Warwick Hadfield

Warwick John Hadfield OAM is an Australian sports journalist, songwriter, playwright, author and poet. June 2026 will be the 30th anniversary of his first sporting report on ABC Radio National's flagship Breakfast program.

Hadfield was born in Sydney in 1952. He lived and worked there until when in 1989 he moved to Tasmania where he worked with The Mercury newspaper as sports editor, Hydro Tasmania in media and public relations and then the ABC. In 1997, he moved from Tasmania to Geelong when his wife Alison Hadfield took up a senior management role at Deakin University where with Professor Pip Hamilton she helped create and raise the University's research profile. Warwick Hadfield also worked as a consultant to Deakin Research, helping create an industry leading website and working as media adviser to emerging and established researchers.

Before working in the media, and after completing high school at Richmond High School in New South Wales in 1970, Hadfield spent 10 years working in the New South Wales public service, primarily the Petty Sessions Branch of the Justice Department and gaining internal legal qualifications. His love of sport and writing drew Hadfield to working for local Sutherland Shire newspapers and the AAP, covering grade cricket in Sydney.

Hadfield was Geelong Football Club communications manager for three years. In 2022, the song The Old River Knows written by Hadfield and recorded by Lindsay Field, Sam See and Glyn Mason was released.

Hadfield's monograph Never Short of a Word contains a collection of his writings including short stories and poems.

In 2019, Hadfield was awarded OAM for service to broadcast media as a journalist and to the arts, music and the community. Hadfield recently became aware five of his ancestors were aboard ships in The First Fleet; an able seaman, a Royal Marine, and three convicts.

Books Cricket rebels by Chris Harte and Warwick Hadfield, Sydney, QB Books, 1985. Sporting diets by Warwick Hadfield. Sydney, Lilyfield Publishers, 1987. Never short of a word by Warwick Hadfield. Self published, 2012. Sheeds: follow your dreams by Kevin Sheedy with Warwick Hadfield, Melbourne, Crown Content, 2001. The 500 club: footy's greatest coaches by Kevin Sheedy with Warwick Hadfield. Melbourne, News Custom Publishing, 2004. The long march: reflections from a lifetime in football by Kevin Sheedy with Warwick Hadfield. Melbourne, Slattery, 2013.