The Western Australian Football League (WAFL) was formed in 1885 and has since remained the premier Australian Rules football league in Western Australia.
A 9 team, single division competition, the season is based around a 22 week or so "home-and-away" (regular) reason starting in March through to August. The top four teams play off in a series of finals culminating in the Grand Final, always held at Subiaco Oval and usually sometime in September.
Although payments are made to players, generally they are so low that no player in the league could be considered a professional. In saying that however players not required by the two Western Australian-based AFL clubs (West Coast Eagles and Fremantle Dockers) will usually play for a WAFL club instead that weekend.
Teams currently playing in the WAFL include:
- Claremont
- East Fremantle
- East Perth
- Peel
- Perth
- West Perth
- South Fremantle
- Subiaco
- Swan Districts
A bloodied Haydn Bunton Jr celebrates Swan Districts first Grand Final win, 1961.
Organised football in the Perth/Fremantle region of Western Australia dates back to 1881. Back then though rugby was the dominant football code, with only one senior club - Unions - being of Australian Rules persuasion.
In 1883 a second club emerged, Swans, but Australian Rules' growth remained much subdued compared to that of Victoria and South Australia.
However in those days many young men of Perth's wealthier families were educated in Adelaide, the capital of South Australia.
On returning home from there they naturally wished to play the sport they'd grown up with and no doubt exerted some influence on their less affluent peers as to such. Coincidentally, the press at the time reported there was a growing dissatisfaction with rugby as a spectacle.
Finally in 1885 one of the leading rugby clubs, Fremantle, decided to change to 'Australian Rules'. It was quickly joined by three other clubs - Rovers, Victorians, and a team of schoolboys from Perth High. The schoolboy side lasted just two matches, but the three other sides went on to contest what in retrospect was viewed as the first ever official Western Australian Football Association (WAFA) premiership, won by Rovers. And virtually overnight Australian Rules football became the dominant code for the spectator as well.
Progress of Australian Rules in Western Australia still lagged behind the big football cities of Melbourne, Adelaide and Geelong however. Numerous clubs came and went giving a very unstable look to the WAFA.
It actually took an economic depression to finally and irrevocably etch the game into the collective Western Australian consciousness. During the mid 1890's Australia underwent its most severe period of economic hardship ever. In desperation, many people headed west, hoping to benefit from the gold boom. Included were a large number of footballers, some of the highest calibre.
The higher standard of play that naturally followed helped increase the game's popularity whilest increasing the professionalism of the WAFA.
By 1901 the WAFA had grown to have 6 teams. Up to this point at most 5 sides had ever made up the competition and this number had invariably changed from year to year as clubs came and went. And by 1906 there were 8 teams - these being West Perth, East Perth, East Fremantle, South Fremantle, North Fremantle, Subiaco, Perth and Midland Junction.
In 1908 the WAFA renamed to the Western Australian Football League (WAFL).
Unlike most other Australian football leagues the WAFL didn't go into recess during the Great War, however two teams - North Fremantle and Midland Junction - did not last this period each contesting the WAFL for the last time in 1915 and 1917 respectively.
In 1921 the WAFL followed the idea of the SANFL's Magarey Medal and introduced the Sandover Medal to be awarded to the fairest and best player over a season as voted by the field umpires. The medal has been awarded anually ever since.
In 1926 Claremont entered the league to bring the number of teams back to 7.
In 1932 the WAFL renamed to the Western Australian National Football League (WANFL) - the "national" concept in the name being adopted by the SANFL and a couple of other leagues a few years earlier.
In 1934 Swan Districts entered the league, and these now 8 competing sides still remain today and are generally referred to as the "traditional 8 clubs".
Because of World War 2 the league only ran an "under age" competition between 1942-44, however the three premierships won during this time are pretty much given equal stature to any other in official records. All clubs competed, with the exception of Swan Districts who could not form a team in 1942, although they were back in 1943.
In 1980 the WANFL reverted back to being called the WAFL.
Come the 80's and more and more star WAFL players were looking to head to the VFL, enticed by the bigger money and the fact that it was more and more gaining a reputation as the "big" league.
Ironically at that point crowds were as big as they ever were in the early 80's, but soon after interest in the WAFL started to decline slowly as it became increasingly obvious that even larger numbers of the WAFL's best players were going to head east.
It came to a head when in 1987 the West Coast Eagles were formed and entered the VFL (the VFL was renamed the AFL in 1990). With many of Western Australia's best players now competing in a team that represented Western Australia on a national scale, it was suddenly apparent that the WAFL was now a second-class competition although this wasn't fully evident at first.
In 1990 the league was renamed to the Western Australian State Football League, but it had reverted back to WAFL by 1991.
In 1995 the Fremantle Dockers were formed such that two Western Australian teams now competed in the AFL, and this fully cemented the WAFL as a second-class competition. Indeed the 1991 introduction of the Adelaide Crows to the VFL/AFL meant that the SANFL was now on the same level as the WAFL - previously it tried to keep South Australia out of the national arena and that in theory made it equal with the national league (although in practise it didn't really work that way.)
WAFL clubs have struggled ever since with their sudden demise from being more or less equal to any VFL club to second class status in the pecking order.
In 1997 Peel Thunder become the ninth WAFL club when they were somewhat controversially allowed in and have struggled throughout their brief history with the traditional 8 clubs generally being opposed to their presence, mainly because having an odd number of teams forces a bye to be fixtured in each week.
1997 also saw the WAFL rename to Westar Rules in a failed attempt to market the league, however the name was back to the WAFL again in 2001.
Recent years have seen the WAFL stabilise itself as a league a step down from the AFL. Obviously the sudden player drain brought on by the expansion of the VFL into the AFL has lessened the standard of play, however this has recovered somewhat with "veteren" AFL players returning and new players coming through.History
