MAX COLLINS - ENTREPRENEUR AND SPORTSMAN



Max attended the Milton State School all his primary school days where he gained a sporting scholarship to Brisbane Grammar School along with another well know Australian Tennis player, namely Roy Emerson. With Max & Roy in the school tennis team they would not have lost too many matches.

In those days you had to be a very top player to get any sort of sponsorship and Max was sponsored by the Bank of New South Wales during his tennis career. Roy Emerson, Mal Anderson, Ken Fletcher just to name a few, were sponsored by Slazenger's and Rod Laver by Dunlop.

In his early working life Max worked for 3 different finance companies, GMAC, AGC, ASL but subsequently bought a sports store in Roma and left Brisbane for some years. He moved back to Brisbane and got into the car business where he was general manger of 13 car yards before owning and operating 3 yards.

He then ventured into the building industry and was running his own building company building approximately 60 houses per year.

Max also found time to manage the Ipswich Tennis Association, which had 21 ant bed courts, while coaching their Junior Association players. He also ran Custom Credit Operation Tennis for John Newcombe and Tony Roche and trained 6 players headed for the overseas tennis circuit, these players were apprenticed to Max as Tennis coaches while they were with him.

Max also spent approximately 10 years overseas as mandate to various entities including Shell Excon doing currency transactions.

The busy lifestyle that Max led, came to a sudden halt when he contracted cancer five years ago and was given 6 weeks to live. He was obviously very sick when first diagnosed with the illness and lost 25Kgs in the first two weeks of his 3 month stay in hospital. Max is now back doing some tennis coaching on a small scale and still trying to replace some of the 25Kgs he lost when he became ill.

Once a month Max meets up with his tennis mates of years gone bye for lunch and when he learned that his squash mates do the same, he now joins them at Fish Lovers Restaurant at Rosalie on the first Wednesday of each month.

Max had an amazing list of sporting achievements, besides his time at the squash club. These are listed below along with his record at the squash club.

Max was a top tennis player both as a junior and open player and represented Queensland in both junior and open tennis, Max told me once the first time he ever ran into Dave Prickett on the tennis court was when Dave beat him in an under 11 State title. Max won about 100 tennis tournaments including Junior and Open singles and doubles events. Some of the top Australian players Max played against and with were Lewis Hoad, Ken Rosewall, Rod Laver, Neale Fraser, Roy Emerson, Ashley Cooper, Mal Anderson, Ken Fletcher just to name a few.

Some of Max's best wins were a win against Roy Emerson in a Queensland Title one year and a good win over Rod Laver in the final of the Rose Bowl tournament, Max won 6-0, 6-1.

Max was runner up to Bob Mark in the final of the 1956 Australian Junior Boys title. Max beat the No 1 seed (Barry Phillips-Moore) in the semi and Bob beat Rod Laver in his semi; Max was also runner up in the Boys double titles that year.

When Max moved to Roma he took up Badminton. He represented Roma in Badminton and won a Queensland State Special doubles title one year. When he was playing Badminton in Roma, he played with and against Paul Finch who he later ran into again at the Boomerang club. In addition to his other exploits, Max played cricket in the Roma district, winning several premierships in country towns in that area. He Captained Roma/Maranoa to win the inaugural Caltex Queensland Shield and when Max returned to Brisbane he captained Western Suburbs B grade for years in the Brisbane competition bringing on the juniors through the grades.

While still at Roma he played Snooker and was successful one year in winning the Roma/Maranoa Club title. When Max returned to Brisbane he played for Moggill United Seniors Soccer club and coached junior teams in the club.

He has also played golf for many years, and over the years has hit 3 holes-in-one, those that play a bit of golf know most of us play all our lives and don't hit one hole-in-one.

Max also had a brief and successful Boxing career. In 1956 Max was called up to do his compulsory national service at Wacol, in those days every 18 year old male had to do 3 months military training, during his time at Wacol there were a couple of other fellows that were in the same Company as Max. One was Joe Williams and the other fellow was a Top Brisbane jockey at the time, his name was Mel Schumacher, who in 1961 won the Melbourne Cup on Baystone.

Max was selected to represent his Company in the Heavyweight Division of the boxing tournament and won the final. A little bird told me that even though the crowd had been warned that there was to be no betting on the results of the fights, a bloke next to Joe Williams said "I have Ten Pounds to say your bloke won't last the first round", of course Joe said "Your On, but we will make it the result of the fight". Joe was Ten Pounds richer after the fight.

Max's on court Squash Record at the club is listed below.



Max's A2 Team in 1974/75 won the Col Brandon Teams Incentive Trophy, His team mates were Frank Hughes, Ray Smith, and John Stirling.

1976. Max was runner up to Ray Kettley in the club championships and also the winner in the senior event in the same year. John Stirling was the runner up.

1976. Max was in the team that won the Queensland State Teams Titles in Townsville, his team mates were Ray Kettley, Nick Jeffrey, Peter Land and Brian King.

1977. The club was again successful in winning the Queensland State Teams Title, members of the winning team that year were Max, Nick Jeffrey, John Smerdon, Ray Kettley and John Beck.

Max won 4 Pennants for the club 3 of them were in A2, which was a great effort as the club only won 5 A2 Men's Pennants in its entire history.

1967/68 Summer C2 Max's team mates were Ray Kettley, Ray Allan, Geoff Gillam and Bob McCormick. Bob claims to this day that the main reason for the team's success was his shrewd decision to drop himself from the final.

1971/72 Summer Season A2 the winning team was Max, Bob Ford, Ray Kettley, John Cameron and Noel Farthing.

1973/74. Summer Season A2. Max's team mates that season were Tom Connor, Mike Lapham, John Stirling and Santo Coco.

1974. Winter Season A2 Max's team mates were John Stirling, Tom Connor & Santo Coco.