Graham Murray

Graham Murray

Woolloongabba, Queensland, Australia
Playing information
Height	171 cm (5 ft 7 in)
Weight	75 kg (11 st 11 lb)
Position	Halfback
Club Years Team Pld T G FG P 1976–80 Parramatta Eels 46 9 0 0 27 1981–83 South Sydney 43 7 0 0 21 Total 89 16 0 0 48
Coaching information
Club Years Team Gms W D L W% 1991–95 Illawarra Steelers 95 51 5 39 54 1997 Hunter Mariners 18 7 0 11 39 1998–99 Leeds Rhinos 59 43 1 15 73 2000–01 Sydney Roosters 57 31 1 25 54 2002–08 North Qld Cowboys 161 79 1 81 49 Total 390 211 8 171 54 Representative Years Team Gms W D L W% 1995 Fiji 3 1 0 2 33 2001–05 City NSW 5 3 0 2 60 2006–07 New South Wales 6 2 0 4 33
Source: [1][2][3]

Graham Ernest Murray (6 January 1955 – 28 July 2013) was an Australian professional rugby league footballer who played in the 1970s and 1980s, and coached in the 1990s, 2000s and 2010s.

A New South Wales State of Origin head coach, Murray coached extensively at the highest club level: coaching the Illawarra Steelers, the Hunter Mariners, the Leeds Rhinos, the Sydney Roosters and the North Queensland Cowboys between the years 1991 and 2008. He also coached the Fiji national rugby league team, the City New South Wales rugby league team and the Australian women's team. He was named Dally M Coach of the Year in 1992.

Personal life

Murray was born in Peak Hill, New South Wales to James Murray and Shirley Gallagher. He was the youngest of five siblings.

He married Amanda Jurd on 15 December 1984. On their ninth wedding anniversary they had a daughter.

Playing career

Parramatta

Having starred for the

caused him to flirt between the grades in 1979 and 1980. In 1979 he captained the reserves to their third premiership in five years.

South Sydney

Murray moved to Souths in 1981 and played fairly regularly in first grade until he left at the end of 1983 to play in the country.

Coaching career

Murray began his coaching career with appointments as reserve grade coach at Penrith, where he won a premiership in 1987 and helped develop many of the future 1991 first-grade premiership team, and Balmain.

Illawarra Steelers

Murray was made coach of the

organisation. He was the only person out of the hundreds of players, coaches and administrators involved with the Super League saga to lose his job as a direct consequence of the brewing war.

Murray was the coach of the Fiji team in the 1995 World Cup, winning one game and losing two.

Hunter Mariners

Installed as coach of

in 1998.

Leeds Rhinos

Left without a team to coach in Australia, Murray joined the

.

Sydney Roosters

After the resignation of

.

Murray was also the

2001

, Murray was sacked by the Roosters two days after the end of his second season with the club.

North Queensland Cowboys

After starting 2002 in his former profession as a teacher of mathematics, he was made head coach of the North Queensland Cowboys to replace the sacked Murray Hurst in April. After three seasons of steady improvement, the Cowboys made the NRL finals for the first time in 2004 and finished one game short of the grand final. They improved on their efforts in the following season, reaching the 2005 NRL Grand Final, the Cowboys' first, which they lost to the Wests Tigers by 30 to 16.

Murray coached City to victory in the annual contest against Country Origin in 2002, 2003 and 2005.

In 2006, Murray was named coach of the Illawarra Steelers’ "Team of Steel", celebrating the club’s 25th anniversary. Murray was appointed coach of the

, the Cowboys missed the finals and finished in ninth position.

Murray was re-appointed as New South Wales coach in 2007, with the full support of the North Queensland Cowboys board. Once again, however, New South Wales lost the series by two games to one. In August 2007, Murray announced that he would step down as coach of New South Wales.^[4]

On 19 May 2008, Murray resigned as coach of the North Queensland Cowboys.^[5][6]

Later career

In 2010, Murray was appointed as the head coach of the

He was appointed the Newcastle Knights’ High Performance Unit Director of Coaching for the 2012 season.^[9][10]

On 30 November 2012, Murray was appointed head coach of the Wynnum Manly Seagulls.^[11] Murray stood down as the Seagulls coach due to ill health.^[12]

Death

In March 2013, Murray was comatose for a week following a heart attack.

Murray had another heart attack in July 2013, and was subsequently hospitalised at the Princess Alexandra Hospital in Woolloongabba, Brisbane. On 28 July, he was taken off life support and died later that day, aged 58.^{[13][14][15][16]}

Sources

• Gary Lester, ed. (1983). The Sun Book of Rugby League – 1983. Sydney, New South Wales: John Fairfax Marketing. p. 78.
  ISBN 0-909558-83-3
  .

References

Sporting positions
Preceded by Ron Hilditch 1989–1990	Coach Illawarra Steelers 1991–1995	Succeeded by Allan Fitzgibbon 1995
Preceded by team created	Coach Hunter Mariners 1997	Succeeded by team demised
Preceded by Phil Gould 1995–99	Coach Sydney Roosters 2000–2001	Succeeded by Ricky Stuart 2002–06
Preceded by team recreated	Coach City Origin 2001–2005	Succeeded by Tim Sheens 2006–2008
Preceded by Murray Hurst 2001–2002	Coach North Queensland Cowboys 2002–2008	Succeeded by Ian Millward 2008
Preceded by Ricky Stuart 2005	Coach New South Wales Origin 2006–2007	Succeeded by Craig Bellamy 2008–2010