Coleman: The Intro To Hill I'll Never Forget

LEGEND dog man Jimmy Coleman remembers it like it was yesterday.

“Christine and I were at Wentworth Park and this young football bloke called Terry Hill, I think he was 17 then, approached us to train a dog for him,” Coleman said.

“He'd only just got his driver's license but he already had a greyhound.

‘Well, 5am the next day, there is Terry Hill at the front gate of our property, the dog in the car, wanting to know if we had thought about training for him.

“We hadn't even gone down to do our own dogs at that time.”

It was the start of a lifelong friendship between rugby league great Terry and greyhound racing hall of famers Jim and Christine.

Terry Hill's death at 52 robs this industry of one of its best and most loved ambassadors.

As his great mate Shayne Stiff said: “Terry loved greyhound racing even more than rugby league”.

And that is certainly saying something considering he played 264 NRL games, 14 State of Origins and nine Tests.

Jimmy remembers Terry claiming the bitch in the car that morning would be “a super stayer”.

“I took one look at it and said it would be nothing but a speedy squib,” Jimmy said and he was right but 17-year-old Terry learned an immediate lesson.

From then on Jimmy guided his greyhound racing exploits and was behind him buying the great Placard, his National Sprint and Topgun winner and the dog that made Terry a household name in greyhound racing as well.

From that time on, Terry was never without a greyhound. He lived for the industry.

Top flight gallopers like Fast Times, Shall Not, Mr America, Major Major, Golden Night, She's A Hotshot, Came And Went, were just a few he raced with George Kairouz his long-time friend and work mate.

Terry Hill loved the banter of greyhound racing and adored the fact he was the NSW Blues' captain of the greyhound racing State Of Origin team.

He played the role like no other, better than anyone else could.

Whenever he would ring, just to chat pedigrees, and all things greyhound racing, it was rare he would talk rugby league.

His knowledge of greyhounds had been honed since those days when Jimmy and Christine Coleman took him under their wing as a 17-year-old.

Few had as much knowledge.

He could celebrate a victory of any of his dogs with the best of them.

And he copped a solid ribbing whenever Queensland won the annual State Of Origin rugby league clashes.

His insight into that horrid drive in the team bus down the famous Caxton Street leading to the Lang Park cauldron on State Of Origin night, running the gauntlet of Queenslanders coming out of those Caxton Street pubs, was something to be remembered.

But, Terry Hill is someone to be remembered.

He was ever available to be that ambassador for greyhound racing.

He lived for it, and should be remembered for just that, as much as he was for what he did on a rugby league field.