{xtypo_dropcap}P{/xtypo_dropcap}aul Hasler had an unusual initiation to league football.

“It was in about my fourth league game that I encountered Mark Jackson,” he recalled. “He turned around and biffed me one on the nose, so I gave the bugger one back. He then pushed me to the ground, sat on me and kept punching. It was an interesting confrontation.”

There weren’t too many others who could boast of belting Paul Hasler without knowing all about it. Hasler was a tough player who never took a backward step, and was a fearless customer around the packs.

An Osborne Park junior who was invited to try out with West Perth after finishing third in the 1981 association Medal count, he joined players such as Paul Mifka, Sean King, and Darren Bewick in the colts side in 1982.   

Hasler served his apprenticeship with the colts and reserves for five seasons before getting his chance in round four of the 1987 season. A forward in his junior days, advice from Bruce Monteath convinced him to try himself in defence, and it was as a backman that he began his senior career.

Paul made his league debut in a back pocket against Perth in a match the Falcons lost by thirty eight points at Leederville Oval. Among his side’s best, he proceeded to cement his spot in the side, never out of it except for injury, until taking a year off to travel the globe in 1992.

Bottom four occupants in Paul’s first two seasons with the league side, West Perth played off in the first semi final of 1989. Despite the efforts of Hasler, who was moved into the middle by coach George Michalczyk midway through the third quarter and responded by booting an inspirational goal, later awarded “goal of the day,” the scores were level on the final siren, which brought the two sides back the following week.     

The Falcons left their form home on replay day, losing by forty three points.

Hasler finished in eighth position in Sandover Medal voting that season, and was considered by many to be one of the best defenders in the league, but State honours weren’t forthcoming due to the lack of an interstate fixture.

Appointed club captain in 1990, he embarked on a twelve month odyssey at the completion of the following season, during which he played in the London Australian Rules competition. Back with the Falcons in 1993, he found he’d lost the passion for top level football, and retired at the end of that season, having played a hundred and eighteen league games.

Hasler went to Scarborough Amateurs under coach Gary Armstrong, and was part of the undefeated 1995 combination.

In 1996, Darren Harris, who had been coaching the reserves as well as playing in the league side, found the workload too much, and coach John Dimmer offered Paul the reserves job.  Seven years later, at the age of thirty eight, he was talked into playing F Grade Amateurs with Stirling, coached by old mate Trevor Green. In 2004 he joined Gavin Bell on the coaching staff of the colts.

East Perth defender “Butch” Baroni, who is now a great mate, is Paul’s nomination as toughest opponent, while Craig Nelson was best team mate. Nelson took it upon himself to become Hasler’s minder early in his career. “Whenever Craig reckoned I’d been unfairly dealt with he’d deal his own retribution,” Paul laughed.

Paul’s father, Lew, was a long time player with Sunday League club, Osborne Park, and was mates with West Perth and Collingwood star Ray Gabelich, so is a Collingwood supporter, an affliction passed on to Paul. Wife Sandy follows Carlton, so there are plenty of blues in the Hasler household during the winter months. The Haslers have two boys, Louis and William, and a daughter, Grace. A salesman with Hallmark Cards, Paul gets to about six or eight home games a year.

Physically strong, and at six foot able to outmark taller forwards on most occasions, a club captain and life member, Paul Hasler was an extremely consistent and talented defender for West Perth and an on field leader during the late eighties and early nineties.