Francis Patrick Walker (born 10 September 1933) is a retired Australian rules footballer who played for

Perth Football Club The Perth Football Club, nicknamed the Demons, is an Australian rules football club based in Lathlain, Western Australia, Lathlain, Western Australia, currently playing in the West Australian Football League (WAFL) and WAFL Women's (WAFLW). R ...

in the

West 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), and also represented

Western Australia Western Australia (WA) is the westernmost state of Australia. It is bounded by the Indian Ocean to the north and west, the Southern Ocean to the south, the Northern Territory to the north-east, and South Australia to the south-east. Western Aust ...

. Walker was educated at Aquinas College in

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, where he was mentored in football by

Jerry Dolan John "Jerry" Dolan (25 December 1901 – 26 December 1986) was an Australian rules footballer and coach in the West Australian Football League (WAFL) before becoming a politician. He played for as well as coached East Fremantle and was also a ...

. He was also playing club football for South Perth under

East Perth East is one of the four cardinal directions or points of the compass. It is the opposite direction from west and is the direction from which the Sun rises on the Earth. Etymology As in other languages, the word is formed from the fact that eas ...

great Mick Cronin. Walker trained with East Perth in 1951, even attending a trip to

Collie Collies form a distinctive type of herding dogs, including many related landraces and standardized breeds. The type originated in Scotland and Northern England. Collies are medium-sized, fairly lightly-built dogs, with pointed snouts. Many type ...

with them and playing a scratch match against South Fremantle. He was living with his grandparents in South Perth, whilst his father was living in Cannington. South Perth was within the recruiting boundary of Perth, whilst Cannington was unallocated, East Perth tried to sign him up as living with his father, they sent the request off amongst other paperwork, hoping the address anomaly would go unnoticed. Mistakenly sent early, Perth officials obtained it. Jack O'Dea of Perth signed Walker just before the start of the 1952 season. He played two games in the seconds before making his debut against West Perth. He won the

best and fairest In Australian sport, the best and fairest award recognises the player(s) adjudged to have had the best performance in a game or over a season for a given sporting club or competition. The awards are sometimes dependent on not receiving a suspensi ...

for Perth in 1955 and 1956, runner-up in his last full season in 1963. He topped the club's goal kicking in 1953, his record of 410 goals one of the highest on Perth's all-time goalkickers list. He made his debut for Western Australia against Victoria at the MCG in 1955, kicking two of their three goals for the game. He represented Western Australia ten times. In 1961, he was assistant coach to Bob Miller. Miller was sacked early in the season, Walker was elevated to the coaching position, but on the insistence of the club, he was a non-playing coach, meaning Walker did not play until 1962, when he was made assistant to Ern Henfry. In 1964, Walker retired after 226 games. He was nicknamed "Dickie" because his father and grandfather were also named Frank.

References

Footy Goss: Where are they now? Frank Dickie Walker
{{DEFAULTSORT:Walker, Frank 1933 births Living people Australian rules footballers from Western Australia Perth Football Club players Perth Football Club coaches People educated at Aquinas College, Perth West Australian Football Hall of Fame inductees