The SANFL didn't compare to the VFL back in the day

[Ford Fairlane]

Talking of the North players who dished it out a bit, Michael Parsons (RIP) was another one who fired up in a few of North's grand finals in the mid 80's against Glenelg.

John Riley, Klomp, Sims and Antrobus were probably the worst offenders though.

Wrong Riley. John Riley split atoms, Stephen Riley split heads.

 

[charcolechaddy]

Talking of the North players who dished it out a bit, Michael Parsons (RIP) was another one who fired up in a few of North's grand finals in the mid 80's against Glenelg.

John Riley, Klomp, Sims and Antrobus were probably the worst offenders though.

Wasn't it Steven riley, two brothers the grey haired one was a rocket scientist , imagine the conversations between him and Dietrich.

 

[mianfei]

The SANFL and WAFL weren't quite up to the standard of the VFL in the 1970's and 80's, but the difference was not significant. Nowhere near like comparing the current SANFL and AFL.

I don't think anyone here is saying the SANFL was better but the top players in our league were every bit as good as what was on show in the VFL.

There is no doubt about that: at least via Greg Phillips’ amazing display in the 1989 SANFL Grand Final one can see that the top players were up to AFL standard until the admission of the Crows. If Brereton and Dunstall had played on that defence they would probably have been held goalless between them. The Port Adelaide of 1989 is quite clearly the last time any team in the state competitions was up to the standard of the VFL/AFL (curiously, just as the name was changed!). Phillips, of course, was a former player with Collingwood but I cannot believe he ever played as well at Victoria Park as he did there.

The VFL had, however, clearly been the competition with the highest overall standard since at least the 1930s, because of the large financial patronage available to its top clubs and later, though having the ground with the largest capacity in the largest “football” city. However, it was not until country zoning increased the value of interstate players that the VFL began to attract the majority of top players from the SANFL and WAFL, and it took interstate expansion to complete this totally.

 

[Dalphonso]

There is no doubt about that: at least via Greg Phillips’ amazing display in the 1989 SANFL Grand Final one can see that the top players were up to AFL standard until the admission of the Crows. If Brereton and Dunstall had played on that defence they would probably have been held goalless between them. The Port Adelaide of 1989 is quite clearly the last time any team in the state competitions was up to the standard of the VFL/AFL (curiously, just as the name was changed!). Phillips, of course, was a former player with Collingwood but I cannot believe he ever played as well at Victoria Park as he did there.

The VFL had, however, clearly been the competition with the highest overall standard since at least the 1930s, because of the large financial patronage available to its top clubs and later, though having the ground with the largest capacity in the largest “football” city. However, it was not until country zoning increased the value of interstate players that the VFL began to attract the majority of top players from the SANFL and WAFL, and it took interstate expansion to complete this totally.

I could argue here a little but I doubt it would make any difference.
Greg Phillips was a very very good footballer at Collingwood but he never dominated like he did in the SANFL due to the superior opposition in the VFL.
Port were the Manchester United of the SANFL.
They had the best players and were the best run team.
After them everything fell away to virtually hopeless down the bottom.So hopeless were some clubs that teams in Mt Gambier would have beaten them.

 

[Ebert80]

Not sure that the Mt Gambier teams would have beaten them, but there were probably 2 clubs who towards the end of the 1980's who were very poor - South in 1988, and Sturt for a few years from 1989.

But other clubs at that time were quite strong - North, Glenelg, Norwood in particular.

Again, no one is saying the SANFL was stronger than the AFL, but the gap in standard was not as massive, as you like to tell us.

 

[Dalphonso]

Not sure that the Mt Gambier teams would have beaten them, but there were probably 2 clubs who towards the end of the 1980's who were very poor - South in 1988, and Sturt for a few years from 1989.

But other clubs at that time were quite strong - North, Glenelg, Norwood in particular.

Again, no one is saying the SANFL was stronger than the AFL, but the gap in standard was not as massive, as you like to tell us.

No! You like to misquote me.
To begin with you don't know the difference betwen the VFL and the AFL so it is pointless trying to argue with the uneducated.
The gap in standard in lets say 1975 was not that great but an SANFL side probably had 3 top class footballers wheras a VFL side probably had 8-10 of roughly the same ability.
Why can't people fathom this?
It is not rocket surgery!

 

[tribey]

I could argue here a little but I doubt it would make any difference.
Greg Phillips was a very very good footballer at Collingwood but he never dominated like he did in the SANFL due to the superior opposition in the VFL.
Port were the Manchester United of the SANFL.
They had the best players and were the best run team.
After them everything fell away to virtually hopeless down the bottom.So hopeless were some clubs that teams in Mt Gambier would have beaten them.

Port = Ajax Amsterdam

 

[scalives]

The trouble is you old blokes are just pig ignorant.
Watch a replay of any SANFL Grand Final from the 70's and early to mid 80's and compare them with video's of the VFL Grand Finals during that same period and then you come back and tell us young fellers(I am 46 on the 15th July}What the better standard of football was and who had more A grade players on each side?
The trouble is you old blokes continually let the very young falsely believe that the SANFL was the equievalant of the VFL when you are sadly misquided and view only from a parochial South Australian perspective.

The VFL was a better comp because it had a Lot of SA and WA players in it. As soon as State of origin started we saw the eveness of the players.

 

[Boston tiger]

Victoria has over 3 and a half times the population of South Australia. Both football mad.
Is it even an argument which league was the strongest.
Money crowds professionalism etc.

 

[Fanster56]

I think in the 70s the VFL was slightly ahead of SA and WA, but not by as much as it should have been, given Victoria's greater population and wealth and ability to attract interstate recruits.

The best club sides in SA and WA could more than hold their own against VFL teams and in my opinion it's a shame that these clubs (apart from Port) never got the chance to play in the AFL and we instead ended up with ridiculous composite "franchise" teams.

But of course history is written by the victors and the quality of SA and WA football in that era must be tarnished and diminished by propaganda at every opportunity to ensure that history is rewritten to suit the AFL's revisionist agenda.

I basically agree with this. I can recall reading an interview with Gary Hardeman, an excellent footballer for Melbourne who transferred to Sturt in the late 1970s (played 44 SANFL games between 1978 and 1980). Can't lay my hands on the precise source unfortunately, but I'm 99% sure it was in a SA Footy Budget. Asked how he would describe the difference between the VFL and SANFL teams of that period he said that the better SANFL teams had probably 14-15 players of "VFL standard". If you examine the records of matches between VFL and SANFL clubs (Escort Cup, pre-season trial games etc.) during the mid to late '70s Hardeman's assessment is borne out in that the SA clubs tended to win about 30-35% of the time.

 

[JimmyBeerCans]

Blight & Carmen are another two that have said the step up wasn't what it was cracked up to be but I guess they were rare natural talents I've only seen the old footage of them, seen it raised before and shot down by the "Davies couldn't get a kick but went back to the sanfl and kicked eleventy thousand goals or Phillips was just an average VFL performer" brigade.

 

[1954]

Difference in population aside, people need to take into account the VFL clubs were taking the best Tassie players way back in the early to mid 60's, a decade or more before they began to sign the best from WA, and later SA.

Tassie was virtually a kindergarten for the VFL clubs - Baldock, Hart, Hudson and Howell are just a few that made the move across bass strait, and they were all champion players.
There was also a centreman who won two brownlows in the early 60's, one with the saints, and the other at the tiggers, but I can't think of his name.

 

[mic59]

Blight & Carmen.........

Wasn't he the one who used to play wearing a hat made out of fruit?

 

[70sDinosaur]

Difference in population aside, people need to take into account the VFL clubs were taking the best Tassie players way back in the early to mid 60's, a decade or more before they began to sign the best from WA, and later SA.

Tassie was virtually a kindergarten for the VFL clubs - Baldock, Hart, Hudson and Howell are just a few that made the move across bass strait, and they were all champion players.
There was also a centreman who won two brownlows in the early 60's, one with the saints, and the other at the tiggers, but I can't think of his name.

Ian Stewart?

 

[1954]

Ian Stewart?

That's the bloke.

 

[mianfei]

The VFL was a better comp because it had a Lot of SA and WA players in it. As soon as State of origin started we saw the eveness of the players.

That’s very true: the WA and SA Origin teams were often more than a match for the Victorians, in spite of the fact that Victoria possessed a considerably larger population.

However, I should note that in the period when the VFL began taking players for South Australia and Western Australia, two closely related demographic problems both explain the relative poverty of Victoria’s Origin teams and why they began looking interstate:

1. During the Menzies Era, the government encouraged large-scale immigration – mostly of Southern and Eastern Europeans who knew only soccer and could never develop interest in Australian Rules upon immigrating or bearing children. These migrants settled in the inner city and served to decimate the support bases of Fitzroy, South Melbourne, Footscray and North Melbourne to a sufficient degree to render those clubs uncompetitive on the field and forced to cost-cutting off it
2. In an effort to make those clubs – plus middle class Melbourne and Hawthorn – more competitive with the “big five” in Carlton, Collingwood, Essendon, Geelong and Richmond, the league introduced country zoning in 1968. Without access to their former large pool of country players, these richer VFL clubs slowly but surely turned their money interstate, with the trickle becoming a flood by the 1980s

Without country zoning, it is likely that the drain of players from the SANFL and WA(N)FL to the VFL would have ben at the very least slower, especially as the number of clubs in the VFL would probably have been reduced during the economic crises of the 1970s and 1980s.

 

[GScirea]

Hello (again), I apologise if this is the wrong section to post these questions in…

I have a few questions in relation to the history of PAFC as well as SA/AUS football in general. I have friends and family members from overseas who have grown fond of the sport and they often ask questions about Aussie rules, however - I’m not always entirely sure how to answer them… Many are questions that I’ve asked myself and tried to research. I thought I’d ask on these forums, as I wasn’t around during the 70’s, 80’s and I was literally pooping my pants in 1990. Many of you appear to be very knowledgeable regarding PAFC/SANFL/VFL history so any information would be greatly appreciated.

So… A few questions in no particular order (with a some additional thoughts underneath each question). I'm sorry, I realise many of these points have probably been discussed ad nauseam over the years...

A national competition: why did it take so long?

Australia is one of the most developed and sporting mad countries in the world, yet; the competition only became truly national in 1991 (after the ‘The Creation of an Artificial Bird’). Of course, there are some people that would argue that it still isn’t truly national…but that’s a different argument.

Then a linked question to that: Even without a national competition, why did the ‘Championship of Australia’ cease to exist for approximately 54 years, resume for 8 and then stop again? From what I’ve read/been told it wasn’t the highlight of the national football calendar anyway. Why wasn’t there a ‘Champions League’ type competition? There seemed to be enough interest to generate enough money… When we compare the situation to other popular sports around the world, it really was quite odd/unique to Australian rules… 9-12 suburban teams kicking a peculiarly shaped ball was the biggest sport in AUS…yet they rarely left their respective cities? Why?


How elite was the SANFL (especially when compared to the VFL)? When did it stop being elite?

Some Victorians describe it as a ‘feeder’ league, which is extremely condescending. Based on research/data/evidence, the situation could be compared to the European football leagues. Traditionally, the big leagues in Europe have always been (in no particular order): Spain, Italy, England and Germany. The Spanish, Italian and English leagues have at one point or another been described as the best…Teams like Bayern Munich, Borussia Dortmund, Ajax, Benfica, Porto and others have proven that you don’t have to be in ‘the best’ league to be THE BEST IN EUROPE/THE WORLD (I realise things are a bit different now and the Bundesliga is pretty awesome, so please think historically).

The Victorian League was historically the best (like the ENG, ITA & SPA leagues); it DOES NOT however mean that the SANFL was some form of reject league like it is now. The German league was rarely considered the best league, nor were the Portuguese or Dutch leagues BUT European Cup/Champions league winning teams have often come from these countries… They may not be as historically good as the ‘historical big 3’ but they’ve all had extremely strong teams... I hope the link I've made is clear enough.


Port Adelaide is SA's oldest and Australia's most successful football club

This is actually quite topical given recent AFL Commission developments officially recognising the above statement – not that we needed any approval, but the club can now ‘officially’ make the above claim across the AFL.

37?

This might be an unpopular opinion… so please don’t hit me.

A Crow fan/*acquaintance (one of the few who aren’t completely insecure/ infatuated with the number 119, tarps or completely delusional) said something along the lines of: “Whilst this news is going to give additional ammunition to Port fans it doesn’t bother me and I accept it as the truth, the only part that bothers me is the Premierships in 98 and 99 definitely shouldn’t count and neither should the premierships POST 1990.. That’s still 30 Premierships – still the best and still something to be proud of”

*He can never be a TRUE friend for obvious reasons.

Now, this is the ‘don’t hit me part’ – I agree with him. Especially 98, 99. The Premierships of the early 90s were extremely important in the context of finally being granted an AFL license but do they still fit the criteria of being the ‘elite’/ top level trophy of the time?

Again, sorry – I know how important the premierships of the early 90s were and I know PAFC got screwed over big time but those SANFL premierships almost seem tainted by the ‘already having an SA team in the AFL stick' when we consider their overall 'status'. If you disagree, please educate me.

Thanks, please feel free to answer any of these questions! Whilst I’m not a baby, I’m also not old enough to remember the 'fighting for AFL entry years' or really any pre AFL stuff (except for the 96GF v Centrals) so your wisdom and knowledge would be greatly appreciated! Thanks.

 

[Gigantor]

There was a period from around 1970 to the mid 80s when the standard of the SANFL was very, very good, such that their top teams were more than a match for the VFL's bottom teams. The same thing could probably be said of the WAFL around the same time.

So no doubt, the VFL was the best league, but it wasn't a mile ahead of the other two.

 

[GScirea]

Over the years, there has been talk of Celtic & Rangers joining the EPL and many believe the move is inevitable (even if it takes a while).
If this were to happen some EPL fans may mock their Scottish adversaries in jest but there would typically be a genuine appreciation for the history of these clubs. Whilst I don't lose sleep over it - the lack of respect our club recieves for its SANFL success is deplorable. This thread is titled 'The SANFL didn't compare to the VFL back in the day'; the Scottish league has never compared to the top tier of English football, but that doesn't mean anyone can disregard the supremacy of Celtic and Rangers and their SPL history would not simply be erased upon entering the better comp.

As mentioned in my post above,
Based on research/data/evidence, the situation (SANFL v VFL 'back in the day') could be compared to the European football leagues. Traditionally, the big leagues in Europe have always been (in no particular order): Spain, Italy, England and Germany. The Spanish, Italian and English leagues have at one point or another been described as the best…Teams like Bayern Munich, Borussia Dortmund, Ajax, Benfica, Porto and others have proven that you don’t have to be in ‘the best’ league to be THE BEST IN EUROPE/THE WORLD (I realise things are a bit different now and the Bundesliga is pretty awesome, so please think historically).

The Victorian League was historically the best (like the ENG, ITA & SPA leagues);it DOES NOT however mean that the SANFL was some form of reject league like it is now. The German league was rarely considered the best league, nor were the Portuguese or Dutch leagues BUT European Cup/Champions league winning teams have often come from these countries… They may not be as historically good as the ‘historical big 3’ but they’ve all had extremely strong teams…

Sorry to those that hate the round ball comparisons. Time for PAFC-Awesomeness-Awareness-Month. We can sell little magpie pins. The magpies can wear a teal scarf.

 

[Gigantor]

Over the years, there has been talk of Celtic & Rangers joining the EPL and many believe the move is inevitable (even if it takes a while).
If this were to happen some EPL fans may mock their Scottish adversaries in jest but there would typically be a genuine appreciation for the history of these clubs. Whilst I don't lose sleep over it - the lack of respect our club recieves for its SANFL success is deplorable. This thread is titled 'The SANFL didn't compare to the VFL back in the day'; the Scottish league has never compared to the top tier of English football, but that doesn't mean anyone can disregard the supremacy of Celtic and Rangers and their SPL history would not simply be erased upon entering the better comp.

As mentioned in my post above,
Based on research/data/evidence, the situation (SANFL v VFL 'back in the day') could be compared to the European football leagues. Traditionally, the big leagues in Europe have always been (in no particular order): Spain, Italy, England and Germany. The Spanish, Italian and English leagues have at one point or another been described as the best…Teams like Bayern Munich, Borussia Dortmund, Ajax, Benfica, Porto and others have proven that you don’t have to be in ‘the best’ league to be THE BEST IN EUROPE/THE WORLD (I realise things are a bit different now and the Bundesliga is pretty awesome, so please think historically).

The Victorian League was historically the best (like the ENG, ITA & SPA leagues);it DOES NOT however mean that the SANFL was some form of reject league like it is now. The German league was rarely considered the best league, nor were the Portuguese or Dutch leagues BUT European Cup/Champions league winning teams have often come from these countries… They may not be as historically good as the ‘historical big 3’ but they’ve all had extremely strong teams…

Sorry to those that hate the round ball comparisons. Time for PAFC-Awesomeness-Awareness-Month. We can sell little magpie pins. The magpies can wear a teal scarf.

I think the soccer comparison works well, back in the day, the stronger clubs from the smaller nations, like the examples you mention, often had success in Europe (more so than today), and to this day, the Dutch and Portuguese leagues are still looked upon as decent leagues.

Of course, who could ever argue with Gaetano, former NT captain, WC winner and an all time great libero.

 

[raptalia]

I have heard there was a bloke named Greg Williams who might beg to differ?
You have to remember that Ebert only excelled in the B grade SANFL.
He did step up to the A grade playing at North Melbourne but although he did well.He certainly wasn't outstanding.Age was against him.


(*Moderator's Note - new thread started on topic raised in existing thread)

Old thread I know but I had to join in the chorus and have a go...

You are either having a laugh or you have absolutely no idea what you are posting about. I followed the Sydney Swans when Williams was playing for them and he was a great player for sure but he used handball in a different fashion to Ebert. Diesel's hand ball was fast and efficient and effective under pressure but Russell Ebert's handball went further and with bullet like precision. The reason that Williams perfected handball was that he could not kick more than 45 metres and even then they were flat punt kicks. Russell Ebert put a unique stamp on the game as he perfected the art of holding the ball above the head and hand balling which incidentally Robbie Gray was pinged for in a game last year. Unlike Williams, Ebert could drop kick 50-60 metres and used hand ball as an attacking weapon rather than a first option.

As for the VFL being ahead of the SANFL in the pre AFL days who cares? It is really a relative issue as I can guarantee you that I, and plenty of others, followed Port with as much passion as any supporter followed their team in the VFL. I can also guarantee you that those of us around at the time when Russell played got more pleasure from all those SANFL winning Grand Finals than Collingwood supporters did watching losing Grand Finals. The VFL would have been ahead of the SANFL based on population and money but that should not detract from the ability or performance of SA players.

 

[Boston tiger]

The Vics have nearly 4 times the population as the Croweaters. Both are as passionate about the game as each other it's just comes down to numbers.