Men: Ian Thorpe
Women: Dawn Fraser

Bernard Tomic for both men and women

Nuh uh. Delly.

If you just go off statistical performance in their chosen sport for the men it has to be Bradman. Then daylight

It's a pretty broad category though. Do people get special consideration for excelling at 2 (or more) different sports?

Nice topic though

For the girls I'd say Betty Cuthbert or Margaret Court (sorry rainbow people)

It wouldn't be Bradman as most of his extraordinary career was before WW2.

Men - Mick Doohan (500cc motorcycles) - World Champion 5 years in a row.

Women - Heather McKay (Squash) - Google and have a look at her record. Just ridiculous.

Men: Jack Charlton (Snooker) Something like 19 world titles.


Women: Layne Beechley. Won many surf titles.

Winx

"He remains the only player to have been world championship runner-up in both snooker and billiards without winning either title."

Southern Joe how about fact checking your posts.



D'Oh!!!

Cathy freeman? Didn't she only win 1 gold medal?

Beachley is a good pick^

Men: Tim Cahill
Women: Layne Beachley

Women, I'd pick from Heather McKay, Betty Cuthbert, Margaret Court, Emma George and Layne Beachley. Probably land for Court. Amazing record - possibly unmatched - across multiple disciplines of tennis. Her win rates are astonishing, pre and post motherhood.

For men, I'd pick from Geoff Hunt, Rod Laver, Ric Charlesworth or Mick Doohan. Again, go with the tennis player and opt for Laver.

Great thread. Some noms:

Men: Mick Doohan, Andrew Gaze, John Eales, Jamie Dwyer, Ian Thorpe.

Women: Lauren Jackson, Margaret Court, Layne Beachley, Steph Gilmore, Shane Gould.

Men:
Dick Thornett would have to be looked at as well, made the aussie team in 3 sports Water Polo(went to Rome 1960 Olympics/Rugby league/rugby union.
Cahill probably not the best in the world ever but club football is different to international football and he has been a talisman in that, he would do better in some better teams e.g. Argentina. Longevity and wider audience appeal there to in tim cahill's favour plus a sport like soccer is so big and popular that it's more competitive in some ways than say surfing, but in saying that to break into surfing is tough or golf or tennis as there's not many spots. Greg Norman's stats are awesome as well. He was world no 1 for along time in a hot field in the 80's and 90's. In his stellar1986 season he led going into the last day of every single golf major, something Jack Nickalous/and Tiger Woods have never achieved..
Love him or hate him anthony mundine has an impressive resume. He was a good ball player to, he would of made NBL...
Mick Dittman was a good jockey and Peter Brock has a good record as does Jack Brabham.. Warney is right up there as is Keith Miller..

Women:
Cathy Freeman has a lot of the stuff Tim Cahill has when measuring success e.g. wider audience appeal and iconic clutch moments.. Shirley Strickland might be best ever aussie athlete she won more track and field golds than any other woman.

Modern day athletes have faced more competition due to larger global populations and people playing the sport which does harm the stats of people like Laver/Makay/Shirley Strickland etc

http://www.smh.com.au/sport/horseracing/pearson-snubbed-as-newspaper-names-horse-as-sportswoman-of-the-year-20121223-2btac.html

Black Caviar was named by this paper as Sportswoman of the year, my comment was in jest.

yes - really good thread and interesting posts

nice to learn some new things about Aussie sport

If you base it on who achieved the highest level against the most opposition, then you'd need to look at participation numbers around the world.

For men, you could make a case for Kewell and Viduka in that case, assuming that soccer has the highest participation numbers, or Gaze.

For women, you would have to consider Liz Ellis and Anne Sargeant in netball, or even one of the Matilda's.

In terms of longevity and dominance, I'd go for Greg Norman just ahead of Thorpey and Lauren Jackson just ahead of Heather Mackay.

In a few years, it may even be Ben Simmons.

Mens:
Grant Kenny has an excellent record, and he was good at 2 sports he won a Bronze in kayaking at the 84 olympics on top of a great Ironman record..
Ken Rosewell has an excellent record and highly impressive longevity stats..

Womens:
Shane Gould's stats were incredible, 3 individual gold medals at 72 olympics all in world record time and she picked up 2 other medals a bronze or silver I think..
Susie O'Neil has a great record..

Ken Catchapole to was a great rugby union player..

WW2 cutoff not withstanding I'd still go with Bradman.

And for women its Court them daylight.
Even to this day, she remains the greatest ever female player in the world. Her Major singles record (M or F) still stands, and her combined record of 64 Major titles is unlikely to ever be broken.

Margaret court and laver's weakness is they played in a less competitive era than today as tennis was less global back then....
Also players only all started coming to the Australian open in 1988 when it moved to the tennis centre, at Kooyong the whole field didn't always turn up eg Bjorg hardly played at the OZ open, Connors and McEnroe missed plenty...