudden I was seeing Russell close hand as an opponent at Central District and as a team-mate in State teams - and that is a scary moment, particularly when you just feel honoured to be on the same ground as Russell.

When I came back from Hawthorn and worked with Russell at the SANFL for 12 months he had the junior development programs perfectly arranged for the kids. And I learned what a fantastic bloke Russell was on and off the field. He was so honest in life - and has such a lovely family who are a living tribute to Russell.

John Platten

Magarey and Brownlow Medallist

 

Russell set the bar so high. He had incredible skill, on the left or right foot. He was a great team player. He moved the ball extremely well. And he was strong - as I learned when I would go to tackle him hard on the hips and find the ball moving on because Russell had lifted his arms to complete his overhead handball. He was the whole package as a footballer. 

We enjoyed some battles in those Port Adelaide-Norwood rivalry matches and Russell was the best player by a mile.

I also came to know Russell in business - and he never let me down. I would enjoy those days when we were neighbours in business at Regency Park and we would chew the fat on where football was going. 

Michael Taylor

Norwood and Collingwood

 

Just a great man. Russell was always positive in anything he touched.

He was a great footballer. As an opponent, you knew you were in for a contest when you were up against Russell. You knew he would give 100 per cent. He was just a fantastic competitor. He was loved by his team-mates. He always played fair; there was never anything that was dirty. He always was at the footy.

Russell was a man of unquestionable integrity. It was black and white with Russell - never anything grey. He did it the right way; never anything that was in-between.

Peter Carey

Glenelg premiership ruckman 

There are footballers who come along in every generation to change the game by their ability, their presence or their achievements. From the late 1960s, there were two in South Australian football - Russell Ebert and Barrie Robran. To try to compare them is folly.

Russell, like Barrie, was a truly great player; they carried teams with them. Russell Ebert did exactly that. He made a great team at a great club. He is the one person who stands above all others at Port Adelaide and he epitomised all that Port Adelaide is about.

We had huge battles with Port Adelaide at Glenelg. Sometimes they were violent. Russell stood above that. He played with scrupulous fairness. That does not mean he was not rugged in his approach. But I can't remember him losing his temper or taking a bloke out or bending the rules. He was the epitome of what the Magarey Medal symbolises - he lived up to the ideal of fairness while he also was the most brilliant.

As an opponent, you feared Russell - not in a physical sense but because of his brilliance.

Russell was easily 'Mr Football' of his era. You had to bow to him for his football and especially for his standing as a man. Bow and respect him.

Russell was an icon in the purest meaning of the term. To know Russell the man, you loved him. If you did not know him, you revered him.

Graham Cornes

Glenelg and South Adelaide

 

As a player, Russell always was in control. He could play 'high' - and there are not enough photographs of his high marks. Thankfully, you can see how good he was for high marks on video. He was a great player when the ball was on the ground - this too was his strength even as a player who stood at 6'2. He could play very well 'high' and 'low'.

Russell also never lost his feet. And he is famous for how he used his hands with that overhead handball; for that to be remembered 40 years on is quite an achievement. That handball - and the way it mesmerised opponents - was brilliant.

Handball was not a feature of the Port Adelaide game when Russell started playing league football in the 1960s. He was the exception and Russell started handball at Port Adelaide as a way to bring his team-mates into the game.

Barrie Robran

North Adelaide

Australian Football Hall of Fame Legend 

Russell was such a dynamic footballer. He worked so hard when he played. And even then, the game seemed to come relatively easy for him. He was not casual in what he did. He was committed, hard working and extremely strong on the ground. He had great ball control. And he was very good in the air - he could match it with most of the big men in the game.

His strength and intensity stood out. And he was durable, as noted by all the games he played and for as long as his league career was.

John Halbert

Sturt premiership captain and 1961 Magarey Medallist 

 

When Woodville was starting up in the 1960s, our recruiting people told us of a lad in the Riverland who had the potential to be an out-and-out champion. By the 1970s, we would go into games against Port Adelaide knowing we had to select teams that could counter balance his brilliance. 

At Woodville, everyone - players and staff - had total respect for Russell when he came to coach in 1988. He earned that immeasurable respect for the way he threw himself headstrong into the role.

Bill Sanders

Woodville Football Club chairman

Media

It is problematic whether there has been a better player anywhere when the ball was on the ground. At pace and with his strong body arched, Russell’s balance, power and calibrated feints in and around packs, often with the ball in one hand, exemplified his greatness. Blessed with sure hands and a sixth sense of which he modestly made light, his courage complemented an exceptional creativeness by hand and foot. Russell’s legacy extends well beyond his beloved Port Adelaide Football Club. He enriched the game in South Australia and beyond.   

Mike Coward

 

One image will never leave me of Russell Ebert. It was a State game in 1971 at the MCG and I went there to look at a few Victorian players. I came away from that game with a South Australian making the biggest impression and carrying the greatest respect. Russell Ebert seemed to battle the Victorians on his own that day. At one stage he had two Victorians hanging off him and he still managed to hold up the ball and get a handball away. He was so strong, so defiant, so outstanding.

Dennis Cometti 

 

Winning four Magarey Medals and six best-and-fairest awards at Australian football's most successful club are merely opening lines to the volumes on the contribution Russell Ebert made to our game. He introduced fans to Port Adelaide and showed them everything awesome it has to offer – his skills, dedication and fairness of play. He made people love this game, and for many of the less fortunate – the sick, elderly, disabled and their families – it was all they had in life. Yet, for all the accolades and respect he earned from reaching out to the greater football community he remained humble. As difficult as it may be to comprehend right now, in many ways Russell Frank Ebert, OAM was a better man than he was a footballer. He was that special; one of football and life's finest.

Ashley Porter

Russell Ebert’s numerous, wondrous football skills showcased his greatness. To dwell on one ... When he wanted possession of the ball, when he really set his steely mind to get it - which was often - he got it. Simple as that.

It might sound basic enough, but only champions can be so greedy.

It was a privilege to watch Ebert strut his stuff so superbly, so powerfully for Port Adelaide from 1968-85 throughout a strong SANFL era, interrupted by his one season with North Melbourne in 1979 when, 30 in the June and flying to Melbourne every Thursday, he played all 25 games and averaged 25 disposals a game. North Melbourne lost the preliminary final to Collingwood, which was beaten by Carlton by five points in the grand final.

Ebert’s consistent, selfless charity work with and for the handicapped and needy through the decades was legendary at Alberton.

For all that, he could be a prickly character at times. This might not be the best example, but I remember bumping into Russell at Alberton Oval in the euphoric atmosphere of the Sunday morning after Port Adelaide’s 40-point premiership triumph against Brisbane at the MCG in 2004.

“Shed a tear, Russ?” I asked innocently enough.

He glared at me disdainfully and replied, stern-faced: “I don’t shed tears.”

Alan Shiell

Umpires

I was privileged in the late 1960s and early 1970s to see at close hand on the football field two of the greatest players to ever pull on boots - Russell Ebert and Barrie Robran. They were two of a kind, both champions - but different.

Russell had everything - and then he invented the overhead handball that could go 20-30 metres. It was not a throw. It was his technique but it was a handball.

As a player, he had to get Magarey Medal votes. He was around the ball so much and did so much. His technique was intense. He could control a game. And he would deliver the ball to his team-mates beautifully. He was fair; Russell never did anything behind the door.

Russell also was a nice bloke. Look at how many young people he helped with their lives and their football.

Murray Ducker

Hall of Fame umpire

Administrators

Russell was a great player - one of the best of all-time. He and Barrie Robran are the two best players I saw. He was an exceptional footballer and a great coach of our State junior teams. 

Russell also was a character, one I liked very much.

I never tired of calling his name at Magarey Medal counts because Russell captured all that the medal symbolises. He was most brilliant with his style of play and he simply was great in all aspects of the game. He always was fair. There was no weakness to his game. He was courageous. He was brilliant, very brilliant. He deserves all the praise as an outstanding footballer.

Max Basheer

Longest-serving SANFL president 

Other Sports

I don't know anyone who has spent time with Russell who has not walked away feeling better about themselves. 

He was an unbelievable role model. In a sports world where tags such as 'elite' and 'champion' are thrown around too easily, Russell Ebert legitimately lived up to all those images and more. 

Russell also was a great person. Those who knew him well came to appreciate he was a funny guy. He had great humor.

Phil Smyth

Olympian, basketball legend 

 

Russell's passion stood out. So did his energy. And that great passion was contagious. He was a real honest person - so humble, no ego, no bullshit. He was all life and energy. My experiences with Russell showed he had time for everyone.

Anna Meares

Olympian, cycling champion