The first semi final of 1965 was a rough house affair, with more than a few behind the play incidents. To suggest that the losers, West Perth, were unhappy about some aspects of proceedings would be an understatement.

So fast forward to the thirtieth of April 1966 when the two clubs met once again, with memories of the previous encounter fresh in the minds of a West Perth line up that was considerably different from the one that took the field at Subiaco in 1965.

The injection of eleven new players into the Cardinals twenty by coach Bob Spargo, including seven from the thirds and Victorians Graham Jacobs and John McArthur had invigorated the side, which boasted a two out of three winning record at that stage of the season.

Joe Merillo, playing his fourth league game, knew on the Thursday evening that he’d be playing on the man West Perth were most unhappy with, the tough and unrelenting Trevor Sprigg. “I didn’t sleep for two nights,” Joe recalled. “When we finally sidled up to each other he gave me a wink and a solid bump, which didn’t help much. But Spriggy played it hard and fair.”

East Fremantle repeated their previous result, winning by twenty points, but revenge was at hand for West Perth, who knocked Old Easts out of premiership contention with a twenty six point win in the first semi final. It was a mixed afternoon for Merillo in his first WAFL final, winning the Braemar Mark Of The Day but dislocating his shoulder in the process. “It wasn’t worth the raincoat I got as a prize,” he ruefully recalled. The award was one of several Joe collected over the course of his career for spectacular grabs.

“I learnt my first lesson as a result of that injury,” Merillo said. “ I worked like hell to get back for the preliminary final and succeeded, thinking I was fit, but I wasn’t.” East Perth won by seven goals.

Born in Italy, Joe Merillo was brought up in Greenbushes, where Polly Farmer spent some time, and played in the seniors reserves side at eleven, later travelling to Kirup to play in the juniors competition. When the family relocated to Fitzgerald Street, North Perth, he lined up with Inglewood under sixteens, his heart set on emulating his idol, Farmer, at East Perth.

But the East Perth/West Perth zone boundaries ran along Fitzgerald Street, and the Merillos had moved to the wrong side.

Joe was so keen on joining the Royals that he stood out of the game for a season, but to no avail.

A visit from West Perth secretary Kevin Bradley persuaded Merillo to give it a try, and, as he made friendships with his new team mates, including John Wynne, he grew to embrace the club. After a year with the thirds he trained hard in the pre season of 1965 and reaped the rewards. “I reckon that my first season was my best,” he recalled.

Another finals loss in 1967, this time at the hands of South Fremantle, was followed by more frustration for Joe midway through the following season, when a ruptured and torn hamstring saw him lose ten games at a crucial stage of a year that West Perth were once again shaping as a premiership prospect. Back in the side for the last qualifying game, Merillo played in the preliminary final team that went down to East Perth by twenty seven points.

It was fitting that Joe’s boyhood hero Graham Farmer was at the helm at West Perth when the club finally broke through for a mesmerising grand final triumph in 1969, but unfortunately Merillo wasn’t part of the twenty that took the field on the memorable day. Broken ribs in the second semi final prevented him from being part of the final twenty, although he was named in the twenty on Thursday night. “That was just cosmetic,” he said. “I was never going to play.”

A bad knee injury in 1970 ruined that season for Merillo, and, after playing what he termed: “a shocker” at the beginning of the following season he spent the rest of the year in the reserves. “I made a few crook decisions in my time and giving WAFL footy at the end of 1971 at the age of twenty four with seventy league games under my belt was one of them.”

“You only get one go at league footy,” I was told. “Once you’re thirty you can go bush.” But I ignored the advice and took the coaching position at Kalannie. At the same time I have to add that I thoroughly enjoyed country football and made many lasting friendships along the way.”

After a year at Kalannie Joe had a rethink, and finally ventured to his original club of choice, East Perth, where he spent half of 1973, playing the other half with Mal McRae-coached Osborne Park. Merillo had plenty of time for the former West Perth ruckman, describing him as a player who had the ability to have achieved more than he did at league level.

Spending the following season at East Perth, Merillo captain coached Brookton in 1975, reaching two grand finals but missing the chocolates in a stint that saw him appointed captain coach of the Avon Association side, before putting the boots away temporarily, but returning to the club as a player and sharing in a long awaited premiership.

In 1981, the thirty five year old Merillo captain coached Gingin, as well as the Mortlock League side.

His sole involvement with football after that was watching and supporting son Jamie as the younger Merillo’s football career unfolded. Joe and Elsma Merillo also have a daughter, Justine.

Inducted into the WA Netball Hall of Fame in 2001, Elsma captained WA to the 1974 national championships title and earned Australian "All Star” selection five times from 1965-70.

As goal attack or goal shooter, she was an integral member of the Australian team that was runner-up at the 1967 world championships in Perth and the successful team in Jamaica in 1971. Originally name vice-captain for the 1969 series with New Zealand, Elsma captained the side in two Tests, with a series drawn.

She enjoyed an extensive coaching career that included State schoolgirls and WA under-age teams, national squads, WAIS and WA teams, WA Netball League premiers and the Australian B side on a 1992 New Zealand tour.

 

A physical education teacher and lecturer in human movement Elsma was the University of WA’s Sportsman of the Year in 1969 and in 1989 became the inaugural administrator of the WA Netball League.

 

Her brother, Darryl Harris, played league football for Perth and also excelled at cricket, baseball, and golf.

 

It was inevitable that the sporting genes of Joe and Elsma Merillo would be carried on, and it was Jamie who went on to play at AFL level. Jamie Merillo broke his jaw in the Fremantle Dockers’ first ever game but still managed eleven for the year. He made a total of fifteen appearances for Fremantle and forty one with Claremont, including a premiership, in a career that was destroyed by constant injury, and was also a very good swimmer who competed in the backstroke finals of the Australian team qualifying trials for the Barcelona Olympics.

 

“Jamie was his own worst enemy,” Joe said. “He stepped in too many holes. He wanted to get the ball and beat his opponents at the same time. His body was on the line constantly, resulting in a series of injuries.”

 

In 1984, Joe Merillo bought a business owned previously by former Hawthorn, East Fremantle, and Perth coach Alan Joyce, and has built it up to be one of the leaders in it’s field. Industrial Protective Products(WA) is a wholly owned Western Australian Company operating as a “true safety house” supplying Personal Protective Equipment together with a wide range of specific equipment to the mining, construction and associated industries throughout Western Australia.

 

A more than handy golfer on his day, Joe has spent so much time at work that the greens at Royal Fremantle have seen very little of him recently, but he enjoys a round when he can get away, both on the green and in the clubhouse.

 

It came as no surprise that Graham Farmer received Joe’s vote as best he’d played with, and another champ, Perth’s Greg Brehaut got the nod as hardest to beat.

 

In the late Sixties and early Seventies West Perth had many of their finest players in action, including the names of Smeath, Wynne, Dyson, Boyanich, Watling, Whinnen, Dempsey, Hebbard, France, and Farmer, but the name of Merillo, while not necessarily in the same bracket as that illustrious group, was nevertheless a favourite with West Perth supporters and one who could have gone on to bigger things but for injury.