Proposal to include premierships dating back to 1870 gathering pace

[Goggin Our Best]

The difference is that, unlike the logic used by Colin Carter, Dogs fans are not trying to represent that Essendon didn't win the 1924 VFL/AFL Premiership, however you want to interpret the meaning of a subsequent game.

We understand that Essendon were clearly the premier team of the 1924 VFL season.

There was no premier team of the 1896 VFL season, because it did not exist.

I wasnt saying that the VFA Flags should be counted

I just thought what i posted was interesting in the fact that in 1924 the VFA Premier defeated the VFL Premier in a play off game

Where as you could fast forward to say the early 1970s when the VFA comp was quite reasonble however a VFL Premier at that time would beat the VFA Premier by about 15 goals , flog them

Thus probably from the 1920s and going back from their its pretty mushy as to who were the champion teams

 

[threenewpadlocks]

I wasnt saying that the VFA Flags should be counted

I just thought what i posted was interesting in the fact that in 1924 the VFA Premier defeated the VFL Premier in a play off game

Where as you could fast forward to say the early 1970s when the VFA comp was quite reasonble however a VFL Premier at that time would beat the VFA Premier by about 15 goals , flog them

Thus probably from the 1920s and going back from their its pretty mushy as to who were the champion teams

Yeah, there's lots of interesting nuggets of footy history that get lost if you just view footy history through the eyes of just the VFL/AFL competition alone.

For example Port Adelaide won the 1914 SANFL flag undefeated, then defeated the rest of the competition put together in a team, then defeated Carlton, the VFL premiers of that season.

It's recognised by Port fans but it can be argued it's not recognised in the wider football context.

It's inarguable that the Australian Football Hall of Fame has a clear both Victorian and post-TV, mid 50's bias and doesn't do a very good job of what it's meant to do. It is an Australian Football Hall of Fame, not an VFL/AFL Hall of Fame.

Broadly speaking I can empathise and agree with Carter on the broad view that footy history, even in the context of wanting to examine the highest-quality Victorian or Australian football in a given point in time, is too often reduced to a competition that specifically began in 1897. Games like the Footscray vs. Essendon game, the Port Adelaide vs. Carlton game, or interstate carnival fixtures (which are forgotten in history but were big deals at the time, a mini world-cup of sorts for footy) are all interesting and bigger deals but forgotten.

Carter's book "Football's forgotten heroes" is a good title.
His subtitle "reclaiming the AFL competition's earliest years - 1870 to 1896" is an incredibly bad and flawed one.

There's no competition to reclaim. That competition still has a history that lasts to this day. Teams such as Port Melbourne and Williamston played in that competition in that period and now play in the same, evolved competition in 2024.

 

[peetoo]

Indeed given the increasingly difficult situation being in the 2.5 level competition, Port Melbourne Williamstown and a couple of other are to be admired