The 1970s – 1980s

It was 1973 in Alice Springs. The town had only recently become a municipality and appointed its first council. AFL football was the town’s biggest sport and drew crowds of around 2000 people each Sunday, which was a real family affair.

Some players from the Federal Football Club started volunteering their time after work, and at the weekends, to help build their own sport’s club for the east side of town. 

Greg Neck was just one of those footballers who donated his time to build the club.

“Geoff Hewitt, an electrician in town, certainly did a heck of a lot of coordinating. I was a labourer and, at the end of the day after we finished work, we’d go down and meet him and lay bricks...on the weekends we’d pick-up supplies to take down there for the builders to complete their work during the week.”

Greg Neck recalled that building their own club to go back to after a game was pretty special.

“At that stage, all you had was what is now the Gillen Club – that was called West’s Sporting Club. So Eastside and West’s were really the only sporting clubs with their own facilities to go back to.”

The Feds spirit of volunteering didn’t stop with just the construction of their club. Everyone lent a hand to ensure they had a place to go to celebrate their wins and commiserate their losses.

“Club Eastside was our main base every Sunday – we’d be there to either celebrate a win or a loss and had a lot of fun. Some of the footballers would get in and volunteer behind the bar and help out. It was very community minded.”

Greg recalls some great memories of being at the club with his growing family during his 12 years as a footballer.

“I remember my wife and I would take the kids back to the club on a Sunday night, some of them in bassinets. I remember we went back there after we won the grand final in 1974...we didn’t win another one until about 2012, so that’s a top memory.”

The 1990s – today

As a football club, Feds was struggling to maintain Club Eastside and didn’t have the cash flow to make improvements to it. The 70s until the early 90s saw it run as a mob of volunteers and propped up by devoted locals, like Greg Neck’s father. Sadly, it was never going to survive in that way.

Greg recalls that the club was eventually sold in the late 1990s. 

“The new owners put a lot of money into the club to improve its facilities, make the bars a lot bigger, and make it a real family venue by putting in playground equipment for kids.”

Today, Club Eastside exists to support its founding clubs: The Federal football club, netball club, cricket club, and Red Centre Devils rugby club. It offers all the services one could want in a community sports club, including an indoor function space, outdoor entertainment area, a great selection of dine-in pub meals, and members pricing for food and drinks. 

For locals like Greg, Club Eastside’s history makes it an important part of Alice Springs.