Australian Soccer 'Invaded by Migrants'?

A piece by Ted Glover in the Sydney Sunday Herald in 1950 screamed the headline "Soccer is Invaded by Migrants". It's a bizarre concept that flies in the face of conventional understandings of soccer history in Australia which see soccer as a game of and for migrants. Glover was not as concerned by the migrant invasion as was the sub-editor who came up with the headline because his article celebrates the arrival of continental European footballers to Australia who will boost the stocks of the game. Glover does make the point however that "the Government wants migrants to avoid forming into groups, and, as a result, there will probably be some opposition should such clubs seek League status."

This piece from the Advertiser in 1951 clarifies the general fear of migrants altering soccer for the worse. It also disturbs two comfortable assumption about the history of soccer in Australia. First it shows that the fear of 'wogball' sometimes came from within the game. Secondly, it shows that the attempts to 'ethnically cleanse' the names of Australian soccer teams go back to well before David Hill and Frank Lowy's more recents efforts to de-wog the game.

Migrant Soccer Teams May Go By PIVOT 

Two suggested alrerations to the constitution of the S.A. Soccer Football Association which have been submitted by the Prospect Club for consideration at the annual general meeting at the Tramways Hall on Wednesday, will have far reaching results if carried by club delegates. 

The adoption of the first of the two sugges tions will mean the disbanding of many new Australian clubs, and the absorption of their players by other clubs. It Is suggested that rule 9 be altered to read: — 'That clubs and associations in SA. playing soccer footbull and being otherwise qualified according to the rules of this association, shall eligible for membership subject to the approval of the executive council, who shall have the power to admit or reject such applicants. To qualify for acceptance, clubs must bear the name of a SA suburb, town or district. or the name of a recognised SA business, industry or organisation. In addition,   clubs so accepted will be allowed to have registered not more than five senior players in any one season who are not of British or Australian birth. (The Advertiser 16 November 1951, p 6)

Why I still call the game 'soccer'

I noticed that I came in for some criticism recently for my use of the term soccer. Here I try to explain why it is my preferred term.

In recent years many proponents of soccer in Australia have begun to call the game football. The new governing body, the FFA, established in 2004 as a part of sweeping reforms to the game’s management, decided to ‘take back’ the name football – a move that received a lot of support in the soccer community but one which generated a great degree of opposition and disagreement from supporters of Australian rules and the Rugby codes.

This is understandable. ‘Football’ is a very powerful term. When used it is an assertion of the regional dominance of the game it is describing. Australian rules proponent, Martin Flanagan believes the

football naming-rights argument is a small matter of large consequence. Politics is largely decided by headlines that transfer the meaning of a mere handful of words. In sport, in this part of the world, one of those words is football. Whoever owns that word to some extent owns the future.

Prior to 2004, in most of Victoria, Tasmania, South Australia and Western Australia ‘football’ denoted Australian rules; in Queensland and New South Wales it usually meant Rugby League. And while generally these conventions still hold they have been destabilised by the re-naming of soccer. Significantly, the intense branding of terms like NRL (National Rugby  League) and AFL (Australian Football League, the peak Australian rules body) has allowed soccer some space and leverage in adopting the term football. But we need to be careful to draw a cultural distinction between what the PR agents denote and that which the general public connotes.

This new policy of soccer ‘taking back’ the name of football is also based on a few fallacies:

• That the use of the term soccer was forced upon the game. This is only partly true. The name soccer was adopted to in order to both domesticate the game in Australia as well as internationalising its image here. The term British Association football was seen as tying the game too tightly to its British roots. The preferred option, Association football, was unavailable, already taken by the second-string Australia rules competition in Victoria. Soccer was the only term available that referenced Association football unambiguously.
• Soccer is an American abomination. This is not true. The term was invented in English public schools – though not necessarily without a pejorative aspect.
• Soccer is a diminutive that belittles the game. This is a matter of emphasis and manner of articulation. Any diminution is in the manner of expression (soccer is a word that lends itself to sarcastic inflection) and not the semantic content.
• Leading figures and commentators in the Australian game like Johnny Warren and Les Murray always used the word ‘football’ when talking about soccer. They did not.

Confusion over names is part of the complex history of all football codes in this country. Australian rules and soccer have undergone a significant name changes in the course of their development, as have their many organising and controlling bodies – usually for interesting cultural-political reasons.

As the rules of the Melbourne Football Club start their expansion out of Melbourne into other towns and colonies (including NZ) the name of the game becomes Melbourne rules, becomes Victorian rules, becomes Australian rules (with a brief digression into Australasian rules). Australian rules is officially known as Australian Football and also has made claims on the title of the ‘National Game’.

The game that is initially known in Victoria as Anglo-Australian football, or British Association rules, or English Association rules, or (rarely) Scottish Association rules, officially becomes Soccer football in the 1920s and just plain soccer after that – though it starts to be described as soccer in the Argus newspaper from 1908 on. In Queensland, the first organising body was the Anglo-Queensland Football Association while the game in New South Wales was initially administered by the Southern British Football Union. In the Perth press the game is described as Socker (which is an Americanism) for a few brief years around the turn of the century!

This represents a methodological problem for the historian – if the names of the games and the organising bodies are not consistent over time or across the various colonies at any given time, we need to be very careful when we read an historical newspaper article that refers to football.

For example, an article in a Maitland newspaper in 1883 reviews a match of Association football played by a team named Northumberland. A contemporary reader would be forgiven for the immediate assumption was that it was a soccer team comprised of miners from the north east of England. Closer reading showed that it was actually a game of Victorian rules being played by a local team against South Melbourne FC.

This changeability of names points to a very different conception of football from the ones held today – the idea that soccer and rugby and Australian rules were differing strains of the same game of football. For much of the first part of the 20^th century, newspaper soccer reports were made under the heading of football. Typically, the Argus would list under the heading of football: VFL, VFA, rugby and soccer. And while they gave greater weight to Australian rules there was not the same sense of separation that the media deploys today.

In some papers, the football results were given in such an order that we can only discern from the actual scores the games that were being played.

This too represents a methodological problem. Soccer reports are often there in newspapers but they are sometimes buried at the end of or hidden within a general football report. Historians have overlooked vital pieces of information because of this.

From 1850 onward until about 1870 we get many reports of football games where virtually all we know is that between zero and 3 goals were scored, mostly kicked but occasionally taken across the line in or by a scrimmage. Many journalists thought little of posterity when they filed their reports. We know that different kinds of football were being played but sometimes we have no idea what kinds.

The FFA’s rebranding of soccer as ‘football’ threatens to introduce the same kind of lack of clarity for historians of the future. Therefore I am an advocate for the use of soccer in public discourse for the time being — at least until history and common sense determines otherwise. 

This may or may not be an adequate explanation for some of you and I'd be interested in comments that engaged with it. I'm not utterly wedded to my position and I could shift if convinced by good arguments.

FC Clifton Hill v Fawkner Blues FC, Quarries Park, 14/07/12

Off to Quarries to see if Fawkner can get the three points and close in on Moreland City. If Clifton Hill can't get the 3 points today their promotion hopes will be slim. So there's a lot at stake.

Arrived at 2.15.

Fawkner ressies up 2-1 with about 15 to go. Clifton Hill arguing among themselves. Neither team looking likely.

All over. Fawkner win 2-1.

Team sheets are below.

A very young referee (who had a good game btw)

Fawkner leaves the dressing room.

3.00 underway. Clifton Hill defending the clubhouse end. Free kick Clifton Hill in good position on right taken quickly and wasted.

3.03. Bad Fawkner tackle results in handbags. Free kick to Clifton Hill on half way.

3.05. Defensive free kick taken by Tyrikos.

Clifton hill having slightly the better opening exchanges.

3.07. On cue. Fawkner break. Keeper calls for it and nearly mucks it up. Out for throw. Fawkner bring it back but Clifton Hill free kick.

Fawkner player Baross given yellow card for wearing skin colored shorts that are normally unseen under his blue shorts. Coyness forces him to the dressing room to remove them. Fawkner down a man for 2 minutes. 

Back Baross comes, sans leggings.

Game a midfield tussle so far.

3.12. Fawkner free kick 25 out on right. Floated in and keeper takes on the full.

Two biggish teams tending to cancel each other out. Fawkner trying long balls that Clifton Hill have managed to defuse. Though the feeling is that one may yet work. Clifton Hill not penetrating at all.

3.20 Fawkner's McNamara: "where's the fookin tempo!" good question.

3.23. Dangerous Fawkner free kick 20 out. Headed back. Keeper saves fumbles cleared. Return shot saved and cleared.

3.24. Clifton Hill free kick 30 out. Floated in and put behind unnecessarily for corner. Corner cleared.

3.27. Fawkner free kick 30 out on right. Headed behind for goal kick.

Fawkner looking the better team. Their keeper has had nothing to do while the Clifton Hill keeper has been very busy.

3.31. Clifton Hill corner right. Ronald McDonald punches clear.

3.32. Normal service resumed as Fawkner attack. Cross from right over forward's head. Out for goal kick.

3.33. Beesley on for Clifton Hill. Replaces Sharkey.

3.34. Clifton Hill free kick left 20 out. Blasted over.

Where have I been moment #564. I asked the Clifton Hill subs why Bobby wasn't playing. "He's left the club and gone to sunshine!"

3.36 Fawkner cross. Header on target. Well held by keeper.

3.40. Fawkner shot from distance sliced wide.

3.41. Fawkner's McNamara not happy with offside call.

3.42. Fawkner cross from left headed behind for corner. Foul by Fawkner in box releases pressure.

3.43  Rare Clifton Hill penetration deep on right. Nothing comes of it.

3.45. Clifton Hill's Dohi looks a good player. Not getting much chance to show his skills though.

3.46. Half time. 0-0.

A tight tussle that Fawkner shaded. Clifton Hill with little sense of penetration will need to figure something out if they want to win this. Fawkner has probably played too much long ball. Better football might have seen them score already.

4.00 2nd half underway. Fawkner dangerous immediately.

4.01. Clifton Hill free kick 20 out on right. Weak. Cleared.

4.02. Fawkner free kick. 25 out to right. Low rocket. Well parried. Keeper gathers returned ball.

4.06. Good lead up work by Fawkner. Weak shot. Easily saved.

4.07. Clifton Hill counter. God crops from left. Gathered and cleared by lb.

4.08. Fawkner corner after good lead up. Headed over.

4.10. Clifton Hill shot just wide.

4.11. Fawkner free kick 30 out on right wing. Crossed. Headed back and after a bit of a scramble poked in.

Fawkner lead 1-0.

The goal hasn't changed the character of the game. Fawkner still dominant though Clifton Hill looking slightly dangerous at times.

4.18. Fawkner free kick 25 out on left. Shot takes slight deflection and saved easily.

4.20. Dangerous cross from Clifton Hill's Dohi. Kennedy off his line well to intercept.

Fawkner keeper, Kile Kennedy still in his pink gear.

4.21. Clifton Hill press again. Kennedy does well to prevent corner.

Clifton hill looking much brighter this half.

4.23. Clifton Hill muck up free kick. Fawkner break and Baross breaks and scores in one-on-one easily lifting it over advancing keeper.

Fawkner 2-0.

Clifton hill fight back. Two attacks in a row crosses from the left gave proved dangerous. Fawkner saved by a deflection and then excellent keeping and poor reflexes from the Clifton Hill forward. Offside in any case.

4.28. Clifton Hill corner right. Scottish centre half, McKlusky nae fkn happy! Nothing comes if the corner.

Clifton Hill don't seem to understand how dangerous they have been on the left. Dohi starting to have an impact. Fawkner starting to seem a little edgy. Not panicking yet.

4.33. Word through that Altona city are up 1-0 against Phoenix.

4.38. Clifton Hill yellow. Kennedy not happy that ref hasn't played on. Free kick results in blast over bar.

4.40. Clifton Hill Sabonovski off. Fakos on.

4.41. Promising Clifton Hill move called back for offside.

4.43. Fawkner 15 off 20 on.

4.43. Fawkner capitalizes on poor punched clearance by Milliaras. Good interplay and shot across keeper is wide.

4.45. Clifton Hill offside again! It's as if they don't know the rule.

4.46. All over. Fawkner win 2-0. And they deserved it.

Apart from a brief period Clifton Hill just werent in it. Fawkner should probably have won by more but they'll take it I guess.

Is soccer the game that never "happened"?

This is something from the book I am writing on the cultural history of soccer in Australia. I'd be really interested in feedback (positive or negative). It's slightly pessimistic when excerpted like this but is embedded in a more positive context in the book.

Soccer has failed to rise to the level of mythology, legend and story in Australia. Philip Mosely and Bill Murray put it another way: “it has not entered the Australian soul”. Roy Hay asks whether “there has been a failure to make the game Australian.” These formulations are all ways of remarking that soccer has not managed to insert itself positively into the narratives that Australians tell themselves about themselves. This is the basis upon which it is possible to utter an apparent falsity – that Australian soccer is the game that never happened.

Even though there continue to be countless moments of individuals, teams, clubs and associations seeming to play and organise soccer matches and competitions, the game has never really happened in and for itself. It has been an instead game and a nearly game, a counter-attraction or curtain-raiser to the main game wherever and whenever it has been played. Australians have played and watched soccer as a digression, a replacement, a substitute, a surrogate, a next-best thing at best, when they would rather be doing something else, somewhere else.

So games of soccer that were very much played, and won (or drawn) did not ‘happen’ in the sense that they did not register as having happened as significant moments of Australian behaviour. Like mirages, they appeared on the horizon and vanished as suddenly as they emerged not even to be consigned to the scrapheap of history but almost to disappear, leaving little but unsettling personal memories and a thin archival trace.

Australian soccer is a game on the edge, literally and metaphorically. It is a foreign game and has remained so for all of the 140 years or more that Australians have been playing it. Indeed, it is sometimes a “wicked foreign game” that menaces and threatens to overrun Australian society, steal our land and brainwash and enfeeble our children. Its values and practices are ‘other’ and the game has periodically been asked to go back whence it came. When it does find a temporary residence here it is often on the edge of the comfort zones of our suburbs and towns, on grounds built on industrial wastelands and recently reclaimed rubbish tips. Australian soccer has had to fight and scrap against more permanent and established residents for every piece of land to which it has access. Only rarely has such land become a settled home for the game. Freud might have described the condition of Australian soccer as unheimlich, in acknowledgement of its homeless and uncanny presence in Australian sporting culture.

Australian soccer is a game on the edge of attention, often languishing in the shadows cast by bigger edifices, silenced by the white noise of mainstream sports trivia. Mainstream media outlets down the years have rarely supplied good coverage of the game (peak moments aside), usually relying on the nincompoopism of the circular argument: “We don’t cover it because there is little interest. Australians don’t follow soccer,” thereby simultaneously confessing and justifying their failure to lead or create that interest or follow whatever interest that does exist. Newspaper and other media audiences have been reminded and reminded for the past 150 years about how little they know about this ‘brand-new’ game, soccer, leaving those who consider they do know the game feeling like uninvited guests.

Soccer sits on the edge of history in Australia. It is never a core theme for the historian – though perhaps sometimes an interesting sideline (or Greek chorus!) to the main story. Historians refer habitually to its novelty, difference and foreignness. Sporting histories are little better. While able to respect the game as a legitimate object of research, they are still written under the sway of the myths of soccer’s marginality. Sport historians find it harder to see soccer as a subject of research. Even those histories that profess to tell the story of the game from the inside can be diverted by the all-pervading mythologies that have built up around sport and culture in Australia. They are liable to take on board non-negotiable truths that rule the game out of the game. Many soccer historians have been complicit in their own marginalisation, happy to provide comments from the sideline rather than fight their way into the commentary box.

Australian soccer is on the edge of Australia – again in two senses. It is only played around the edges, in the big cities, home to the migrants, that leaf-fringed demense despised by the architects of bush nationalism. AD Hope’s ‘Australia’ has this biting stanza:

And her five cities, like five teeming sores,
Each drains her: a vast parasite robber-state
Where second-hand Europeans pullulate
Timidly on the edge of alien shores.

While not about soccer, Hope’s poem is about its place, the “second-hand Europeans” who live there and that place’s relation to the spiritual centre of Australia. The rugged heart, the heroic source of real Australia is not a place of soccer.

Australian literature, legends and mythologies are constructed as soccer-free narratives and the game’s intrusion in them is rare and ever dissonant when it does occur. Australian soccer has no Cazaly up there with whom its players can go – whether that be to popular adulation or to their deaths in the field of battle. It has no “six-foot recruit from Eaglehawk” to provide its “hope of salvation.” There are many Australian soccer players who have “come down from the bush” but the game has access to no mythological narratives in which to accommodate them. The game might be able to boast Kasey Wehrman, an Aboriginal hard man from Cloncurry, but it cannot point to any archetypal bush heroes in its pantheon of greasy wogs and sneaky Scotsmen alongside whom he can sit.

Nor does Wehrman have any tangible Indigenous notables to provide fatherly mentoring. The deeds of Bondi Neal, Charles Perkins, Gordon Briscoe, John Moriarty and Harry Williams could shine down the ages as beacons to young Aboriginal players because they were genuine stars of Australian soccer, a game to which Aboriginal players were welcomed in ways other codes of football found difficult. Yet this moment, like many others, has vanished from public perception and Aboriginal players are largely absent in the stories of Australian soccer.

Ultimately Australian soccer is a game on the edge of legitimacy, a game at the edge of itself. And while we inhabit a cultural conversation that can accommodate the perversion of logic and sense that allows the nation’s most played team game to be figured as un-Australian and marginal it will be ever thus.

Altona East v. Keilor Park, Paisley Park, 7/07/12

Back at good old Paisley Park after 6 weeks away.

Arrived at half time in the ressies. Altona East down 2-1.

Keilor score a good goal despite great effort by keeper. 3-1.

All over.

The other Les Murray, aka Steve from Broady and his stats from the ressies game below

How could they have lost?

3.04. Underway. Phoenix running away from the golf course.

3.06. Yabio for Phoenix shoots. Tries to beat keeper inside post. Put behind for corner. Poor corner. Cleared.

3.09. Keilor corner cleared. Firm shot well held by keeper.

Good open game so far. Though my commo-fascist companions beg to differ.

3.21. Piledriver by Bourakis for Phoenix from 30 just misses right hand post.

3.32. Close shot by Keilor. Just wide.

3.33. Massive uproar. Was it a dive by the Keilor player?

3.35. Good pressure by Phoenix. Results in corner.

3.36. Free kick Phoenix left. Too long headed behind for goal kick.

3.41. Nice interplay up front for Phoenix. Out for corner. Foul in box fk to Keilor.

3.45. Goal to Phoenix. About 6 unnecessary passes before its slotted from a metre out. 1-0.

3.49. Keilor corner. Reminder that they had poor field position towards the end of the half.

3.50. Half time. Altona East lead 1-0.

4.07. 2nd half underway.

4.08. Phoenix break left. Cross missed. Should have scored.

4.09. Keilor scores but goal disallowed. Not clear why.

Keilor have lifted in response.

4.16. Keilor now pressuring. 2nd firm long shot in two minutes smacks of desperation.

4.18. Phoenix fk 30 out. Floated in and cleared.

4.19. Keilor break. 2 on 2. Feeble shot straight at keeper.

4.24. Keilor break. Put behind for corner. Corner cleared.

4.26. Phoenix corner left. Into side netting.

4.30. Good break by Phoenix Yabio cuts back in shoots. Cleared. Return shot wide.

4.35. Good goal to Phoenix. Cross to Yabio. Cut back to Galea. Sidefoot placed beautifully into side netting. 2-0.

4.41. Yellow to Keilor.

4.44. What looked a certain goal to Phoenix just wide. Unmarked man in box.

4.47. Long shot from Keilor. Desperation.

4.48. Another looping dipping shot from Keilor. Just wide.

4.53. Keilor yellow.

4.57. Keilor kick. 25 out. Goal. Well taken. 2-1. A twitchy time for Phoenix.

4.59. All over. Phoenix win 2-1. Probably deserved to win as well.

They've called it the Wanderers, yeah the Wanderers, they roam around . . . etc

So, 'Wanderers' it is!

The new Western Sydney team's name has been announced and the club can now get on with the business of organising the less symbolic and more substantive aspects of running an A League team.

Like all such processes this naming has produced great consternation - something that is, admittedly, not all that difficult to create within soccer circles. While I didn't have a great stake in the outcome, I'm quietly pleased that the FFA has gone with the Wanderers. For once they might have got something right.

* * *

The Wanderers was the name given to the very first organised team in Sydney in 1880. Even the first game played by the team was out west, at the King's School in Parramatta.

In July of 1880, a movement seemed to emerge in Sydney. A number of letters to the editor of the Sydney Morning Herald were published, advocating the playing of football under the English Association rules.

This long letter from John Walter Fletcher published in the SMH on 17 July 1880 sums up the interest and takes the important step of suggesting a meeting. It is an important, if not founding, document.

TO THE EDITOR OF THE HERALD.

Sir,-I was glad to see in your issue of this morning a letter advocating the introduction of the English Association game into New South Wales, and I am a little surprised that some old English player has not made the suggestion before. I have reason to think from conversations I have had on the subject that if the game could properly be started it would become very popular, not only with players, but with the public. Unfortunately, a very general misapprehension appears to exist as to the nature of the game, a great many people I have spoken to evidently confusing it with the Victorian Association game, whereas the two games have not a single point in common. As to its chances of popularity, let any one read in Bell's Life the accounts of International or club contests in Glasgow, Sheffield, London, &c. witnessed often by from 10,000 to 12,000 spectators. It is, I think, about twelve years since the game was first started in England, though its principle, that football is a game for feet and for hands, had long existed in the Eton and Harrow games. At the present time the football players of Great Britain, playing under Rugby and Association rules, are about equally divided, and the two games exist side by side without one interfering in the least with the other, save that of late the value of good dribbling has become universally acknowledged in the Rugby game. I feel that we are rather late in writing in advocacy of the English Association game, inasmuch as a large sectïon of the football players of New South Wales, dissatisfied with Rugby rules, appear to have committed themselves to the adoption of Victorian rules. Nevertheless, there must be many old English and Scotch Association players, or old Eton and Harrow men, who would be glad to see their old game played here, and who would make an effort to introduce it; and I am quite sure that the principle of the game, which forbids the use of the hands, except by goalkeeper, and does away with scrummaging, collaring, mauling, &c, will commend itself to a very large section or this community. The game is essentially a scientific one, requiring, above everything else, unselfish and organized combination. I do not wish to attack the old Rugby game, which, properly played, is interesting and exciting to players and spectators; but must enter a protest against the introduction of the Victorian game, which, though certainly interesting and amusing to look at, is, I believe, rougher than the Rugby, and violates the fundamental principle of all games like football - I mean the law of off side. The very thing condemned under the name of "sneaking" in the Eton game is here encouraged and applauded, and in fact may almost be said to be the chief art of the game. In the brief space of a letter it is impossible to say all that one would in behalf of the introduction of the rules of the English Association; but I hope that, since at the present time a radical change is demanded in the present code, football players and the public generally will give the matter a more thorough investigation than it has yet received before committing themselves to the Victorian game. I should be willing to communicate with gentlemen willing to assist in starting a club under the rules of the English Association, and perhaps it might be possible to convene a meeting to consider the whole question. I am, &c.,

J. W. FLETCHER.

Union Club, July 14.

In what seems very little time a meeting is convened for 3 August.

FOOTBALL UNDER ENGLISH ASSOCIATION RULES

A meeting convened by Messrs. J. W. Fletcher and J. A. Todd will take place this evening, at Aaron's Exchange Hotel, " to consider and promote the introduction of football under English Association rules." All football players and others who may be interested in the improvement of the winter pastime are invited to attend. (SMH, 3 August)

And two short weeks later, the first game is played with the second already planned.

FOOTBALL.

The first match in New South Wales played under English Association rules was played on Saturday last, by the newly formed club, against the King's School boys at Parramatta. The visitors had a very fair team, allowing for the fact that hardly one of them had played football for some years. This advantage was, however, balanced by the fact that the boys had not played these rules before. The game was well contested for an hour and a half, and terminated in favour of the visitors by five goals to none; the number of goals must not, however, be taken as a criterion of the play, which was remarkably even, particularly after half time, the boys on several occasions only failing to score on account of their want of familiarity with the art of passing and middling the ball. On the side of the English Association Club all played up well, but the play of D. Roxburgh as back was remarkably good and invaluable to his side, and Scott's goal-keeping deserves praise. On the King's School side the play of Fenwick was very fine, and he would make a grand Association player; all, however, played well. Mr Savage, an old International player, played with and coached Kings School. The names of the club players were -T.A .Todd (captain), W.J. Baker, T.W. Fletcher, C.E. Hewlett, C.F. Fletcher, Wastinage, W. Robertson, W. Simson, Chapman, D. Roxburgh, J Scott (goal).

A match has been arranged, under English Association rules, on Moore Park, for next Saturday, against the Redfern Club. (SMH, 18 August)

Interestingly the team did not yet have a name. This situation was rectified at a meeting on 19 August at which the name was determined and a number of other decisions were ratified, including the decision to seek membership of the Football Association:

FOOTBALL.

A committee meeting of the newly-formed English Association Football Club was held on Thursday evening last, at which the following resolutions were proposed and carried -

1. "That the club be called 'The Wanderers.'"
2. "That the uniform be white jersey and cap, with badge southern cross, and blue stockings."
3. "That an account of the proceedings be sent to England to the secretary of the English Association, for publication."'
4. "That the club be enrolled (with permission) in the English Association." (SMH, 24 August)

The first game under the new name saw the team score another win, this time against a team from Redfern FC.

REDFERN v. WANDERERS.-The second match under the English Association Rules took place at Moore Park on Saturday last, and resulted in a win for the newly-named Wanderers by two goals to nil, both of which were secured in the first 10 minutes, after which the game was very even. Redfern Club, being strangers to the rules, played up well, ably assisted by W.J. Baker. For Redfern, J. Mulcahy and North played well, whilst for the Wanderers J. Fletcher, Harbottle, and M'Donald, were in grand form. (SMH, 28 August)

The Wanderers name pops up in match reports throughout the rest of the decade. In 1888 a healthy competition seems to have been established in the Sydney region, one which is oriented significantly to a Scottish sensibility (thereby marking a long tradition in Australian soccer). The following article suggests that up to fourteen clubs, including the Wanderers, were active in metropolitan NSW at this time.

SOUTHERN BRITISH FOOTBALL ASSOCIATION.

The annual meeting of the Southern British Football Association was held on Tuesday night, at Hodge's Commercial Hotel, Mr. John Wallace occupied the chair, there being about 25 members present. The annual report stated that a new series of rules had been drawn up on the lines of those used by the Scottish Association, certain alterations being made to suit the game here. During the past season there were seven clubs in the association, viz.:- Parkgrove, Granville, Rovers, Wanderers, Caledonians, Hamilton Athletics, and Pyrmont Rangers, whilst almost an equal number did not join, but two of these - Bulli and Joadja - have joined for this season.

Yet from here the Wanderers name appears to fade from the records. Indeed, a subsequent use of the name in July 1888 is in reference to the Parramatta Wanderers, a Rugby team!

While the archives are sketchy, Phil Mosely's brilliant thesis, 'A Social History of Soccer in New South Wales, 1880-1957' gives a good coverage of the early history. We learn from it that the first Sydney Wanderers were a spent force by the 1890s. Maybe their spirit lived on in the Auburn Wanderers (referenced in 1893 and 1898) and the Balmain Wanderers in 1899, but it is hard to tell. Nonetheless, the Wanderers were a substantial force in the establishment of soccer as a competitive and organised sport in Sydney - no matter how historically fleeting their presence.

There were plenty of candidates for the new name of the West Sydney Club. None of them, however, had the claim to history that the 'Wanderers' has. Whether this was a good point or not was not for me to decide. There are many other names and arguments that needed to be looked at. But I'd love to think that a sense of this history is what gave the name the edge. What I do know is that I and some other (though by no means all) soccer historians are pleased that an acknowledgment of the game's historical roots and longevity have been made in the naming of the Australian soccer's newest professional club.

Kingborough United Lions FC v. South Hobart FC, Lightwood Park, 24/06/12

This will be a cracker. The Lions have an opportunity to really pull South back to the pack (second place in fact) if they can win today. If they lose, the league will be a two-horse race. It could be a season-defining game.

Andy Brennan - the goal-scoring machine - has been running a bit clunky lately, scoring only one goal in a long time. He needs to find form again.

I reckon he'll get a couple in a 2-all draw today.

It'll be blogging light today because it might yet be my last game of the trip and I want to pay more attention to the game than blogging allows. Go to the Back Post for thorough tracking of the game.

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Arrived 1.50.

South won u19s 3-2.

Ressies 2-2 match still in progress.

Goal to lions. Trent pearce. 3-2. Can't be long to go now. All over, 3-2.

Sweep Running

• Julius. 2-1 south
• Callan. 3-2 lions
• Rod. 2-1 lions
• Ian 2-2
• Walter 3-1 south

Everyone confident that a few goals will be scored.

Who will find the pot of gold today?

Due to the great strip clash controversy south are playing in Lions' second strip. Grey tops and red shorts. The galahs?

2.36. Underway.

South pressuring to begin with. Lions having trouble getting out of their own half.

2.44. Good lead up work by south through the middle with Brennan playing deeper. Morton through and scores. 1-0 south.

Weather coming in. This could get miserable.

2.54. Lions free kick. Floated in from 35 out. Bobbled on heads and goes to keeper. First decent threat by Lions.

2.58. South free kick right. Floated in and cleared. Returned and cleared.

3.07. Long period of South dominance results in shot that clips crossbar.

3.10. Morton shoots at keeper.

3.11. Brennan shows great control and turns in box. Shoots just wide.

3.12. Morton heads just wide.

3.18. Lions get down the other end. Free kick from right. Headed behind for corner. Corner cleared.

3.21. Lions nearly score. Ludford clearance just misses!

3.22. Half time.

South will wonder why they are only one up. Matt Rhodes needs to get out the hair dryer and get his charges 'warmed up'. The most one-sided premier league game I've seen this trip.

3.37. 2nd half underway.

Kingborough looking a lot better already.

3.46. Brennan hits crossbar from 25 metres.

3.47. Williams misses a shocker at back post.

Lions getting some field position.

3.49. Ince shoots for South. Keeper down to it.

3.54. Good work by Cowen for Lions on right. Good cross. Cleared.

3.55. Lions free kick 30 out. Floated in headed back to spot and no one there to pounce.

3.58. Brennan scores. Beats keeper from left 20 out. South 2-0.

4.01. Morton right footed free kick from left. Hits back post.

4.01 Kingborough score. Farquhar takes the ball into the box and crosses for Cowen who slots an easy goal. South 2-1.

4.05. Lions Penalty appeals waved away.

Out of nowhere the game has lifted. And there's some tension in the press box. Julius wants the score to stay as it is. I want lions to get one and Callan wants lions to get 2. Walter wants south to get one more.

4.09. Lions free kick left 25 out. Floated in and cleared.

4.15. South free kick 40 out. Worked left. Brennan fires wildly.

4.19. Lions Schuth ruled offside. Shows dissent and gets yellow.

4.21. Brennan botches goal. Deliberately to stuff up walter's chances of winning sweep?

4.24. Lions free kick. 25 out on right. Floated over. Smashed out by Lions forward for throw in. Last chance.

4.25. All over. South win 2-1. Julius wins $20


Not the cracker I'd expected. Poor first half where Kingborough weren't in it and South couldn't bury them. Second half much better and Kingborough could have snatched a draw if possibly legitimate penalty claims had been upheld. South needs to convert its dominance into goals while it is dominant. Opposition teams will always feel like they are in it while South are looking good everywhere but the scoreboard.

A very cold looking Mt Wellington in the distance as we leave Lightfoot Park

Taroona FC v. Metro FC, Kelvedon Park, 23/06/12

I promised myself when I came that I'd get to see a game at Kelvedon Park and also get to see some non-Premier League games. It's taken me a while (with only one weekend to go) but I will get there this afternoon for the Division 1 clash between Taroona and Metro, which starts at 2.30.

Some History

TFC

There's a fascinating history here. On the website it seems to say two slightly different things. The Taroona Football Club Summary claims

Founded: 1978

• The first Taroona club was Taroona Ajax (1972) who won Div 1 in 1973, gaining promotion to the Premier League for 1974.

• They were relegated in 1974 and the club disbanded.

• Lindisfarne St Mirren merged with Taroona Junior Club to form the current Taroona Football Club in 1978.

The History column claims

Taroona was founded in 1972 out of the disbanded Taroona Ajax Soccer Club and immediately made an impact on southern soccer circles by winning the Metrolpolitan League Division Two. The club gained promotion, but due to dramatic personnel changes they were relegated the following year and even failed to field a senior side in the 1976 and 1977 seasons, entering only junior sides.

Nonetheless I get a sense of the club's founding as a Dutch Club, a momentary collapse and a brief period when it played under the banner of Taroona St Mirren.

MFC

Metro Claremont was founded in 1941. It isthe second oldest surviving club in Tasmania. Its formation came aboutthrough the hard work of Cyril Parks, Alec Stuart and Hugh Blackburn,dedicated followers of the British Code and keen to organise a side inthe New Town Metropolitan area. The name has no ties with the HobartMetro bus service as some onlookers outside the game may think.Many Metro players in the early days were former students of the HobartTechnical College, New Town (nowadays New Town High School).
Adapted from Chris Hudson's A Century Of Soccer 1898-1998 A Tasmanian History

Metro is a club with a great history that probably considers itself as having come down from greater heights. As a Sunderland and South Melbourne supporter, I have an inkling of just how they feel. (For those who think lower mid-table in the EPL is not really all that low have a look at this, Sunderland's sixth championship in less than 50 years. In 1936!)

Taroona is coming off two losses and Metro hasn't picked up a point since April.

Walter Pless has this preview on his web site:

Fifth-placed Taroona host sixth-ranked metro at Kelvedon Park at 2.30pm tomorrow in what should be a fiercely contested game.

Andrew Tye, the Taroona coach, is a former Metro player. 

“Our side to meet Metro this week has undergone a number of changes for varying reasons including availability and injury,” said Tye. 

“Rob Hortle comes in to the side for his first start of the year as a result of an injury to John Burridge, while Hugo Luttmer, Gary Hamilton and Darragh Carey also return.
“Hugo’s inclusion bumps the average age of our side up to 22, which shows that the team is still relatively inexperienced, but with youth comes energy, enthusiasm and an eternal optimism. 

“Whilst our last couple of weeks have been poor, the team has trained well and are a talented enough group that I feel 90 minutes of consistent football is just around the corner. 

“Metro are a team that will always provide a stern contest, as they showed in our last match, where they came from behind to beat us. 

“They have players that can hurt you and are particularly strong in the air. We will have to be at our very best to beat them.”

I'm looking forward to going to my second favourite ground in Hobart for the game today. Blogging from about 1.45.

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Here at 1.40. Taroona ressies up 1-0.

See what I mean? Excuse thumbs!

Metro coach, George Krambousanos - a work in progress?

Reverves game. 1-0. Full time.

John Meehan. Taroona president.

Just heard a very relaxed rendering of the taroona victory song. Based on horto magiko!! . . .  No. Actually the south Melbourne footy club song. 'Thunder from the sky etc.'

Glenorchy knights still with the best song in Hobart!

2.30. Underway on time. Taroona attacking the city end.

2.32. Taroona corner left. Comes to nothing. Taroona attack right. Out for gk.

2.33. Metro attack left. Keeper out to clear.

2.34. Taroona corner left. Cleared.

2.35. Metro counter. 19 shoots from left across keeper out for goal kick.

2.37 Taroona corner left. Through to right wing. Crossed back. Shot over. Goal kick fired back. Another goal kick.

2.38. Metro counter. Mix of poor and strong defending. Cleared and comes back to keeper.

2.40. Metro kick midfield. Comes to nothing.

2.41. Taroona attack right. Cleared for throw.

2.42. Taroona attack down middle. Through ball. Goal. 1-0.

2.44. Taroona Attack. Ballooned shot from left well over. Cross better option.

Taroona dominant and deserve lead.

2.45. Metro attack down left. Forward beats. Shoots across face of goal. Sustained period of attack for Metro.

2.46. Taroona break. Goal kick. Poor kick. Ball returned. Goal. Taroona 2-0.

Taroona left winger no 8 looking useful and threatening.

2.50 Taroona attack. Accidental handball. Seen them given before. Could've been a pen and game over.

2.51. Metro attack down left. Weak shot and keeper mishandles into goal. OG. 2-1. Game on again.

2.52. Metro attacks again. Defensive mix up. Nearly another.

Good end to end game now. There's a few goals left in this game.

2.56. Taroona free kick on right. Crossed in. Keeper gathers.

2.57. Metro through ball too hard. Keeper gathers.

I know I should be focused on the game but that's an amazing sky!

I was sitting on that. A good shot from Metro player. Just misses and destroys chair.

3.03. Metro midfield starting to get some possession but not giving good final ball.

3.04. Ordinary offside against Metro.

Peanut gallery up on hill. Lots of banter!

3.07. Taroona cross from right. Too long. Behind for goal kick.

3.08. Metro free kick. 25 out. Into wall. Cleared long.

3.10. Good work by Taroona down left. Puts wide when should have scored.

3.11. Metro attack left. Shot identical to goal. Keeper gathers this time.

3.12. Taroona build down left. Sustained attack. Comes to nothing.

3.14. Taroona cross from right. Keeper gathers. Metro long ball out for goal kick.

Good moment when the ref suggests two players should get off the field and take up boxing instead.

3.15. Half time. Gary Hamilton scored both of Taroona's goals. Good energetic football. Some technical deficiencies compared to premier but pretty wholehearted stuff.

3.30. 2nd half. Metro free kick 40 out. Onto Metro head. Caught by keeper.

3.32. Yellow to Taroon.

3.33. Yellow to Metro 4.

Pretty willing so far without either side settling.

3.36. Metro long ball. Striker air swing.

3.37. Taroona counter. Possession in dangerous territory. Free kick relieves pressure.

3.38. Taroona cross from left. Keeper gathers. Didn't repay the own goal favor.

3.39. Getting cold now.

The two benches.

3.41 Good Taroona counter. Pen appeals. Goal kick.

3.42. Metro counter. Close offside call with striker on goal.

3.43. Metro free kick. Nodded on. Keeper saves high.

3.45. Bustling run by Taroona 10. Fouled 25 out. Kick just over.

3.48. Taroona no 10 gets space down right. Has trouble crossing. Seems hampered by injury.

3.50. Period of Taroona pressure. Cleared.

Game is a bit formless at the moment. A lot of undirected overhit balls.

3.55. Taroona corner right. Too long behind for goal kick.

There's a older silver- haired Geordie playing for m. Everything he does drips with residual quality. He'll deliver a killer ball soon.

3.59. Fk to m. 30 out. Great save by keeper out for corner.

4.00. Equally good save other end. Ball coming back and keeper puts around his left post. Corner comes to nothing.

4.02. Disputed m offside. Kick long to keeper.

4.03. Taroona offside. And another.

4.04. Long throw. Keeper punches clear.

4.05. Good attack by Taroona 8. Put out by defence. Corner crossed. Header blocked. Cleared.

Series of free kicks to Metro. Metro looking likely.

4.09. Taroona break. Good save by Metro keeper. Another soft Metro free kick.

4.10. Great work from Taroona 8. Cross. Botched goal.

4.11. Taroona corner right. Cleared.

4.12. Good ball from Taroona left back 2 to no 8 down left.

4.13. Cross. Another botched goal.

4.14. Good work by Metro 20 on right.

4.14. Goal. Taroona break. Toby Dove rounds keeper and scores. 3-1.

4.16. Full time. 3-1. 

Probably a fair result. Even though Metro started to work better in midfield as the game went on, Taroona had the better chances and put three of them away. Metro keeper had a good game so it could have been worse.

And maybe this explains some of the poor ball control from time to time.

An Englishman's View of Footy, 1952

This piece was published in the Argus on 9 May in 1952. It's a bit silly but a bit interesting. It resonates with me for all sorts of reasons.It's a bit unfair on footy and it's surprising the Argus went with it. I've been trying to find responses but I've found nothing yet.

A young Englishman came into "The Argus" Magazine office the other day and rather diffidently offered us a typewritten manuscript. "It's an article about Australian Rules," he said. "Oh, you mean football," we prompted him. "No," he said quite firmly. "Not football. Australian Rules." Candidly, we weren't enthusiastic, but we read the article, dutifully, after he'd gone. It was an experience we would like you to share. True or false, we thought, these views possibly reflect those of thousands of English people now living among us, And that, you will agree when you've finished the article, is a chastening thought.

"A RACE of humans living in the south-eastern corner of a south-eastern continent: passionately addicted to a ball game that other men tend to find confusing and dull."

That's what an anthropologist might report on the people of Victoria.

As enthusiasts of this game you call Australian Rules Football, you are more rabid than any other State.

It was In Mount Isa, up in North Queenland, that I first made a real acquaintance with Victorians. Two young fellows from Melbourne: sensible, well-balanced fellows, with a sense of humor, too - until one day I asked, rather casually, "What's that funny sort of game you play down in Victoria - Australian Rules, or whatever you call it?"

Eyebrows shot upwards, pupils dilated, then features froze into a mask of supreme indifference. I was made to feel like a man who had strolled into the Kremlin and asked "Who was Karl Marx, anyway?"

I was a man among strangers; the unbeliever within the temple. As one who did not know the first thing about Australian Rules, I was given to understand that my universe was necessarily limited.

A couple of years later, picking grapes in the Murray Valley, the fruitgrower's young sons asked me if I were interested in football. When I asked them what they meant by football, they said, rather puzzledly, "Australian Rules, of course."

By then I had passed through Melbourne, and walking across a park one afternoon I had seen a game of Australian Rules being played by two local teams. Thus I was able to inform my young friends on the fruit block that there was only one true game of football soccer - and that their interest in such an unworthy and perverted offspring as Australian Rules could only be explained by the fact that they had never seen a well-played game of soccer.

When I returned to Melbourne, however, I resolved to see a game played by two big name teams. Perhaps I had missed something in that scratch game on the park. After all, there was the democratic maxim that a million people can't be wrong. A game which could hold such sway over such numbers must have something to recommend it.

The other Saturday I went to see one of these big games.

Having inquired the way to the football ground, I began walking across a pleasant parkland, studded with trees, fringed by old sedate looking houses. Suddenly a mighty roar and screaming rent the quiet weekend air, a thunder of human noise. The game had obviously started.

As I neared the ground I got involved with a stream of other late-comers, who were rushing forward with Intense and urgent air, as though on the brink of a revolutionary uprising.

Inside, the tiered stands were full of men and women shouting, gesticulating, muttering following the fortunes of the game with a rapt and unswerving absorption, as though the muddied and panting young men on the field were Olympian gods tumbled among us mortals for one precious hour.

The pitch seemed all wrong to begin with. It was kind of circular in shape; not the rectangle that one expects all proper football pitches to be.

BEHIND the odd-looking goalposts, two portly gentleman with flags waved to each other at intervals in some weird and outlandish semaphore; then two men In spotless whites, presumably referees, would scamper halfway down the pitch with the ball, like two ageing aspirants for the Stawell Gift.

The players were everywhere; far too many of them. Wherever the ball went, a pack, a ruck, a veritable mob would follow, reducing the game to a perpetual melee.

However could this continual jumping and kicking and booting and jostling and pushing, this bewildering flurry of arms and legs, arouse such passion in the breasts of civilised men and women?

Thinking, perhaps, some subtle chess-like precision of the game was escaping me I climbed some steps to watch from a higher level - but the game preserved its overwhelming and uninspiring pointlessness.

It began to rain, a slow, grey drizzle, which made the spectacle even more depressing. People retreated back to the covered stands, but the unfortunate players continued in defiance of the elements, slithering about on the greasy turf.

The one redeeming feature of the game was that It went fairly quickly. There had been a short Interval; they had changed ends.

The final blast went.

As I made my way, not unjoyfully, to the gates, I could not help but notice that most people were not moving. Inquiry elicited that it was only half-time; unlike proper football, they changed round four times in the course of a game. People were looking forward to seeing yet more.

When I left the ground, the screaming, the groanings, the commandings, the exhortations were on again.

I felt like a sober man among a crowd ol happy drunks; like a wise man among idiots who were thankful for their idiocy.

It was when they said. "You'll never be at home In Victoria if you don't like Australian Rules" that I started looking up time-tables back to Queensland.

--Harry Williams.

New Town Eagles FC v South Hobart FC, Clare St, 17/06/12

Yesterday a clash of the cellar dwellers. Last night a middle-storey battle. Today a visit to the Penthouse. South Hobart basically get their chance to establish a 7-point break on all opposition today. A position from which they would almost certainly win the league. The Eagles get a chance to narrow the gap to 1 point.

Hopefully it'll be a cracker. I'm going for Andy Brennan to break his drought in a 2-1 loss for South.

I'll blog it from about 2pm. The game 'starts' at 2.30 -- but if you believe that will happen I have a plot of land on the moon to sell you.

____________________


Here at 1.45. South leading 3-0 in the reserves just after Half time.

South shot just wide.

There's a line there somewhere.

South penalty. 4-0.

Full time. South 4-0.

2.35. Game underway after minute's silence.

Very physical game predicted by someone who should know.

2.38. Corner south tight. Headed over.

2.41. Brennan scores. Ball squirts through keeper's legs from a long shot. South 1-0.

2.43. Eagles fk left edge of area. Wasted over.

2.45. S corner left. Short to hickey. Eagles struggle but clear inthe end.

2.48. Good eagles attack. Corner left. Not cleared. Mckeown slots it from edge of area. 1-1.

2.50. Nice eagles attack.

2.51. South counter. Corner left.

2.52. Eagles goal. Left wing cross header saved. Follow up kicked into crossbar. Headed in to make sure. Eagles 2-1.

2.56. Eagles corner left. Headed behind for goal kick.

2.57. South corner left. Cleared.

Things have quietened down now.

3.03. Eagles fk right 30 out. Crossed and nearly met on left. Behind for goal kick.

3.05. Brennan tries from too far out. Doesn't get the power of the shot when he scored.

3.06. Eagles shot from distance. Keeper Well down.

3.08. Good work south on left. Cross over not met by Morton.

3.10. Another long shot by south. Easily gathered.

3.11. Eagle fk left edge of area. Push not seen by ref.

3.12. Brennan shot into side netting after rounding keeper.

3.14. Eagles attack. Defused.

3.15. Eagles fk. Long to wing. Cut back in. Striker bundled over. No foul.

3.18. South corner left. Cleared. Worked back to right. Brennan put through but can't beat the ball to the goal line.

3.20. Brennan crosses in to ludford. Good save from close.

South starting to dominate. Eagles only getting forward on the break.

3.22. Half time. Eagles 2-1.

Good game so far. South looked the better team but Eagles defending well. But for a Keeper error eagles would be two up.

3.38. 2nd half underway.

3.39. Good attack by eagles down right. Cut back. Shot from left just over.

Good opening spell to Eagles. Looking tidy and organized.

3.44. Shot from right by eagles. Just wide.

3.46. South counter. Brennan on right crosses back. Poor shot wide

3.48 South corner tight. Shot just wide.

3.49. Another eagles attack. Last ditch tackle robs striker and keeper gathers.

3.52. Eagles cross from right. Just behind.

3.54. Good lead up work by eagles. Cross from right and forward just fails to get enough on it. Goes behind.

3.56. Scott hurt in bad tackle. Yellow to south player. Could have been red. Scott returns to field.

3.59. South cross from left. Too hard and goes behind.

4.01. Good work from eagles. Long shot. Not enough on it.

4.03. Brennan looks to have hurt his groin.

Game now a bit of a to and fro struggle. Engrossing.

4.10. South corner left. Put behind for another.

4.11. Hickey slices a 9 iron from 40 out.

4.12. Weak eagles shot from left saved by keeper.

4.13. Eagles corner left.

4.15. Brave keeping. Eagles player lucky to avoid second yellow.

Eagles inexplicably rattled ATM.

4.16. South fk. Ends in overorganised farce. Cleared.

4.17. Scott in one on one. Shoots to early and too low.

4.19. Deflected shot saved by eagles keeper.

4.20. Eagles break down right. Last ditch tacle out for corner.

4.22. Attacking throw to south. Cleared.

4.23. South handles clearance. Fk from circle. Ball in Eagles attacking left.

4.24. Full time. Eagles. 2-1. 

Good enjoyable game. Eagles deserved it from their 2nd half performance more than the 1st. The result also breathes some life into the Southern Premier League. South have buckled three times recently when facing good teams who seem to want the game more than them.