BIO

Wartime competition 1942-1944
Norwood-North games: 14
Norwood-North goals: 21


Neville James Way was born on 16 March 1924 and grew up on the Western Australian goldfields. He attended Goldfields High School where he was nicknamed "Inky" because of his jet black hair. 

After playing in the Goldfields League for Boulder City in 1940 and 1941, he enlisted in the Navy in 1942 and while stationed in Melbourne, played eight games for St Kilda in the VFL.
 
Way first played for Norwood in 1944. A forward/ruckman, he played 14 games in the Norwood-North Adelaide combined team that won the flag in the World War II competition and was adjudged the team's best and fairest for that season.
 
A  regular state player, he kicked seven goals in South Australia's win over Victoria in 1945. He was again prominent in the drawn interstate game against the Victorians the following season and represented the State in the 1947 National Carnival in Hobart.
 
An excellent mark, Way was named at full forward in both the 1946 and 1950 winning Grand Final teams. He was unlucky to miss out on the 1948 premiership after breaking down at training in the week leading up to the Grand Final. He had struggled in the 1948 finals series with shoulder and knee complaints.
 
Way was the leading goal-kicker for Norwood in 1945 with 39 goals and again in 1947 with 49 goals. In 1947 he was also joint runner-up for the Magarey Medal.
 
He studied medicine and after retiring from football at 26, moved to England in 1953 and then to Western Australia.

Neville Way passed away on 13 June 2018 in Western Australia aged 94

R Cialini Nov 2013, Oct 2019