1959 VFA season

Last updated

1959 VFA premiership season
Teams16
Premiers Williamstown
10th premiership
Minor premiers Williamstown
8th minor premiership
←  1958
1960  →

The 1959 Victorian Football Association season was the 78th season of the Australian rules football competition. The premiership was won by the Williamstown Football Club after it defeated Coburg in the Grand Final on 10 October by 35 points. It was Williamstown's tenth premiership, taking it past Footscray to become the club with the most premierships won in VFA history, a title it held until it was passed by Port Melbourne in 1976; it was also the fifth of five premierships won in six seasons between 1954 and 1959, and the club's fourth consecutive minor premiership.

Contents

Association Membership

Prior to 1959, the Prahran Football Club was expelled from the Association for failing to meet the minimum home ground requirements, and was replaced by the Sunshine Football Club. As such, the Association membership numbers remained constant at 16.

Expulsion of Prahran

Throughout its history, the Prahran Football Club had played its home matches at Toorak Oval, which it leased throughout the winter from the City of Prahran. At the time, each Association club played a Seconds match on its home venue on weekends when the firsts team was playing away – the modern practice of playing Seconds games as curtain-raisers to Firsts games was not established until 1980. On 4 March 1959, the Prahran Council announced that it was seeking tenders to let Toorak Oval to a separate sporting body on alternate weekends during winter – such that the Prahran First Sixteen would play its home matches there, and another sport would be played there when the Prahran Firsts were playing away. The Council was primarily seeking to improve its financial return on the venue: it cost the city £2,000 to maintain and operate the ground annually, and it received only £60 from the football club in rent for the entire winter, and the gate takings from Seconds matches were meagre; [1] but, it received comparatively enormous offers of £440 from the Jugoslav United Soccer Team and £660 from the Victorian Rugby Union to lease the ground on alternate Saturdays during winter. [2] This was not the first time that other codes had made attempts to share occupancy of Association venues; in 1954, the Prahran council had turned down an offer of £800 from J.U.S.T. to lease Toorak Oval on alternate weekends, [3] and Hakoah made unsuccessful attempts to share the Camberwell Sports Ground with Camberwell in 1955 and 1956. [4]

The potential to lose access to Toorak Oval for Seconds games was a problem for the Prahran Football Club, because the VFA constitution included a requirement that all clubs' Firsts and Seconds must play their matches on the same home ground on alternate weekends [5] – with the exception of Brighton, which had a decades-long arrangement to share Elsternwick Park with the Elsternwick Amateur Football Club. [6] On 6 March, the Association confirmed that it would expel Prahran if it could not meet these requirements. The Association's hardline approach was based on a slippery slope argument, that allowing one council to seek a more lucrative deal for alternate Saturdays would result in all councils eventually taking the same action; access to better venues would be a fillip for rugby, soccer and other sports which were in direct competition with the Association, and would therefore be detrimental to the Association's long-term popularity and viability. [5]

In two weeks of negotiations, the council offered the Prahran Seconds the use of Como Park, and offered to provide temporary fencing to bring the venue to Association standards; [7] and alternatively suggested that the Prahran Seconds could play a curtain-raiser to the successful bidder – but the Association rejected both suggestions. [2] The Prahran Football Club also increased its own offer to the council from £60 to £175 to lease the ground for the entire winter. [8]

On 16 March, the Prahran Council formally agreed to lease Toorak Oval to the Victorian Rugby Union on alternate Saturdays, and the Association Board of Management unanimously agreed to expel Prahran. [9] The Association made clear that it would welcome Prahran back as soon as it was able to secure a ground for the entire winter, [10] and the club ultimately came to an agreement with the council in October 1959, with rent of £100 per year; as such, Prahran's expulsion lasted only for the 1959 season. Prahran spent the 1959 season in the Metropolitan League, and won its premiership. [11] Permission was given for Prahran's players to be cleared to other clubs in Melbourne, under a gentlemen's agreement that they be cleared back to Prahran when the club was re-admitted to the Association. [12]

Admission of Sunshine

With Prahran expelled from the Association, the Sunshine Football Club lodged an application to replace it. Sunshine's application was first reported on 24 March, [7] and was accepted unanimously by the remaining members of the Association on 27 March. [13] The Association had made overtures to a club based in Sunshine as early as the central ground dispute of 1934, [14] and the club had actively been seeking admission to the Association for the previous eight years. [10]

Sunshine was a large club in a strong growth area of Melbourne's west, which operated two teams in the Metropolitan League and three teams in the Footscray District League and had more than 200 registered players. It was runner-up in the Metropolitan League in 1958. It played its home games at Selwyn Park, which was up to Association standard and had a recently built £20,000 pavilion. [10]

Sunshine's playing uniform in the Metropolitan league consisted of blue and white hoops, identical to Moorabbin's guernsey. The clubs were not drawn to play each other until late in the season, so Sunshine played in its hoops until July, when it switched to a navy blue guernsey with a white yoke, and plain blue socks. [15] [16]

Rule changes

The Association reduced the number of players on the field from eighteen per side to sixteen per side from the 1959 season; the two wingmen were the positions eliminated from the game under the new system. Each team also had two reserve players. [17] The change lasted for 33 seasons; it was not until 1992 that the Association returned to the national standard eighteen-a-side rules. [18] The Association had previously played sixteen-a-side between 1912 and 1918. [19]

Premiership

The home-and-home season was played twenty weeks. As in 1958, the clubs were split into a north-of-the-Yarra section and a south-of-the-Yarra section for the fixturing: in the first fourteen rounds, each club played home-and-home against the other seven clubs in its section; [20] then, each club played against clubs from the opposite section over the final six rounds. [21] The clubs were arranged into a single combined ladder including both northern and southern teams, and the top four clubs then contested a finals series under the Page–McIntyre system to determine the premiers for the season.

Ladder

1959 VFA ladder
TEAMPWLDPFPAPctPTS
1 Williamstown (P)20173021591339161.268
2 Sandringham 20164020641340154.064
3 Oakleigh 20164020211364148.264
4 Coburg 20164019831420139.664
5 Moorabbin 20155020601266162.760
6 Yarraville 20146019601351145.156
7 Mordialloc 20128018781566119.948
8 Port Melbourne 20109118611644113.242
9 Brunswick 20910117461675104.238
10 Box Hill 2081201596162398.332
11 Preston 2081201502196776.432
12 Dandenong 2061401618192184.224
13 Sunshine 2061401329207264.124
14 Northcote 2031701499227665.912
15 Brighton 2021801365219562.28
16 Camberwell 2011901041266339.14
Key: P = Played, W = Won, L = Lost, D = Drawn, PF = Points For, PA = Points Against, Pct = Percentage; (P) = Premiers, PTS = Premiership pointsSource [22]

Finals

Semifinals
Saturday, 12 September Oakleigh 7.14 (56)def. by Coburg 12.11 (83) St Kilda Cricket Ground (crowd: 9,000) [23]
Saturday, 19 September (postponed) Williamstown v Sandringham St Kilda Cricket Ground [24]
Saturday, 26 September Williamstown 11.14 (80)def. Sandringham 7.16 (58) St Kilda Cricket Ground (crowd: 14,000) [25]
Preliminary Final
Saturday, 3 October Sandringham 13.18 (96)def. by Coburg 14.16 (100) St Kilda Cricket Ground (crowd: 22,000) [26]
1959 VFA Grand Final
Saturday, 10 October Williamstown def. Coburg St Kilda Cricket Ground (crowd: 26,000) [27] [28]
2.8 (20)
6.13 (49)
6.14 (50)
 15.21 (111)		Q1
Q2
Q3
 Final		1.1 (7)
5.6 (36)
9.9 (63)
 11.10 (76)		Umpires: Allen
Cullinan 7, Maloney 2, Mazouris 2, Callahan, Evans, R. Jones, Pelly GoalsByron 2, Carr 2, Jordon 2, Shaw 2, Goullet, Huntington, Matthews
InjuriesGleeson (groin)
Cullinan, for striking Bigelow in the third quarterReports

Awards

Notable events

Related Research Articles

Prahran Football Club, nicknamed The Two Blues, is an Australian rules football club based at Toorak Park in Orrong Road between High Street and Malvern Road, Armadale, in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. The club is currently in Division 1 of the Victorian Amateur Football Association (VAFA). The nickname Two Blues comes from the club uniform which has been royal blue and sky blue since the club formed in 1886.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Toorak Park</span>

Toorak Park is a cricket and Australian rules football arena in the Melbourne suburb of Armadale, Victoria, Australia. It is the home ground of the Prahran Football Club and Old Xaverians Football Club of the Victorian Amateur Football Association (VAFA) and Prahran Cricket Club, which plays in the Victorian Premier Cricket competition. The current capacity of the venue is 7,000.

Brighton Football Club was an Australian rules football club which played in the Victorian Football Association (VFA). The club was based in the Melbourne suburb of Brighton, and was nicknamed the Penguins. After suffering financial hardship throughout the 1950s, Brighton moved to Caulfield and became the Caulfield Bears in the early to mid-1960s.

Sunshine Football Club, nicknamed The Crows, was an Australian rules football club which played in the Victorian Football Association (VFA) from 1959 until 1989. The club colours were navy blue and white.

Moorabbin Football Club was the name of two distinct Australian rules football clubs which played in the Victorian Football Association (VFA). The first club, founded in the early 20th century, joined the VFA in 1951 and played there until 1963 with great success; they played home matches at Moorabbin Oval and wore royal blue and white hooped jerseys. The second club played in the VFA from 1983 to 1987.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">1953 VFA season</span>

The 1953 Victorian Football Association season was the 72nd season of the Australian rules football competition. The premiership was won by the Port Melbourne Football Club, after it defeated Yarraville by 60 points in the Grand Final on 3 October. It was Port Melbourne's seventh VFA premiership, and it was the only premiership that the club won during a sequence of eight consecutive Grand Finals played from 1950 until 1957, and five consecutive minor premierships won from 1951 until 1955.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">1954 VFA season</span>

The 1954 Victorian Football Association season was the 73rd season of the Australian rules football competition. The premiership was won by the Williamstown Football Club, after it defeated Port Melbourne by 32 points in the Grand Final on 2 October. It was Williamstown's sixth premiership, and the first of five premierships won in six seasons from 1954 until 1959.

The 1955 Victorian Football Association season was the 74th season of the Australian rules football competition. The premiership was won by the Williamstown Football Club, after it recorded a come-from-behind nine-point victory against Port Melbourne in the Grand Final on 24 September. It was Williamstown's seventh premiership, its second in a row, and the second of five premierships won in six seasons from 1954 until 1959.

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The 1960 Victorian Football Association season was the 79th season of the Australian rules football competition. The premiership was won by the Oakleigh Football Club, after it defeated Sandringham in the Grand Final on 1 October by 60 points. It was Oakleigh's fifth premiership.

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The 1962 Victorian Football Association season was the 81st season of the top division of the Australian rules football competition, and the second season of its second division. The Division 1 premiership was won by the Sandringham Football Club, after it came from behind to defeat Moorabbin in the Grand Final on 29 September by one point; it was Sandringham's second VFA premiership. The Division 2 premiership was won by Dandenong; it was the club's first premiership in either division.

The 1963 Victorian Football Association season was the 82nd season of the top division of the Australian rules football competition, and the third season of its second division. The Division 1 premiership was won by the Moorabbin Football Club, after it defeated Sandringham in the Grand Final on 21 September by 64 points; it was Moorabbin's second and last VFA premiership, before its suspension from the Association prior to the following season. The Division 2 premiership was won by Preston; it was the club's first premiership in either division since joining the Association.

The 1964 Victorian Football Association season was the 83rd season of the top division of the Australian rules football competition, and the fourth season of its second division. The Division 1 premiership was won by the Port Melbourne Football Club, after it defeated Williamstown in the Grand Final on 26 September by 36 points; it was Port Melbourne's 8th VFA premiership. The Division 2 premiership was won by Geelong West, in only its second season in the VFA.

The 1965 Victorian Football Association season was the 84th season of the top division of the Australian rules football competition, and the fifth season of its second division. The Division 1 premiership was won by the Waverley Football Club, after it defeated Port Melbourne in the Grand Final on 26 September by twelve points; it was the first and only premiership ever won by Waverley in either division in its time in the Association, and it came in only its second season in Division 1. The Division 2 premiership was won by Preston; it was the club's second Division 2 premiership in three years, having competed in and been relegated from Division 1 in the intervening year.

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">1970 VFA season</span>

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References

  1. ↑ "Special talks on Toorak Oval". The Sun News-Pictorial. Melbourne, VIC. 5 March 1959. p. 53.
  2. 1 2 "No compromise on lease by VFA". The Sun News-Pictorial. Melbourne, VIC. 12 March 1959. p. 59.
  3. ↑ "Soccer £800 refused". The Argus. Melbourne, VIC. 16 February 1954. p. 15.
  4. ↑ Dave Anderson (15 November 1955). "Two clubs face expulsion from V.F.A.". The Argus. Melbourne, VIC. p. 16.
  5. 1 2 "Prahran must go, if – VFA". The Sun News-Pictorial. Melbourne, VIC. 7 March 1959. p. 55.
  6. ↑ "VFA decision soon on Prahran players". The Sun News-Pictorial. Melbourne, VIC. 18 March 1959. p. 61.
  7. 1 2 "Council's offer gives Prahran new chance". The Sun News-Pictorial. Melbourne, VIC. 24 March 1959. p. 60.
  8. ↑ "Prahran to offer £175 in rent". The Sun News-Pictorial. Melbourne, VIC. 13 March 1959. p. 51.
  9. ↑ "Prahran expelled by VFA". The Sun News-Pictorial. Melbourne, VIC. 17 March 1959. pp. 61, 64.
  10. 1 2 3 "Sunshine is ready for the word 'go'". The Sun News-Pictorial. Melbourne, VIC. 25 March 1959. p. 55.
  11. ↑ "Prahran gets Toorak Oval". The Sun News-Pictorial. Melbourne, VIC. 6 October 1959. p. 52.
  12. ↑ "Sunshine gets 'all clear' from VFA". The Sun News-Pictorial. Melbourne, VIC. 26 March 1959. p. 403.
  13. ↑ "Sunshine coach still awaiting clearance". The Sun News-Pictorial. Melbourne, VIC. 28 March 1959. p. 43.
  14. ↑ "Senior football squabble may help Sunshine". Sunshine Advocate. Sunshine, VIC. 16 February 1934. p. 1.
  15. ↑ Scot Palmer (15 April 1959). "Moorabbin? No, it's Sunshine". The Sun News-Pictorial. Melbourne, VIC. p. 57.
  16. ↑ Scot Palmer (5 June 1959). "Sunshine to lose its hooped look". The Sun News-Pictorial. Melbourne, VIC. p. 59.
  17. ↑ "VFA will play 16 a side". The Sun News-Pictorial. Melbourne, VIC. 17 March 1959. p. 62.
  18. ↑ Phil Cleary (8 April 1992). "VFA goes home to fans". The Sunday Age (Sport Liftout). Melbourne, VIC. p. 18.
  19. ↑ J.W. (3 May 1919). "Football – the opening day". The Australasian. Vol. CVI, no. 2770. Melbourne, VIC. p. 807.
  20. ↑ Scot Palmer (25 May 1959). "Moorabbin stays top – but it had a scare". The Sun News-Pictorial. Melbourne, VIC. p. 34.
  21. ↑ Scot Palmer (3 August 1959). "North sides shocked South in VFA". The Sun News-Pictorial. Melbourne, VIC. p. 40.
  22. 1 2 Scot Palmer (7 September 1959). "Coburg routed in 40-pt. loss". The Sun News-Pictorial. Melbourne, VIC. p. 46.
  23. ↑ Scot Palmer (14 September 1959). "Coburg burst put Oakleigh down". The Sun News-Pictorial. Melbourne, VIC. p. 43.
  24. 1 2 Scot Palmer (21 September 1959). "VFA rivals say "no"". The Sun News-Pictorial. Melbourne, VIC. p. 51.
  25. 1 2 Scot Palmer (28 September 1959). "Williamstown in Grand Final". The Sun News-Pictorial. Melbourne, VIC. p. 43.
  26. 1 2 Scot Palmer (5 October 1959). "Coburg storms way to G. Final". The Sun News-Pictorial. Melbourne, VIC. p. 53.
  27. ↑ Lou Richards (12 October 1959). "Williamstown flew away with the flag". The Sun News-Pictorial. Melbourne, VIC. p. 47.
  28. ↑ Scot Palmer (12 October 1959). "Best since 1884... now for record". The Sun News-Pictorial. Melbourne, VIC. p. 47.
  29. ↑ Scot Palmer (10 September 1959). "Dand'nong winner in Liston". The Sun News-Pictorial. Melbourne, VIC. p. 40.
  30. ↑ "Port got there, but only just". The Sun News-Pictorial. Melbourne, VIC. 12 October 1959. p. 36.
  31. ↑ Scot Palmer (7 September 1959). "A team divided falls!". The Sun News-Pictorial. Melbourne, VIC. p. 46.
  32. ↑ Scot Palmer (16 June 1959). "Brunswick missed far too many "sitters"". The Sun News-Pictorial. Melbourne, VIC. p. 43.
  33. ↑ Scot Palmer (22 June 1959). "Box Hill gets "new look", topples Moorabbin". The Sun News-Pictorial. Melbourne, VIC. p. 34.
  34. ↑ Scot Palmer (23 September 1959). "VFA semi-final at St Kilda". The Sun News-Pictorial. Melbourne, VIC. p. 64.
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