Vale Peter Diversi

Born 5 April 1932. Passed Away 22 January 2018.

Men of League Foundation number 1639 (Central Coast Branch)

Former Australian lock, Peter Diversi, passed away at Gosford Hospital, aged 85. He had been taken to the hospital after a fall at his Umina nursing home.

Born at Bega on the Far South Coast, Peter was a prominent player in the district as a teenager and represented Group 16 at 18 years of age. A hard tackling lock forward, he joined Western Suburbs in the Illawarra competition for one year in 1951 and then moved to the North Sydney Bears in 1952.

On 17 July 1954, he made his Test debut at the Sydney Cricket Ground when he was called into the side after Mick Croker was dropped following Australia’s 38-21 loss in the second Test of the series at Brisbane. Going into the third Test, the series was locked up at one Test all and Peter played a major role in Australia winning the Ashes. His defence was outstanding, while he also collected one of Australia’s four tries.

A few weeks later, the North Sydney lock was selected to travel to France with the Australian team for the first ever World Cup. He played in all three of Australia’s matches with Great Britain, New Zealand and France and the next year, he played his fifth and final Test against France at the Sydney Cricket Ground on 11 June 1955.

After four seasons and 63 matches with North Sydney, Peter was captain/coach of Gundagai in Maher Cup football during the 1956 and 1957 seasons. He returned to Sydney and joined Manly in 1958 for five seasons. While with Manly he played in the 1959 Grand Final loss to St. George. In his nine seasons of Sydney football, Peter played 130 top grade games, scoring 125 points from 17 tries and 37 goals. He also represented City firsts in two games, NSW in nine matches and Country firsts once, in 1956. He finished his career in 1965 after two seasons with Kurri Kurri in the Newcastle competition. Peter is the uncle of dual Rugby League/Rugby Union Test player, Ray Price.

By Barry Ross