Club History

History

The club was established in 1945 and has a long and distinguished history in the local community. Known firstly as the Annerley Boomerangs, the name was changed to the Annerley Stars Soccer Club with matches being played at the Junction Park State School.

Seeking their own field, Club members approached the Brisbane City Council and work began in 1946 on what is known as the Ekibin Reserve – that area of land where the Annerley Recreation Club’s Seniors’ Clubhouse and field No.1 are now located.

With the building of the South-East freeway the Club was given the marvelous opportunity to acquire a lease on an additional area of land between Ridge Street and Juliette Street.

In previous years this land had been used for Athletics and Hockey, but with a lot of determination, hard work and great Club management this wide open space and the old Seniors’ Soccer ground on the south side of Ridge Street were transformed into what we have today.

Additionally, the former ARC Junior Clubhouse, (since destroyed by fire, but now rebuilt), was renovated and transformed from an old residence.

Funds needed for all this work, including Brisbane’s first football fields’ underground sprinkler system, was funded by some very serious successful fund-raising, with teams and families working hard to raise the necessary money. Sure, we had Bank guarantors if we needed a loan, but they were never used.

Near Juliette Street, a bore was sunk which supplied water to the underground watering system for the main junior fields for many years. Oh! to have it now, but unfortunately the well went dry.

Lighting of the playing fields was of paramount importance and was achieved with minimal expense but maximum effort by a large group of talented Club personnel lead by Mr. Morrie Bath, then chairman of the Juniors, who had a talent for obtaining donations in material, whether it be soil, timber or light poles or anything else we needed, then encouraging tradespeople, mainly within the Club, to give of their time and expertise. It helped that Morrie was a successful businessman and a builder in his own right.

Over the years The Annerley Recreation Club Inc. has fostered Soccer (Football) for tens of thousands of junior players, whose successes, both as teams and as individuals in Representative football, made Annerley one of the most successful Clubs in the history of the Brisbane Junior Soccer Association (which covered all of Brisbane) as they did in its successor on the southside of the Brisbane River, Brisbane Southern Districts Junior Soccer Association.