Club career Dave Brown started his club career in the
Brisbane Rugby League competition with the
Souths Magpies. In
1981, Brown signed with
Sydney club Eastern Suburbs. Under the coaching of
Bob Fulton, Brown played 41 games for the Roosters in 1981 and
1982 (and was considered unlucky not to be selected for the
1982 Kangaroo tour), before following Fulton to Manly in
1983 where he would win the
1983 Dally M of the year award, though injury kept him out of the Sea Eagles Grand Final team that lost 18–6 to
Parramatta. Brown stayed at Manly for the
1984 season, before once again joining Easts for what would be his last two years of top grade football in Australia. After finishing his career with Easts at the end of the
1986 NSWRL season (after having only played 12 games over the course of
1985 and 1986), Brown ventured to
England where he joined
Hull F.C. in the
1986–87 season. Dave Brown played at in
Hull FC's 24–31 defeat by
Castleford in the
1986 Yorkshire Cup Final during the
1986–87 season at
Headingley,
Leeds on Saturday 11 October 1986. Hull finished the season in 11th place and only two places away from being relegated to the
Second Division. Following the season, Brown returned home to Brisbane. After returning to Australia, Brown played in the
Western Australian Rugby League in
Perth as Captain-coach of the Belmont Steelers in 1988–90.
Representative career Dave Brown made his first representative appearance when he was selected Queensland in a 30–5 loss to
New South wales in 1979. Later that year he was chosen for the
Brisbane Firsts team that played in an
Amco Cup game at
Sydney's
Leichhardt Oval in
1979 against the
Cronulla-Sutherland Sharks, a game Cronulla won 22–5. Brown's teammates at Leichhardt that night included pairing
Mal Meninga and
Chris Close,
Ross Strudwick, Test
John Lang, while on the interchange bench was a young forward named
Wally Lewis. Brown played two State of Residence and ten State of Origin matches for Queensland between 1979 and 1986, scoring his only try for the Maroons in Game 3 of the
1983 State of Origin series at
Lang Park after coming on as a replacement for
Darryl Brohman who had his jaw broken after a sickening elbow from
New South Wales' forward
Les Boyd, a Manly teammate of Brown. Brohman had been widely tipped to make his test debut for Australia in the first Trans-Tasman Test against
New Zealand at
Carlaw Park in
Auckland just three days later, but ironically the spot in the test team went to Brown instead. He played his last game for Queensland in Game 1 of the
1986 State of Origin series at Lang Park, but was dropped after NSW defeated Qld 22–16 in front of 33,066 fans. His standout performances for Queensland in 1983 saw him make the first of 5 test appearances for Australia in the opening test of the 1983 Trans-Tasman series against New Zealand, and would retain his spot for the second game at Lang Park. He then went on to play in the front row in the first two games of
The Ashes series against
Great Britain in 1984, before being relegated to the bench for what would be his final test as Australia defeated Great Britain 20–7 in the final test at the
Sydney Cricket Ground. Australia retained The Ashes with a 3–0 series win over the Lions. ==References==