Known as "Whacka", Graves commenced his footballing in Newcastle, New South Wales and came to the attention of Sydney talent scouts when he scored two tries in his international debut representing Newcastle against a touring British side in 1946.
Graves joined South Sydney in 1947 and after only four first grade games was selected for New South Wales. He formed a strong backline pairing with Clive Churchill and was victorious in Grand Finals with Souths in 1950 (scoring two tries) and in 1951 (scoring four tries).
Graves was appointed captain-coach of Cootamundra in 1954.[3] The team won the Group 9 premiership.[4][5]
Representative career
He debuted for Australia against New Zealand in the 1st Test of 1948, played in the rest of that series and then toured Great Britain with the 1948 Kangaroos. He played in two Tests and twenty tour games returning as the side's top scorer with 16 tries and 35 goals for 188 points.
He represented for Australia in seven Test matches (3 Great Britain, 3 New Zealand and 1 France) between 1948 and 1951. He was selected to represent Sydney against France during their 1951 tour of Australasia in a match that ended in a 19-all draw.
He holds positions 1, 2, 4 and 5 in the table of Most Points in a Match for the Rabbitohs with respectively 29 points (Round 8, 1952 v Easts); 27 points (Round 14, 1949 v Easts); 23 points(Round 18, 1952 v Newtown) and 23 points (Round 10, 1948 v Parramatta).
Along with five other Rabbitohs he has achieved the feat of scoring five tries in a single match (Round 14, 1949 v Easts.)