Michael Patrick Blake (13 September 1874 – 2 January 1931) was an
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 oval field, often a modified cricket ground. Points are scored by k ...
er who played with
St Kilda in the
Victorian Football League
The Victorian Football League (VFL) is an Australian rules football league in Australia serving as one of the second-tier regional semi-professional competitions which sit underneath the fully professional Australian Football League (AFL). It ...
(VFL).
Biography
Early life and family
Blake was born in
St Kilda, Victoria
St Kilda is an inner seaside suburb in Melbourne, Victoria (Australia), Victoria, Australia, 6 km (4 miles) south-east of Melbourne's Melbourne City Centre, Central Business District, located within the City of Port Phillip Local governmen ...
on 13 September 1874, one of 11 children to Irish emigrants John Blake and Ellen Coen, who came from
Galway
Galway ( ; ga, Gaillimh, ) is a City status in Ireland, city in the West Region, Ireland, West of Ireland, in the Provinces of Ireland, province of Connacht, which is the county town of County Galway. It lies on the River Corrib between Lo ...
.
He had seven brothers, many of whom were also gifted sportsmen, two of them played in the VFL. A younger brother,
George Blake
George Blake ( Behar; 11 November 1922 – 26 December 2020) was a spy with Britain's Secret Intelligence Service (MI6) and worked as a double agent for the Soviet Union. He became a communist and decided to work for the MGB while a pris ...
, was a two-time olympic long-distance runner who also appeared in the VFL, for St Kilda and
Carlton
Carlton may refer to:
People
* Carlton (name), a list of those with the given name or surname
* Carlton (singer), English soul singer Carlton McCarthy
* Carlton, a pen name used by Joseph Caldwell (1773–1835), American educator, Presbyterian ...
.
[ James Blake and Tom Blake, both elder brothers, played football for the same two clubs. James, who captained St Kilda, retired by the time the VFL was formed, but Tom continued his career in the VFL. Another brother, Harry Blake, was a prominent cross country runner.
He had three children with wife Holly: Allyn, Thomas and Winifred.
]
Football
Recruited from Collegians, Blake started his career with Carlton in the VFA, where he played until transferring to St Kilda in the 1895 season.
At Carlton he had played under the captaincy of his brother Tom and was described by the ''Sporting Globe
''The Sporting Globe'' was a newspaper published in Melbourne from 1922 until 1996. The first issue was published on 22 July 1922, and for the first four weeks it was published only on Saturday evenings; from 16 August 1922 it introduced a Wednesd ...
'' as having been one of the formidable ruckmen in the team.[
He missed St Kilda's inaugural league game in the ]1897 VFL season
The 1897 VFL season was the inaugural season of the Victorian Football League (1897–1989), Victorian Football League (VFL), the new highest-level senior Australian rules football competition in Victoria. The season featured eight clubs, ran fr ...
but was in the side from round two and played 13 games that year, followed by 14 in 1898.[ He didn't continue in 1900 and finished his VFL career with 30 games and no wins, joint fourth most in the league's history, all ahead of him played for ]University
A university () is an institution of higher (or tertiary) education and research which awards academic degrees in several academic disciplines. Universities typically offer both undergraduate and postgraduate programs. In the United States, t ...
.
Other sports
Blake, a member of the Collegian Harriers, was also an amateur athlete like some of his brothers.[ He first competed in athletics at the Victorian 10-mile cross-country championships in 1891.][ In addition to athletics and football, Blake was a good enough diver to win the Victorian title, in a field which included ]Cecil Healy
Cecil Patrick Healy (28 November 1881 – 29 August 1918) was an Australian freestyle swimmer of the 1900s and 1910s, who won silver in the 100 m freestyle at the 1912 Summer Olympics in Stockholm. He also won gold in the 4 × 200 m freestyle ...
.[
]
References
External links
*
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Blake, Mick
1874 births
1931 deaths
St Kilda Football Club players
Australian rules footballers from Melbourne
Australian people of Irish descent
People from St Kilda, Victoria