Personal information | |||
---|---|---|---|
Full name | Ivan Alexander Walsh | ||
Date of birth | 29 December 1924 | ||
Place of birth | Dunedin, New Zealand | ||
Date of death | 12 May 2005 | (aged 80)||
Place of death | Dunedin, New Zealand | ||
Position(s) | Forward | ||
Senior career* | |||
Years | Team | Apps | (Gls) |
Northern | |||
International career | |||
1951 | New Zealand | 4 | (4) |
*Club domestic league appearances and goals |
Ivan Alexander Walsh (29 December 1924 – 12 May 2005) was an association football player who represented New Zealand at international level as a forward.[1]
Walsh was born at Dunedin in 1924 and was educated at the Christian Brothers School in the city.[2][3] He played soccer for the Northern Club in the city and by 1948 was playing for the Otago representative side.[4][5]
Walsh scored on his full New Zealand debut in a 6–4 win over New Caledonia on 22 September 1951[6] and ended his international playing career with four official A-international caps and four goals to his credit,[1][7] scoring a hat-trick in his final appearance, a 9–0 win over New Hebrides on 4 October 1951.[6]
As well as soccer, Walsh also played cricket at a representative level. A right-arm medium paced bowler, he played for the North East Valley club in Dunedin alongside his brother Brian.[8][9] Considered "one of the most promising medium-paced bowlers" that Otago had "had for some years" with "exceptional promise",[10] he played three times for the Otago representative side in the Plunket Shield.[11] He made his debut for the side in January 1949, opening the bowling and taking seven wickets, including a five-wicket haul in the first innings, against Wellington at Carisbrook.[9][12][13]
The Otago Daily Times felt that he was the "find of the match"[10] and it was expected that he would become one of the "mainstays" of the Otago side in future seasons.[9] After taking seven wickets against Southland in a non-first-class match in December 1949, Walsh was included in the Otago side for the season's Shield matches in 1949–50.[14] He played in the first two matches but took only one wicket and was left out of the side for the final Shield match of the season against Canterbury.[11][15] He was not selected in the Otago practice squad later in the season and did not regain his place in the side in future seasons.[16]
Walsh worked as a teacher.[2] He died at Dunedin in 2005 aged 80.[3][13] Obituaries were published in the 2005 New Zealand Cricket Almanack and in the 2006 edition of Wisden Cricketers' Almanack.[2]