Keith Holman

Keith Holman

Personal information
Full name	Keith Victor Holman
Nickname	Yappy
Born	(1927-09-11)11 September 1927 Melbourne, Victoria, Australia
Died	11 October 2011(2011-10-11) (aged 84) Sydney, New South Wales, Australia
Playing information
Height	5 ft 6 in
Weight	11 st 7 lb
Position	Halfback
Club Years Team Pld T G FG P 1948–61 Western Suburbs Magpies 203 70 84 378 Representative Years Team Pld T G FG P 1950–58 New South Wales 25 20 1 0 62 1950–58 Australia 35 14 6 0 54
Coaching information
Club Years Team Gms W D L W% 1954–55 Western Suburbs 36 9 1 26 25 1977–77 Western Suburbs 22 7 0 15 32 Total 58 16 1 41 28
Source: RLP

Keith Victor Holman, MBE (11 September 1927 – 11 October 2011) was an Australian rugby league footballer, a national and state representative Halfback whose club career was played with the Western Suburbs Magpies from 1949 to 1961. He has since been named as one of the nation's finest footballers of the 20th century. After retiring as player, Holman was coach of Wests and later became one of the game's top-level referees.

Holman had an impoverished childhood during the Great Depression. In his earliest years he was raised in a shanty at Yarra Bay in Sydney by a man named Holman who may have been his father. He was taken in by a local family named Schofield who enabled him to be schooled by the De La Salle Brothers at Surry Hills. There he met and befriended Bernie Purcell whom he would later play against and alongside in state and Kangaroo touring sides.

Toward the end of the Second World War Holman joined the RAAF as a Leading Aircraftman. He was a chef with 82 Wing, 23 Squadron and was posted to bases in Ipswich, Queensland and later after the Japanese surrender, at Morakai and Balikpapan in Borneo. The Squadron flew B-24 Liberators in a transport role, flying ex-Prisoners of War and other Australian personnel back to Australia.