Noel Cleal

Noel Cleal

Personal information
Full name	Noel Harvey Cleal
Nickname	Crusher
Born	(1958-10-16) 16 October 1958 (age 58) Warialda, New South Wales, Australia
Playing information
Position	Second-row, Centre
Club Years Team Pld T G FG P 1980–82 Eastern Suburbs 70 26 1 0 80 1983–89 Manly-Warringah 125 43 10 0 192 1985–86 Widnes 16 12 0 0 44 1989–90 Hull F.C. 31 15 0 0 60 Total 242 96 11 0 376 Representative Years Team Pld T G FG P 1985–86 Australia 10 5 0 0 20 1981–88 New South Wales 13 3 0 0 12 1984 City Firsts 1 1 0 0 4 1985–86 Country Firsts 2 1 0 0 4 1987 Country Origin 1 1 0 0 4
Coaching information
Club Years Team Gms W D L W% 1991 Hull F.C.
Source: Rugby League Project Yesterday's Hero

Noel Harvey "Crusher" Cleal (born in Warialda, New South Wales) is an Australian former rugby league footballer who also had a successful coaching career. A destructive Second Rower for the Manly Sea Eagles, he also represented New South Wales in the State of Origin Series and the Australian national rugby league team.

Noel Cleal along with his brother Les came to Sydney first-grade rugby league having already established a name for himself in the country. He had captain-coached the Wondai side to a country premiership in Queensland, and steered an undefeated Sawtell Panthers to a Clayton Cup and maiden premiership, then represented for New South Wales Northern Division against the touring Great Britain Lions in 1979.

"Crusher" began his Sydney career with Eastern Suburbs Roosters in 1980 where he played at Centre. He had three seasons with the Roosters before following coach Bob Fulton to Manly in 1983. Following the move to Manly, Fulton switched Cleal to Second-row, a move which assisted Cleal's ascendancy to State and National representative honours.

Before the start of the 1987 NSWRL season, the Manly board had wanted coach Fulton to install Cleal as club captain replacing Paul Vautin. Fulton however had other ideas and Vautin retained the captaincy. After missing the first eight games of the season while recovering from a broken arm suffered against Hull F.C. on the 1986 Kangaroo tour, Cleal returned to the side from the bench in the Round 9 clash with Easts at Brookvale Oval (scoring the winning try from a Paul Vautin kick). From then on he played each game from the second row, helping the Sea Eagles to their 1987 Grand Final win over the Canberra Raiders in the last grand final played at the Sydney Cricket Ground (Cleal, who was one of the Sea Eagles better players on an unseasonably hot day, suffered a knock to the head during the game and finished the match on the bench). During that year the relationship between Vautin and Cleal was reported to be 'frosty' as a result of the captaincy saga, though both players dispute the claims.