Andrew Douglas Purser (born 31 October 1958) is a former

Australian rules football Australian football, also called Australian rules football or Aussie rules, or more simply football or footy, is a contact sport played between two teams of 18 players on an Australian rules football playing field, oval field, often a modified ...

er who played for the

Footscray Football Club The Western Bulldogs are a professional Australian rules football club based in the Melbourne suburb of Footscray. The club competes in the Australian Football League (AFL), the sport's premier competition. Originally named the Footscray F ...

in the

Victorian Football League The Victorian Football League (VFL) is an Australian rules football competition in Australia operated by the Australian Football League (AFL) as a second-tier, regional, semi-professional competition. It includes teams from clubs based in east ...

(VFL) and for the

East Fremantle Football Club The East Fremantle Football Club, nicknamed the Sharks and colloquially referred to as East Freo, is an Australian rules football club playing in the West Australian Football League (WAFL) and WAFL Women's (WAFLW). The team's home ground is Eas ...

and

West Perth Football Club The West Perth Football Club, nicknamed the Falcons, is an Australian rules football club located in Joondalup, Western Australia. West Perth competes in the West Australian Football League (WAFL) and WAFL Women's (WAFLW) and is the oldest exis ...

in the

Western Australian Football League The West Australian Football League (WAFL "waffle" or "W-A-F-L") is an Australian rules football league based in Perth, Western Australia. The league currently consists of ten teams, which play each other in a 20-round season usually lasting f ...

(WAFL).

Career

Purser began his football career in 1978 with

in the

(WAFL). He played 85 games for East Fremantle over five seasons, where he was a member of the 1979 premiership team and won the club's fairest and best award in 1981. Purser was drafted No. 1 by the

in the 1982 VFL draft. He debuted for Footscray in 1983 and played 112 VFL games over five seasons. He was awarded the

Charles Sutton Medal The Charles Sutton Medal is an Australian rules football award presented annually to the player adjudged best and fairest for the Western Bulldogs throughout the Victorian Football League/Australian Football League season. The medal is named a ...

in 1984 as the club's best and fairest and in 1985 he helped the club reach the preliminary final, where they lost to Hawthorn by 10 points. He also represented Western Australia football in

1983 1983 saw both the official beginning of the Internet and the first mobile cellular telephone call. Events January * January 1 – The migration of the ARPANET to TCP/IP is officially completed (this is considered to be the beginning of the ...

1984 Events January * January 1 – The Bornean Sultanate of Brunei gains full independence from the United Kingdom, having become a British protectorate in 1888. * January 7 – Brunei becomes the sixth member of the Association of Southeas ...

and

1985 The year 1985 was designated as the International Youth Year by the United Nations. Events January * January 1 ** The Internet's Domain Name System is created. ** Greenland withdraws from the European Economic Community as a result of a n ...

. Purser returned to Western Australia in 1988 and played two games for

in the WAFL before retiring from football at age 28 to pursue a career in the finance industry.

Profile

Purser played as a ruckman. At , he was considered undersized for the position. He was bound by a Footscray club rule to not enter the

forward 50 ''The Forward'' (), formerly known as ''The Jewish Daily Forward'', is an American news media organization for a Jewish American audience. Founded in 1897 as a Yiddish-language daily socialist newspaper, ''The New York Times'' reported that Seth ...

and to always remain a kick behind play.

Personal life

Purser and his wife, Jenny, have two children. His son,

Ben Ben is frequently used as a shortened version of the given names Benjamin, Benedict, Bennett, Benson or Ebenezer, and is also a given name in its own right. Ben meaning "son of" is also found in Arabic as ''Ben'' (dialectal Arabic) or ''bin ...

, is a basketball player.

References

External links

* * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Purser, Andrew 1958 births Living people Australian rules footballers from Western Australia Charles Sutton Medal winners East Fremantle Football Club players West Perth Football Club players Western Bulldogs players Western Australian State of Origin players 20th-century Australian sportsmen