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What if East Perth joined the VFL?

15th December, 2021
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Roar Guru
15th December, 2021
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Even many AFL fans are unaware that towards the end of 1980, WAFL club East Perth put in an application to join the VFL.

This application went nowhere showing that the VFL weren’t interested, although they were looking at interstate expansion at the time.

So I’m going to look at what I think would happen if the Royals were accepted into the VFL.

Firstly, looking at East Perth, in the 1980 WAFL season, they finished in fourth position making into the preliminary final before losing to Swan Districts in what was the highest attendance for a WAFL/WANFL preliminary final at over 34,000.

They were averaging 9,779 people through the gates at their home ground of Perth Oval which was significantly behind the lowest VFL attendance at the time which was Fitzroy’s 16,271. It was behind three other WAFL clubs in Swan Districts, South Fremantle and West Perth who to this day are probably still the three biggest clubs in Western Australia (behind the Eagles and Dockers of course).

But East Perth were still a stable club.

Would they have been able to compete with the bigger VFL clubs once they entered? I think so.

We need to remember that average crowd does not equal fan-base, so seeing as the Royals did get crowds of 15k+ in bigger games in 1980, I’d imagine they’d have a fan-base of around 13k average if they entered a bigger league than what they were in, and seeing as they would be the only West Australian team playing in the Victorian league, they’d be the hottest ticket in town which would add to that figure.

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When the West Coast Eagles entered the VFL in 1987, pretty much every man and his dog that lived in Perth supported them. The Royals did have rivals like West Perth and others, so they wouldn’t have been as big as the Eagles but still one of the biggest in the competition

So a club with history and an established fan-base and identity, would presumably succeed playing in another state’s league, but what knock on effects would that have.

Looking at what happened after 1980, would any of it change?

Firstly, at the end of 1981, South Melbourne decided to leave Lake Oval and move to Sydney, seeing as they were an extremely broke club at the time, I don’t think this move would’ve changed, they were looking for anything to stay alive.

Of course in 1987, the Brisbane Bears and the West Coast Eagles joined the competition. Seeing as there wasn’t really any established football clubs in Queensland at the time, I think the Bears would’ve entered the league, especially as we’ve seen Queenslanders get behind composite sides no matter what sport it is.

As for the West Coast Eagles, I don’t think they would’ve existed. Seeing as there was already a Western Australia club, I don’t think the VFL would’ve wanted another one there just yet, and also Western Australia wouldn’t have wanted a composite side. The people probably would’ve preferred to wait for their WAFL club to enter the league

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In 1990, the Adelaide Crows joined the VFL, but there were discussions with Port Adelaide going on before that. Would the SANFL have let the Magpies join the VFL? I think so.

With East Perth thriving in WA, and the Brisbane Bears side struggling, I don’t think the SANFL would want to take a risk on a composite side, and would’ve got out of Port Adelaide’s way. And they’d probably be just as, if not more, successful than they currently are if they joined in 1990.

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AFL marking contest. (Photo by Daniel Kalisz/Getty Images)

In 1995, the Fremantle Dockers joined the AFL. This is a tough one to think about. I still think a Fremantle side would’ve entered the AFL, seeing as Australian Rules Football in Western Australia started in Fremantle, and with 43 per cent of WAFL/WAFA/WANFL flags being won by a club that contains the word Fremantle in its name, it’d make the most sense.

However I think it’d be more of a joint venture between South Fremantle and East Fremantle with the Fremantle AFL club claiming the history of both the Sharks and the Bulldogs

At the end of 1996, Brisbane and Fitzroy merged to become the Brisbane Lions. Seeing as how broke Fitzroy were, and that Brisbane were struggling with identity, I think this merger would still go ahead.

In 1997, Port Adelaide entered the AFL, but in this little fantasy, they’re already in the competition, so the AFL would be looking for a second Adelaide AFL club.

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A poll from 1993 showed the SA population’s second preference to a second SA side behind Port Adelaide was a merged Norwood-Sturt team, so that’d be the best option.

In 2011, the Gold Coast Suns entered the AFL, but it seems as though everyone had forgotten that one of the most successful football clubs in Australia was based in Gold Coast, the Southport Sharks. The Sharks have 22 first-grade premierships in just 60 years of existence, and are doing well in the VFL at the moment, despite having to travel every second week.

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In 2012, the GWS Giants entered the league. There’s no real nationally recognised football club from Western Sydney so this would probably still go as normal.

So if everything I just said happened, the 18 AFL clubs would look like this:
Brisbane, Carlton, Collingwood, East Perth, Essendon, Fremantle, Geelong, Greater Western Sydney, Hawthorn, Melbourne, North Melbourne, Norwood-Sturt, Port Adelaide, Richmond, Southport, St Kilda, Sydney, Western Bulldogs.

So if East Perth did join the VFL, not only would it make the Western Australia football market much different, I believe it would have massive knock-on effects for years to come.

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