COUNTDOWN TO DARWIN | BENNY VIGONA

VIGONA BRILLIANCE

Extracts from AFLNT.com.au & Bulldogs Unleashed | South Fremantle 1960-2020

Brilliant St Mary’s footballer Benny Vigona was inducted into the 2019 AFLNT Hall of Fame after an outstanding playing career which included Northern Territory Football League (NTFL) and West Australian Football League (WAFL) premierships as well as NT and WA representation.

Hailing from Pularumpi on Melville Island, Vigona’s St Mary’s family history connections saw him join the club's Colts ranks via St John’s College.

An NT Schoolboy representative in the first 1974 NT Underage team, Vigona made his NTFL Premier League debut in 1975 before eventually playing 80 senior games and kicking 132 goals as a silky skilled half-forward.

He played in St Mary’s 1977/78 and 1983/84 premierships, winning the best on ground Chaney Medal in the 1978 match after kicking five goals.

The back-to-back Best and Fairest Ludwig Medal winner in 1976/77 and 1977/78, Vigona also won the leading goalkicker award in the Saints' premiership year of 1983/84 with 39 goals.

In 1977 Vigona joined WAFL club South Fremantle where he played 165 games and kicked 351 goals representing Western Australia four times under State of Origin rules; playing twice against both South Australia and Victoria. He was a South Fremantle premiership player in 1980 playing alongside fellow Garden Point born teammates, Basil Campbell and the late Maurice Rioli.

An Aboriginal All Stars representative against Essendon in 1985 Benny also played in the first Australia Day match where the NT defeated South Australian power club Glenelg.

At South Fremantle, Benny was a one-time housemate of team-mate Mark 'Jacko' Jackson. 

Jacko arrived at the Club with his bleached, long blond hair and a temperament that attracted a cult following at Souths but often drove the coaching staff to distraction. And he also landed in Perth with a .22 rifle for his own protection. Benny Vigona, Jackson’s housemate, got jittery at the sight of the rifle, and with the fact that Jackson slept with it.

Managing secretary May was equally amazed when Vigona came to him with the story, and wanted something done about the rifle. “Benny came and saw me and said ‘look, he’s mad, he sleeps with a rifle’,” May said. “When I asked Mark what the gun was for, he said it was for his own protection because his father had told him that we were all mad over here and he’d better get a gun to protect himself. “I told Mark that I needed to confiscate the rifle, and he had no problem with that.”

Benny would get this own back though eventully. Many years later, Jackson told Mike Sheahan on Open Mike on Fox Footy that he was set up badly by housemate Benny. “Benny said ‘have a crack at Maurice in the ring’, but I didn’t know he was a golden gloves (sic). It was a big mistake,” Jackson lamented. Rioli gave historian Steve Errington a blow-by-blow description of the fight in his 2003 interview. Maurice went on to be known as Magic, and Jackson was certainly bedazzled on that fateful day when he didn’t know where the punches were coming from but he knew where they were going.