1899 VFL season

The 1899 VFL season was the third season of the Victorian Football League (VFL), the highest-level senior Australian rules football competition in Victoria. The season featured eight clubs and ran from 13 May to 16 September, comprising a 14-round home-and-away season followed by a finals series featuring all eight clubs.

won the premiership, defeating by one point in the 1899 VFL grand final; it was Fitzroy's second (consecutive and overall) VFL premiership. Fitzroy also won the minor premiership by finishing atop the home-and-away ladder with an 11–3 win–loss record. 's Eddy James won his second leading goalkicker medal as the league's leading goalkicker.

Background

In 1899, the VFL competition consisted of eight teams of 18 on-the-field players each, with no "reserves" (although any of the 18 players who had left the playing field for any reason could later resume their place on the field at any time during the match).

Each team played each other twice in a home-and-away season of 14 rounds.

Once the 14 round home-and-away season had finished, the 1899 VFL Premiers were determined by the specific format and conventions of the 1898 VFL finals system.

Home-and-away season

Round 1

Round 2

Round 3

Round 4

Round 5

Round 6

Round 7

Round 8

Round 9

Round 10

Round 11

Round 12

Round 13

Round 14

Ladder

<onlyinclude>

|- style=background:#E6E6FA | 1 || align=left | (P) || 14 || 11 || 3 || 0 || 618 || 403 || 153.3 || 44 |- style=background:#FEEAD3 | 2 || align=left | || 14 || 10 || 4 || 0 || 684 || 386 || 177.2 || 40 |- style=background:#E6E6FA | 3 || align=left | || 14 || 10 || 4 || 0 || 590 || 436 || 135.3 || 40 |- style=background:#FEEAD3 | 4 || align=left | || 14 || 9 || 5 || 0 || 600 || 428 || 140.2 || 36 |- style=background:#E6E6FA | 5 || align=left | || 14 || 8 || 6 || 0 || 574 || 420 || 136.7 || 32 |- style=background:#FEEAD3 | 6 || align=left | || 14 || 5 || 9 || 0 || 528 || 502 || 105.2 || 20 |- style=background:#E6E6FA | 7 || align=left | || 14 || 3 || 11 || 0 || 317 || 597 || 53.1 || 12 |- style=background:#FEEAD3 | 8 || align=left | || 14 || 0 || 14 || 0 || 288 || 1027 || 28.0 || 0

Rules for classification: 1. premiership points; 2. percentage; 3. points for<br>Average score: 37.5<br>Source: AFL Tables</onlyinclude>

Progression by round

Finals series

Sectional rounds

Sectional round 1

Sectional round 2

Sectional round 3

Section A ladder

<onlyinclude>

|- style=background:#FFFFBB | 1 || align=left | || 3 || 3 || 0 || 0 || 126 || 73 || 172.6 || 12 |- | 2 || align=left | || 3 || 2 || 1 || 0 || 114 || 87 || 131.0 || 8 |- | 3 || align=left | || 3 || 1 || 2 || 0 || 98 || 95 || 103.2 || 4 |- | 4 || align=left | || 3 || 0 || 3 || 0 || 43 || 126 || 34.1 || 0

Rules for classification: 1. premiership points; 2. percentage; 3. points for<br>Source: AFL Tables</onlyinclude>

Section B ladder

<onlyinclude>

|- style=background:#FFFFBB | 1 || align=left | || 3 || 3 || 0 || 0 || 151 || 63 || 239.7 || 12 |- | 2 || align=left | || 3 || 2 || 1 || 0 || 247 || 81 || 304.9 || 8 |- | 3 || align=left | || 3 || 1 || 2 || 0 || 172 || 97 || 177.3 || 4 |- | 4 || align=left | || 3 || 0 || 3 || 0 || 35 || 364 || 9.6 || 0

Rules for classification: 1. premiership points; 2. percentage; 3. points for<br>Source: AFL Tables</onlyinclude>

Grand final

Starting time is local time. Source: AFL Tables

Win–loss table

The following table can be sorted from biggest winning margin to biggest losing margin for each round. If two or more matches in a round are decided by the same margin, these margins are sorted by percentage (i.e. the lowest-scoring winning team is ranked highest and the lowest-scoring losing team is ranked lowest). Opponents are listed above the margins and home matches are in bold.

Source: AFL Tables

Season notes

• The VFL reduced the size of its teams from 20 to 18 on-the-field players, with no "reserves". In doing this, the number of followers was reduced from five (four rucks and a rover) to three (two rucks and a rover).
• The first seven kicks of the round 14 game between Carlton and Fitzroy were free kicks awarded by the umpire.
• In the third sectional round, Geelong set records for the highest score in a game, scoring 23.24 (162), and the highest winning margin of 161 points, against St Kilda. These records both stood for twelve years and twenty years respectively.
• St Kilda's score of 0.1 (1) in the same match set the record for the lowest score in a VFL/AFL game, which has neither been matched nor broken since. Notably, St Kilda's solitary behind was actually the first score of the match.
• Geelong's Jim McShane kicked 11 goals in the same match against St Kilda, a VFL record that was not equalled until Collingwood's Dick Lee's 11 goals in 1914 and not broken until 1919.
• At the end of the 1899 season, in the process of naming his own "champion player", the football correspondent for The Argus ("Old Boy"), selected a team of the best players of the 1899 VFL competition:<br>Backs: Maurie Collins (Essendon), Bill Proudfoot (Collingwood), Peter Burns (Geelong); Halfbacks: Pat Hickey (Fitzroy), George Davidson (South Melbourne), Alf Wood (Melbourne); Centres: Fred Leach (Collingwood), Firth McCallum (Geelong), Harry Wright (Essendon); Wings: Charlie Pannam (Collingwood), Eddie Drohan (Fitzroy), Herb Howson (South Melbourne); Forwards: Bill Jackson (Essendon), Eddy James (Geelong), Charlie Colgan (South Melbourne); Ruck: Mick Pleass (South Melbourne), Frank Hailwood (Collingwood), Joe McShane (Geelong); Rovers: Dick Condon (Collingwood), Bill McSpeerin (Fitzroy), Teddy Rankin (Geelong).<br>From those he considered to be the three best players — that is, Condon, Hickey, and Pleass — he selected Pat Hickey as his "champion player" of the season. ('Old Boy', "Football: A Review of the Season", (Monday, 18 September 1899), p.6).

Awards

• The 1899 VFL Premiership team was Fitzroy.
• The VFL's leading goalkicker was Eddy James of Geelong with 31 goals.
• The Argus newspaper's "Player of the Year" was Fitzroy's Pat Hickey.

References

• Rogers, S. & Brown, A., Every Game Ever Played: VFL/AFL Results 1897–1997 (Sixth Edition), Viking Books, (Ringwood), 1998.
• Ross, J. (ed), 100 Years of Australian Football 1897–1996: The Complete Story of the AFL, All the Big Stories, All the Great Pictures, All the Champions, Every AFL Season Reported, Viking, (Ringwood), 1996.

Sources

• 1899 VFL season at AFL Tables
• 1899 VFL season at Australian Football