power struggle with Kearney, who led the side on-field and who that year had captained Australia to a three Test whitewash of New Zealand, had captained New South Wales to state victory over Queensland, won the Sunday Telegraph'''s Player of the Year award and ultimately captained St. George to premiership victory. The St George committee chose to back Kearney's fine football brain and his advanced strategies on attack, defence and conditioning in choosing him as their captain-coach to go forward. In the process they laid the foundation for the club's eleven-year premiership stranglehold. Following his premiership success with St George as both captain and coach, Kearney was selected as captain-coach of Australia for the 1956 trans-Tasman series against New Zealand with Clive Churchill unavailable due to injury. Australia won the series 3–0 to regain the trans-Tasman trophy that the Kiwis had held since 1935. Kearney stayed on a captain-coach for the 1956 Kangaroo tour in spite of the availability and tour selection of Churchill with whom he reportedly enjoyed an uneasy relationship. The touring side won all three Tests in France but lost against Great Britain 2–1. Kearney played in all Tests on tour. Kearney played in an exceptionally talented Australian side who won the 1957 World Cup under captain Dick Poole, playing out one of the matches with a broken jaw. and the 1958 domestic Ashes series under captain Brian Davies before retiring from international football. Kearney brought tactics and strategy from English rugby league and is often credited with masterminding the St. George Dragons successful run. He was able to inspire loyalty in his players by leading from the front and to develop a level of fitness and ruthless, mistake free football. This discipline was the foundation for the famous straight line brick-wall defence that kept the St George team at the top through those years. He played 156 games from 1952 to 1961, captained the club in five winning Grand Finals (as captain-coach for the latter four) and coached them to further victory in 1961. Post-playing After retiring as a player Kearney stayed on with St George as coach for the remainder of the 1961 NSWRFL season before resigning. He then coached the Parramatta Eels to the semi finals in 1962–1964. He coached the Western Suburbs Magpies club in 1965 and was the foundation coach for the Cronulla-Sutherland Sharks in their first three seasons, 1967–1969. Kearney worked