Melbourne Football Club

The Melbourne Football Club (MFC), nicknamed The Demons, is an Australian rules football club playing in the Australian Football League, based in Melbourne, Victoria. Founded in 1858, it is the oldest football club in Australia and is one of the oldest in the world. It is also distinguished by the fact that it was members of the club who wrote the rules of their game.

Club history

The club has been known as the Demons since 1933; it was known in its early days as the Fuchsias and later as the Redlegs.

Origins

Many sources claim that the MFC is the oldest professional sporting club in the world. There is no doubt that it was formed before any Australian club in any football code. However, some rugby clubs in the U.K. and Ireland are older (see: Oldest football club). The claim of "professionalism" is also contentious, as the Victorian Football League did not officially allow professional players until Rule 29 was passed in 1911, and even then Melbourne remained a proudly amateur club for many years.[1]

The MFC was an offshoot of the Melbourne Cricket Club (MCC), occupiers of what many consider to be Australia's finest sporting arena the Melbourne Cricket Ground (MCG, known as "The G"). The group which became the MFC came together informally on August 7 1858 and the club was formally established in 1859. On May 17 that year, at the Parade Hotel in East Melbourne, Tom Wills, W.J. Hammersley and J.B. Thompson (some sources also include Thomas Smith and/or H. C. A. Harrison), wrote the first set of written rules for Australian rules football. By 1866, several other clubs had also adopted an updated version of Melbourne's rules. In 1877, the club became a foundation member of the Victorian Football Association. The MFC joined the breakaway Victorian Football League (now superceded by the Australian Football League) at its formation in 1897, and has been a part of the competition ever since.

In 1889 the MFC was reincorporated into the MCC, and for many years the two organisations remained unhappily linked. The MFC's close association with the MCC allowed it to claim the MCG as its home ground and have it access to a wealthy membership base, but Melbourne's reputation as an "establishment" club has not always been an advantage. The MCC members' automatic right to attend all events at the ground, including Demons' games, also means that many potential members have a reduced incentive to join the club - thus, Melbourne's membership is currently amongst the lowest in the competition.

In 1900 Melbourne won its first VFL premiership (traditionally known as "The Flag," although since 1959 it has been complemented annually by a premiership trophy), defeating Fitzroy. Melbourne's greatest player of these early years of the VFL was Ivor Warne-Smith, who in 1926 won the club's first Brownlow Medal (the League's annual award for the best and fairest player). In that year Melbourne won its second flag. Warne-Smith won the Brownlow again in 1928.

Age of greatness

F. V. "Checker" Hughes became Melbourne's coach in 1933, and under his leadership the club entered its era of greatness. In 1939 Melbourne won its third flag, against traditional rivals Collingwood, and in 1940 and 1941 it went on to win two more.

In 1946 Melbourne finished second and Don Cordner became the second Demon to win the Brownlow. In 1947 Fred Fanning kicked a record 18 goals in the last game of the season. The following year Melbourne played in the first ever drawn Grand Final, against Essendon. The next week they came back and won the replay.

Norm Smith became Melbourne's coach in 1952, and the following year Ron Barassi played his first game. These two were to take Melbourne to new heights in the coming years. The Demons won the flag in 1955, 1956 and 1957, narrowly lost to Collingwood in 1958, and then won again in 1959 and 1960. With Smith as coach and Barassi as captain, Melbourne dominated the competition.

In 1964 Melbourne won its 12th flag, and seemed set for a new era of domination. But at the end of the season, in one of the greatest shocks in the history of the game, Barassi left the club to become captain-coach of Carlton. The following year Norm Smith was sacked after a dispute with the club. Things were never the same again for the Demons. They had appeared in every Grand Final from 1954-1960 and every Finals' Series from 1954-1964.

Decades of disappointment

Through the 1970s Melbourne, under coaches John Beckwith, Bob Skilton, Tiger Ridley, Denis Jones and Carl Ditterich, Melbourne languished at the bottom of the League ladder. In 1971 they started the season at the top of the ladder and maintained that position until they lost to Collingwood in round 6. The second half of the season was disappointing and they missed the finals. They collected wooden spoons in 1974 and 1978, but narrowly missed the finals in 1976. Innacuracy kept them from a promising start in 1977 as the club was expecting to continue its good form at the end of the previous season. In his only season as coach in 1978 Denis Jones oversaw a wooden spoon and in 1979 Ditterich returned to the club as Captain-Coach. In 1980 the MFC finally legally separated from the MCC, becoming a public company, in an effort to attract more members and improve the club's finances.

Melbourne 1980's shield logo

In 1981, under the chairmanship of Sir Billy Snedden, Ron Barassi returned to Melbourne as coach and immediately appointed Robert Flower as captain. In Barassi's first year the team finished last, but this was attributed to working out who the willing players were and the club won some powerful victories in the next 3 seasons. But although Brian Wilson won the Brownlow in 1982, and Peter Moore won it in 1984, Barassi was unable to get the club back into premiership contention.

For a brief period in the middle of the 1984 season Barassi's five year plan appeared to be on target. In Round 13 they defeated the previous season's premiers Hawthorn and were in fourth position with a strong percentage after having lost the first five games of the season. They met the eventual premiers Essendon in the next game and lost, destroying the confidence that had been built up in the previous games. The losses started and they began to slip down the ladder. They were in the top 5 after the fifth round in 1985 but a complete loss of form saw them finish second last and Barassi felt that he could do little to help the club further.

In 1986 Barassi was replaced by John Northey. Under Northey, Melbourne made the finals in 1987, for the first time since 1964, losing the Preliminary Final to Hawthorn on the last kick of the game after the final siren, when future Brownlow Medallist Jim Stynes walked over the mark after Rod Grinter was penalised, allowing Garry Buckenara a relatively simple opportunity. It was also the last game played by the team captain Robert Flower. The following year the Demons did even better, reaching the Grand Final, only to be defeated, again, by Hawthorn.

From 1987 to the end of 1991 Melbourne had five positive win-loss ratios in successive seasons which they had not been able to achieve since the 1954-1965 era. They enjoyed 76 wins over 47 losses which, in comparison with the 1966-1986 period with only 140 victories and 309 losses, was extremely successful.

Thereafter things went downhill for Northey, although Jim Stynes won the Brownlow in 1991. In 1992 the club finished 11th, and Northey was replaced by Neil Balme as coach. Balme got Melbourne into the finals in 1994, but by 1997 Melbourne was at the bottom of the ladder. By 1996 the club was also in dire financial straits. The board decided, with 52% support of the members, on the desperate step of a merger with Hawthorn, but the Hawthorn members rejected the idea. This was the final straw for many of the MFC members, after years of continual failure.

In the aftermath of the 1996 merger vote, an unlikely rebel leader, Orthodox rabbi and mining tycoon Joseph Gutnick, became president. He put $3 million of his own money into the club, and sacked Balme as coach midway through the 1997 season.

In 2000 the new coach, Neale Daniher, took Melbourne to the Grand Final, where the Demons were soundly beaten by Essendon, but the members expected a new era of success. But in 2001 it was same old story: Melbourne finished 12th. In 2002, although Melbourne again made the finals, Gutnick's autocratic ways provoked another revolt, and after the club took his money, he was voted out by the members.

In 2003 Melbourne plunged into a new crisis, winning only five games for the year and posting a $1 million loss. President Gabriel Szondy resigned and it seemed that Daniher's tenure as coach was under threat. But, continuting the recent trend, in 2004, Melbourne climbed the ladder again, winning 14 games and leading the competition, albeit for one round only, in Round 18. And although the team lost their remaining four games, they still made the finals, only to lose that match also, by five points to Essendon. On a bright note, young-gun Jared Rivers was the winner of the AFL Rising Star award.

Melbourne started 2005 strongly, finding themselves in second place after Round 12 with 9 wins. However a horror streak of seven consecutive losses placed the club's finals hopes in doubt, until the Demons finished the year with 3 nail-biting victories to salvage an Elimination Final appearance. Melbourne was eliminated from the premiership race in the opening week of the finals by Geelong. In 2006, after a slow start, Melbourne again performed well, and were in the top four by the middle of the season. By 2006 Daniher was the second longest-serving coach in the AFL (after Kevin Sheedy), and the longest-surviving in the entire history of the VFL-AFL not to have won a premiership. Many feel 2006 may be his last chance.

Membership base

In 2005, the Melbourne Football Club had a record number of members, but still has one of the smallest membership bases in the AFL competition. This is partly because many traditional Melbourne supporters are already members of the Melbourne Cricket Club, which gets them privileged access to the MCG, so they don't see the need to pay for a separate MFC membership.

Year, #members, finishing position
*1998 17,870 (4th);
*1999 19,713 (14th);
*2000 18,227 (2nd);
*2001 22,940 (11th);
*2002 20,152 (6th);
*2003 20,555 (14th);
*2004 25,252 (5th);
*2005 24,220 (7th);
*2006 24,698 (as at June 30th, 2006) [2]

Premierships

1900, 1926, 1939-40-41, 1948, 1955-56-57, 1959-60, 1964

Current dilemmas

The underlying problem for Melbourne and the other older clubs is that the new Australian Football League, a 16-team national competition, has arguably left too many clubs in Melbourne, a city which despite its great tradition of passionate support for Australian rules football, cannot financially support ten clubs competing against wealthy and successful interstate newcomers.

Like other struggling Melbourne based clubs, the Demons have sold games to interstate venues, including 1 game to Brisbane in 2005 and a game to the Gold Coast, Queensland in 2006.

Some observers wonder about the long-term future of the club, with its thin membership and supporter base, political instability, and lack of consistent on-field success. The AFL's current TV deal requires a 16-team competition and thus it is highly unlikely a team will be allowed to fold in the next few years. If such a guarantee disappeared and clubs were left to survive on their own resources, the Demons, along with the Western Bulldogs and Kangaroos, look the most financially vulnerable. Melbourne has had an additional vulnerability, in that did not have an established permanent home base, with current administration, training and social bases scattered around various venues of the MCG, Junction Oval and the Bentleigh Club. However, the Melbourne Football Club has established a proposal to become co-tenants at a refurbished Olympic Park with other football codes - the Melbourne Storm Rugby League Club and Melbourne Victory Football (Soccer) Club, due to be completed sometime in 2009.

Current squad

As of May 20, 2005:{|valign="top"|
*  1 Simon Buckley
*  2 Nathan Jones
*  3 Clint Bizzell
*  4 Ben Holland
*  5 Brock McLean
*  6 Matthew Bate
*  7 Brad Miller
*  8 Alistair Nicholson
*  9 David Neitz (captain)
* 10 Daniel Ward (footballer)
* 11 Paul Johnson
* 12 Colin Sylvia
* 13 Adem Yze
* 14 Lynden Dunn
* 15 Nick Smith