The 1910 VFL season was the 14th season of the Victorian Football League (VFL), the highest-level senior Australian rules football competition in Victoria. The season featured ten clubs and ran from 30 April to 1 October, comprising an 18-match home-and-away season followed by a four-week finals series featuring the top four clubs.
In 1910, the VFL competition comprised ten teams of 18 on-the-field players each, with no "reserves", although any of the 18 players who had left the playing field for any reason could later resume their place on the field at any time during the match.
Each team played each other twice in a home-and-away season of 18 rounds.
Once the 18 round home-and-away season had finished, the 1910 VFL Premiers were determined by the specific format and conventions of the amended "Argus system".
Rules for classification: 1. premiership points; 2. percentage; 3. points for Average score: 54.1 Source: AFL Tables
Finals series
All of the 1910 finals were played at the MCG so the home team in the semi-finals and Preliminary Final is purely the higher ranked team from the ladder but in the Grand Final the home team was the team that won the Preliminary Final.
In the last quarter of the round 4 match between Carlton and South Melbourne, Carlton's George Topping coward-hit South Melbourne's Bert Streckfuss behind the play, causing spectators to jump the fence and participate in an all-in melee with players and officials. Topping was suspended for the remainder of 1910 and all of 1911 as a result of the incident.[1]
VFL conducted an inquiry into allegations that particular players from Carlton, Fitzroy, Melbourne, and South Melbourne had been paid to play "dead". In particular, Carlton'sDoug Gillespie, Alex "Bongo" Lang, and Doug Fraser were investigated (the inquiry dealt with Lang and Fraser behind closed doors). Gillespie was exonerated, while Lang and Fraser were each suspended for five years.[1]
St Kilda, after losing its first seventeen games, defeated minor premier Carlton in a major upset in the last round to avoid its expected fifth winless season. It remains the worst start by a VFL/AFL team that did not finish winless, equalled in 2001 by Fremantle.
Carlton player and Secretary Arthur Charles "Shooter" Ford was charged with abusing and physically threatening the field umpire (off the field) after Carlton's round 14 match against Fitzroy; Ford was suspended for 12 months and debarred from his role as Club Secretary.[1] There was speculation that the issue between the two was connected with the suspension of George Topping earlier in the season.
T.W Sherrin manufactured special footballs for the Premiership Finals.[1]
Known as the Victorian Football League from 1897–1989; no grand finals were held in 1897 and 1924
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