When I first became exposed to and started following different sports in the mid to late 1960s, there was no such thing as a national club based comp. Each major city had its own home and away competition, plus finals. While all interstate fixtures were … you guessed it … state based.

The VFL had 12 clubs in Melbourne; the SANFL had 10 clubs in Adelaide; the WAFL had 8 clubs based in Perth; the NSWRL had 12 clubs in Sydney; the QRL had 8 clubs in Brisbane and the NCRL had 10 clubs in Newcastle.

However, the first organised interstate comp, and the most enduring, is the Sheffield Shield. Victoria first played Tasmania at cricket in 1851 in Launceston.

Victoria’s first match against New South Wales (NSW) was at the new MCG in 1856. South Australia (SA) joined NSW and Victoria for the inaugural Sheffield Shield in 1892/93. In due course, Queensland joined in 1926/27, Western Australia (WA) in 1947/48 and Tasmania in 1977/78.

In Australian football, which began life in 1858, Victoria first played an interstate match against SA in 1879. The next interstate match that followed was between NSW and Queensland in 1884.

In 1908, the first All-Australian carnival was held, featuring Victoria, SA, WA, Tasmania, NSW, Queensland and New Zealand (NZ). Yes, New Zealand!

This was probably the second mass interstate comp to be played after cricket. However, the All-Australian alternate venue carnival was usually held every 3 years up to the mid-1980s, with the exception of several world wars and other unscheduled interruptions.

In rugby union, NSW first played Queensland in 1882, while in rugby league NSW first played Queensland in 1908. There was tremendous interest in the clash the other night for the inaugural contest between the Melbourne Rebels and NSW Waratahs. And to think that back in the 1930s, Victoria rose as a serious third rugby power behind NSW and Queensland.

The first interstate football (soccer) match as far as I can research, was between Victoria and NSW in 1883, while NSW played Queensland in 1890. In the second half of the 1800s, there was an intense battle for control of the type of football played in the colonies.

While Australian football won out in Victoria, SA, WA and Tasmania, rugby union/league won out in NSW, Queensland and NZ. Soccer continued in all states, but as a much poorer cousin.

Between 1968-77, the Australian Rugby Union (ARU) had a highly ambitious national comp known as the Wallaby Trophy. It’s leading states and regions were divided into two divisions. Those teams competing were – Sydney, NSW Country, Queensland, Victoria, SA, WA, Tasmania and ACT. Sadly, while this was a noble concept, the timing was poor. Rugby union was amateur, poorly organised, internationally weak and broke for most of this time.

Purely for trivia buffs, perhaps the first ever interstate clash of any type was a rowing contest between residents of Sydney (NSW) and Hobart (Tasmania) in boats known as whalers. This occurred in 1833. Then in 1863 NSW beat Victoria in 4-oared gigs.

The first interstate 8-oared rowing contest on the Yarra river was contested in 1878. This ‘head of the river’ race eventually became known as the King’s Cup.

Also in 1878, the Stawell Gift (in country Victoria) professional foot race was run for the first time, while the first interstate Australian Amateur Athletics Championship (AAAC) was held in 1890.

Hockey was popular with women before men took an interest, breaking the common mould with other sports. The first interstate hockey comp for women was contested in 1910 with NSW triumphant. The first men’s edition didn’t occur until 1925, with no winner left for posterity (that I’m aware of).

The first interstate baseball match was between Victoria and SA in 1890, while the first interstate basketball match didn’t occur until 1946, when NSW beat Victoria in the inaugural national championship. The first interstate netball championship of 1926 was won by NSW.

Out of interest, baseball first came to Australia via the Victorian goldfields in the 1850s. The famous Claxton Shield was first contested by the states in 1934, and for a long time was second only to the Sheffield Shield as an annual interstate comp featuring more than 2 or 3 states.

The Claxton Shield was held in the winter, allowing test and Shield cricketers the opportunity to play both sports. Test cricket captain Vic Richardson and his grandsons, Ian (especially), Greg and Trevor, were all outstanding baseballers.

And what of the socially popular pastimes of cycling, golf and tennis? Cycling became hugely popular in the 1890s, and sprouted from there.

The first golf course anywhere in Australia, was opened at Bothwell in Tasmania. The Australian GC opened in 1882 and the Royal Melbourne GC in 1891.

The first tennis court was laid down on Garden Island in Sydney Harbour in 1880. The first Australian Open was held in 1905, and unlike today, where the Open is permanently located in Melbourne, the Open used to take turns around the mainland capital cities.

In surfing circles, the honour of the first surf club is bitterly disputed by Bondi and Bronte, both on Sydney’s eastern shore. Bondi has the official recognition dating back to 1906, but Bronte possibly has more conclusive evidence as far back as 1903, which was regrettably and as it turned, unfortunately for them, lost in a clubhouse fire back in the early 1970s.

Surfing as in board riding, was brought to Australian by the Hawaiian surfer and swimmer Duke Kahanamoku in 1915. He gave his first demonstration of this soon to be hugely popular leisure activity at Freshwater beach on Sydney’s north-eastern shore.

So when did the first national club based comp start, and in which sport? Well, before we get to that, some more background (sorry…).

Because of the wealth of both the Melbourne based VFL and Sydney based NSWRL, Melbourne clubs were recruiting many of the best players from SA, WA and Tasmania, while Sydney clubs were recruiting many of the best players from Queensland and Country NSW.

This was beginning to make a mockery of interstate contests, with Victoria full of ex-SA & WA players, and NSW full of ex-Queensland players.

Consequently, Australian football moved to the State of Origin (SOO) concept in 1977, followed by rugby league in 1980. SOO simply meant that while leading SA and WA players might be playing for Melbourne clubs, or leading Queensland players playing for Sydney clubs, they could still represent the state where they played their first senior game of Australian football or rugby league, as the case may be. Perhaps without realising it, the (SOO) was the first chink in the deconstruction of state based comps.

As history would have it, it was the much maligned association football, or soccer, which inaugurated the first nationally based club competition in 1977, which was called the National Soccer League (NSL). This was followed by the National Basketball League (NBL) in 1979. What about the major sports of Australian football and rugby league?

1982 was a key year for both sporting codes. In 1982 South Melbourne Swans relocated to Sydney. For the first time the VFL had a team from outside its own borders. Brisbane Bears (later merging with Fitzroy Lions) joined in 1987 along with West Coast Eagles. In 1991 Adeliade Crows joined, followed by Fremantle Dockers in 1995 and Port Adelaide Power in 1997. Realising it was no longer a state based comp, the VFL changed its name to the AFL in 1990.

Also in 1982 Canberra Raiders and Illawarra Steelers joined the NSWRL. But it wasn’t until 1988 when Brisbane Broncos, Gold Coast Seagulls and Newcastle Knights joined that the NSWRL had teams outside of NSW participating. Following the brutal “Super League” war of the 1990s, the NRL was inaugurated in 1997 to run the national comp.

Other national club comps to come into vogue were the National Netball League (NNL) in 1985, Australian Baseball League (ABL) in 1989 and the Australian Hockey League (AHL) in 1991.

At the time of writing, rugby union still has no national comp, either provincial or national club based. The Super Rugby (SR) can be viewed as our pseudo national comp, especially as it features the three regional conferences in South Africa, New Zealand and Australia, each of 5 franchises.

There were two attempts to kickstart a national domestic comp in the 2000s, but both were scuppered through a combination of prohibitive costs and lack of will. In 2006, the Australian Provincial Championship (APC) saw NSW Waratahs, Queensland Reds, ACT Brumbies and WA Force play each other once with the best two playing off in a final. This comp was won by ACT beating Queensland in the final.

The following year 2007, saw an 8 team Australian Rugby Championship (ARC) with each team playing the others home and away for 8 matches each. The top four contested the semi-finals and a final, whereby Central Coast Rays defeated Melbourne Rebels. The other teams were Sydney Fleet, Western Sydney Rams, Canberra Vikings, Perth Spirit, Ballymore (Brisbane) Tornadoes and East (Gold) Coast Aces.

As someone who grew up on state based national comps, it saddens me that they might be on the way out. There are effectively just two sports that have remained true to the state/provincial concept – cricket and rugby union. But for how long?

This is if you don’t include baseball, which has returned to the state concept Claxton Shield. Or State Of Origin, which is a contrived (but highly popular) interstate concept for rugby league.

The announcement by Cricket Australia (CA) that the new-fangled Twenty20 cricket comp, the Big Bash league (BBL) would feature 8 city based teams might be the first crack that sees the state based Sheffield Shield collapse. We’ll have to wait and see. And what of rugby union?

I was tremendously heartened to see the banner on the backs of the Reds players – “We are Queensland”. It’s obvious both Waratahs and Reds are proud to retain their provincial titles of New South Wales and Queensland.

The Brumbies are shy to use ACT because they’re pining for a wider audience. The Force are seduced by this modern terminology of ‘Western’.

However, I think both Brumbies and Force could be encouraged to use ACT and WA with a bit of prodding. Perhaps so too the Rebels.

I’m disappointed they have chosen to call themselves Melbourne instead of Victoria. It may be that’s the way they see the franchises heading – city based?

I don’t subscribe to the view that every sport must be city/region based. It’s good for the Australian sporting landscape to have the variety of city based and provincial based comps. South Africa and New Zealand have both done excellent jobs with their national domestic rugby union and cricket comps, creating new provinces out of geo-political provinces or states. Why can’t we do the same in Australia?

For example, a new province operating out of Newcastle and covering Northern NSW, could be called Eastern Australia. It’s appropriate. And Australian Capital Territory (ACT) extending its provincial reach over Southern NSW is no big deal either.

Queensland at or around and above the Tropic of Capricorn would obviously be known as North Queensland. A provincial team based around Gold Coast could be called Border, because it straddles both the Queensland/NSW borders.

It’s a long way off, but if ever the population of North-West Australia (Pilbara-Kimberley region) boomed sufficiently, this new province could be called New Holland, in memory of the time when the whole continent was known by that name for about 150 years from about the mid 1600s to late 1700s. For me, I would like to see both cricket and rugby union retain its provincial roots.

For cricket, this history and tradition dates back to 1851 (Tasmania v Victoria) and for rugby union, this history and tradition dates back to 1882 (NSW v Queensland).

Marketeers especially, take note!