Research Data gaps + big projects

[Gibbsy]

I thought it might be a good idea to create a thread of the current major data gaps online and whether they are being researched. This should prevent double-handling, and also allow those with connections to the AFL stats guys (Col, SR and so on) to update us on the status of their tasks.

I am limiting this to mostly the VFL/AFL and state leagues. Obviously there is an almost infinite amount of local footy data to be sourced on microfiche over many decades, which a few studious researchers have done over time I'm sure. I have included some of the larger women's football leagues here as well, given the particular focus from AustralianFootball.com on preserving its history, and the importance of doing so given its relative anonymity in mass media.

Match results

League	Competition	Data	Status
AFL	Pre-season consolation series [a.k.a. NAB Challenge / Wizard Regional Challenge]	Match scores 2003–2013	Partially online (2009–2013 available on Wikipedia)
AFL	Official practice matches	Match scores for all years	Not online. Info would exist in newspaper reports, Footystats, some AFL.com.au reports.
AFL	Pre-season series [a.k.a. Ansett Cup / Wizard Cup]	Qtr-by-qtr scores 2000–2002	Not online. Final scores and other match data available on Wikipedia. The only gap in the AFL pre-season on AF.com, potentially due to the confusing 'group ladders' not being able to be displayed properly.
VFL (AFL)	Reserves premiership season [a.k.a. VJFL / VFL seconds / VFL reserves / VSFL / AFL reserves]	Match scores 1919–1979	Not online. I believe this has been in the AF.com pipeline for a few years, but not sure if they have the data ready to go and need to input, or still need to research. A smattering of scores from 1919–1925 are available on WP.
VFL/AFL	Under-19s competition [a.k.a. VFL thirds / VFL under-19s / AFL under-19s]	Match scores for all years	Not online. A smattering of scores from 1946–1950 and 1991 are available on WP. Not sure where AF.com are at in terms of research or data. I'd be interested in researching this if it doesn't already exist.
SAFA	Premiership season	Qtr-by-qtr scores 1877–1889	Not online. Final scores and other match data available on Wikipedia.
SANFL (etc.)	Reserves premiership season	Match scores 1906–2007	Not online. Info would probably exist in SA Football Budget and newspaper reports.
SANFL	Under-19s premiership season	Match scores for all years	Not online. Competition existed from 1937–2008. Info would probably exist in SA Football Budget and newspaper reports.
VFA	Reserves premiership season [a.k.a. VJFA / VFA seconds / VFA reserves]	Match scores for all years	Not online. Competition existed from 1928–1995.
TFL (etc.)	Premiership season	Match scores 1879–1940	Not online.
TAC Cup	Premiership season	Match scores 1994–1999	Not online. Info is available in Football Records.
QAFL (etc.)	Premiership season	Match scores 1904–2010	Not online. Scores from 2011–2013 exist on "Gameday" but nowhere else.
NTFL	Premiership season	Match scores 1916/17–2009/10	Not online.
NSWAFL (etc.)	Premiership season	Match scores 1903–2002	Not online. Scores from 2003–2016 exist on "Gameday" but nowhere else.
ACTAFL (etc.)	Premiership season	Match scores 1924–2010	Not online.
VWFL	Premiership season	Match scores 1981–2007	Not online. Scores from 2008–2016 exist on "Gameday" but nowhere else. May be harder to track down than men's leagues given limited newspaper coverage.
WAWFL	Premiership season	Match scores 1988–2015	Not online. Scores from 2016–2018 exist on "Gameday" but nowhere else.
SAWFL	Premiership season	Match scores 1991–2012; 2014	Not online. Scores from 2013 & 2015–2016 exist on "Gameday" but nowhere else.

Statistical data

League	Competition	Data	Status
VFL (AFL)	Premiership season	Behind kickers 1897–1964	Not online. Supposedly Col at the AFL has data back to 1930 but is unpublished.
VFL (AFL)	Premiership season	19th and 20th man usage for all years	Not online. Data exists in match reports; almost all newspapers mention if a player was replaced, what for, and at what stage. Reserve players existed from 1930–1977.

I'm sure there is more that will come to me when I think of it.

Researchers – feel free to post your current projects in here, no matter how niche!

 

[Gibbsy]

Tagging in a bunch of contributors (if I missed you, I'm sorry! It's nothing personal!)

Supermercado 35Daicos Oliver G stemline rbartlett killer MortlockWatcher RedmanWasHere Connor7395 Mobbs ThePope Michael Riley

 

[Gibbsy]

More tags for some of our finest: *Paul* Snidely Whiplash Rainier Wolfcastle emuboy RogersResults waflfootyfacts australianfootball worbod Todman Gibbke mianfei the croucher GreyCrow WhiteHartLane23

 

[Mobbs]

Make sure you have Toucan Soup in your gunsights. Does massive work collecting scores from QAFL iterations over the years.

 

[killer]

Plenty of stuff sitting in a pile at the top of the cupboard

 

[MortlockWatcher]

WAWFL came under the umbrella of the Perth Football League around 2019.

Of late, I have been working on a series of statistical history books for various country leagues around Western Australia. The first one (Goldfields) will hopefully be out in the next six weeks or so and eventually there will be around a dozen in the series released over the next two years or so.

I also have two other projects that are about 90% completed - the AFC night series between 1979 and 1986 (I need to make a visit to the State Library of Victoria to check some newspaper articles and books before I can finish off the last chapter) and also one on the 1981 VFA season, which proved to be the last season before the competition started to unravel before its demise just over a decade later.

 

[RedmanWasHere]

Thanks Gibbsy.

Something I'm currently working on is the round by round games of the SANFL seasons dating back to 1897.

Using AustralianFootball.com as my website to access, I've manually gone through 1897-1906 and calculated each round in my head and having these findings as somewhat of an idea as to each round's total goals and behinds plus total score per round and what that round's average score is.

There might be some numeral differences I'm unaware of but think of the total scores per round as guides.

For the purposes of documentation, I'm treating the finals series and the GF as if they were rounds.

 

[RedmanWasHere]

Forgot to add.

I am doing it all on Ultra Office Calc which is a free Windows suite alternative.

 

[RedmanWasHere]

I am not sure how to approach the pre-1897 seasons of the SANFL though.

Once I've done that, I'll move on to the VFA/VFL from 1897-present.

When that happens, I don't know.

 

[RedmanWasHere]

1897 SANFL season.

As follows:

Season.
Round.
Teams played per round.
Total goals.
Total behinds.
Total points.
Average score of each round.

1897​	R01​	6​	39​	46​	280​	46.6666666666667​
1897​	R02​	6​	41​	55​	301​	50.1666666666667​
1897​	R03​	6​	21​	42​	168​	28​
1897​	R04​	4​	39​	58​	292​	73​
1897​	R05​	4​	18​	18​	126​	31.5​
1897​	R06​	2​	6​	15​	51​	25.5​
1897​	R07​	6​	31​	47​	233​	38.8333333333333​
1897​	R08​	4​	14​	39​	123​	30.75​
1897​	R09​	6​	25​	38​	188​	31.3333333333333​
1897​	R10​	4​	37​	38​	260​	65​
1897​	R11​	6​	22​	38​	170​	28.3333333333333​
1897​	R12​	4​	24​	31​	175​	43.75​
1897​	R13​	2​	6​	17​	53​	26.5​
1897​	R14​	6​	34​	43​	247​	41.1666666666667​
1897​	R15​	6​	36​	47​	263​	43.8333333333333​
1897​	R16​	2​	12​	24​	96​	48​
1897​	R17​	2​	19​	19​	133​	66.5​
1897​	R18​	6​	40​	46​	286​	47.6666666666667​
1897​	R19​	4​	8​	15​	63​	15.75​
1897​	R20​	2​	4​	12​	36​	18​
1897​	R21​	2​	9​	13​	67​	33.5​

If there are forfeitures, I won't count that towards the round's score.

Game cancellations like the AFL's Adelaide vs Geelong R14 game from 2015 likewise.

 

[Oliver G]

Thanks Gibbsy.

My next big project will be the VWFL, I've got a couple of leads, but it looks like it will be tough, especially for those early years.

 

[Gibbsy]

Thanks Gibbsy.

My next big project will be the VWFL, I've got a couple of leads, but it looks like it will be tough, especially for those early years.

No doubt. I’m guessing the only hope is annual reports?

Btw, I’ve made good headway on practice / regional matches tonight.

Have sourced qtr-by-qtr / dates & times / venues and crowds for all matches between 2002 and 2006 so far.

Labour of love, but have used a combination of Footystats Diary, Austadiums, ProQuest, and NewsBank

 

[Toucan Soup]

Huge props to Mobbs for tagging me in this thread.
Gibbsy in reply to your opening post, the QAFL (and various iterations) Results from 1904 to present have all been recorded now. Depending upon the perspective you want to take, there have been 8,452 results identified and recorded up until the end of last season. Of those, there are only approx 30 games where no scores could be found (although using the ladders and a reductive process, those results could be figured out where required).
There is always more information to find - but I simply don't think it has been recorded up here, so cannot be rediscovered. At the very least, as a base level, I wanted to get Results sorted out - and that has been done.

The next rung down, I also want to find and record results for the SQAFA/BAFL Division 1 1970 - 2005 (close to being done), SQAFA/BAFL Division 2 (very patchy), and the Gold Coast (pre-2000) and Sunshine Coast (pre-1994) Leagues (not even commenced). If anyone has records of those competitions, I would be rapt to hear from them.

 

[rbartlett]

Thanks for the tag.
Current projects working on are :

All Richmond Reserves players 1919 - Current Day = 95% complete. Missing around 200 first names.
Richmond behind kickers 1908-1950
RFC chronology, day by day, indepth: 1885 - circa 1955
Jack Dyer chronology 1930(pre Richmond) - 1949

 

[Bassoon]

Hi All. Some of the things I have been working on:

VFL Reserves (missing a couple of St.Kiilda v Collingwood results from the 20s).
VFL Under 19s except for 1946 and 1948 results. The Sun has the 1947 details, and 1949 onwards.
TFL and various iterations
VFA results and goalkickers including the missing Second Division quarter by quarter scores from 1961 to 1964 (sourced from the Sun).
NSW AFL - all results sourced from NSW papers, and old Football Records. Elitetograssroots have the majority of these scores online as well.
ACTAFL results up to 1995
TAC Results

Alot of my research came from downloading old newspapers (the Argus, Australasian, Age, Sportsman, Herald, etc. etc.) and collating the football pages into seperate PDF Files for easier research. I also have done the same for the Football Record.

How can we share all the information and results we have - is it possible to put these all in one place? I'm more than happy to share the results of my research - indeed, I would like to get this to the general public, but I don't have a web site (sosts too much money to set up).

 

[RedmanWasHere]

I know I've probably gone early with my SANFL findings but can we paste our findings here?

 

[Bassoon]

Is this what you mean Redman?

 

[RedmanWasHere]

Is this what you mean Redman?

BINGO!

However, I've omitted the teams involved and have placed sole emphases on the totals and averages per round per season.

 

[Gibbsy]

Hi All. Some of the things I have been working on:

VFL Reserves (missing a couple of St.Kiilda v Collingwood results from the 20s).
VFL Under 19s except for 1946 and 1948 results. The Sun has the 1947 details, and 1949 onwards.
TFL and various iterations
VFA results and goalkickers including the missing Second Division quarter by quarter scores from 1961 to 1964 (sourced from the Sun).
NSW AFL - all results sourced from NSW papers, and old Football Records. Elitetograssroots have the majority of these scores online as well.
ACTAFL results up to 1995
TAC Results

Alot of my research came from downloading old newspapers (the Argus, Australasian, Age, Sportsman, Herald, etc. etc.) and collating the football pages into seperate PDF Files for easier research. I also have done the same for the Football Record.

How can we share all the information and results we have - is it possible to put these all in one place? I'm more than happy to share the results of my research - indeed, I would like to get this to the general public, but I don't have a web site (sosts too much money to set up).

Wonderful!

I would think Oliver G and the AustralianFootball.com team are the best people to get this data to

 

[35Daicos]

Hi All. Some of the things I have been working on:

VFL Reserves (missing a couple of St.Kilda v Collingwood results from the 20s).
VFL Under 19s except for 1946 and 1948 results. The Sun has the 1947 details, and 1949 onwards.
TFL and various iterations
VFA results and goalkickers including the missing Second Division quarter by quarter scores from 1961 to 1964 (sourced from the Sun).
NSW AFL - all results sourced from NSW papers, and old Football Records. Elitetograssroots have the majority of these scores online as well.
ACTAFL results up to 1995
TAC Results

Alot of my research came from downloading old newspapers (the Argus, Australasian, Age, Sportsman, Herald, etc. etc.) and collating the football pages into seperate PDF Files for easier research. I also have done the same for the Football Record.

How can we share all the information and results we have - is it possible to put these all in one place? I'm more than happy to share the results of my research - indeed, I would like to get this to the general public, but I don't have a web site (sosts too much money to set up).

Which games are you missing?

 

[worbod]

Is this what you mean Redman?

Are you aware the years on this database are not matching all the way up to 1929? What I mean is when the database is opened it is clear when reading column B that the first season is 1910. But the exact dates each round was played, as listed in column D, have the year 2010 instead of 1910. This continues all the way to 1929/2029.

 

[Gibbsy]

Are you aware the years on this database are not matching all the way up to 1929? What I mean is when the database is opened it is clear when reading column B that the first season is 1910. But the exact dates each round was played, as listed in column D, have the year 2010 instead of 1910. This continues all the way to 1929/2029.

I assume that is an input error caused by using a two-digit year instead of a four-digit year, and the program defaults to the 20xx years as it presumes that to be more likely

 

[Bassoon]

Hi Gibbsy

Yes it is. Collated some years ago.

Heres more with the same issue with dates. Reserves and Under 19s.

 

[Gibbsy]

Hi Gibbsy

Yes it is. Collated some years ago.

Heres more with the same issue with dates. Reserves and Under 19s.

Outstanding work!!

As far as I can tell, the only hurdle to inputting that data into AustralianFootball.com right now (apart from the obvious being time required) would be that the results are all listed with the victors first, and as such the home team and venue are therefore unknown. There isn't currently a mechanism to select an 'unknown' home/away team, unfortunately.

One of the downfalls of transcribing from the 'back pages' of newspapers – particular in country and metro leagues where you would often just get team name abbreviations and the goals/behinds tally – is that the victor is always listed first, and therefore the only way you can know for sure who the home team was is by finding a pre-season fixture list, or better yet, a primary source for each week. For instance, I have all the results for my local league going back to its inception (1971), but don't have the home teams and venues for anything pre-2000, hence the data remains 'offline' for now.

Hopefully when AF 2.0 comes along (whenever that may be), this issue can be alleviated and we can get more scores up over time. I know Oliver G is crossing his fingers that that may be sooner rather than later!

 

[Supermercado]

VFL/AFL related:

• Reserves/Seconds team lists (both selected sides and late changes) - irregularly published in newspapers
• Thirds/Under 19s team lists - almost never published except for finals.
• Reserves/Under 19s tribunal results - From the 1970s onwards the reports are usually shown via Inside Football or in the papers but the outcomes aren't recorded unless the result is spicy enough to be reported in the papers. I asked the AFL about this several years ago and was told they don't have these records.
• Pretty much anything about the Fourths - including match scores, ladders, player lists, awards.

Specifically MFC related:

• Full names of all pre-VFL players
• Full names of trialists, non-senior players etc... (1890s - 1920s, 1930s-1940s, 1950s-1990s)
• Player photos
• Clubs of origin