1979 VFL season
The 1979 VFL season was the 83rd season of the Victorian Football League (VFL), the highest level senior Australian rules football competition in Victoria. The season featured twelve clubs, ran from 31 March until 29 September, and comprised a 22-game home-and-away season followed by a finals series featuring the top five clubs.
| 1979 VFL Premiership season | |
|---|---|
| Teams | 12 |
| Premiers | Carlton (12th premiership) |
| Minor premiers | Carlton (14th minor premiership) |
| Night series | Collingwood (1st Night series win) |
| Matches played | 138 |
| Attendance | 3,574,281 (25,901 per match) |
| Highest attendance | 113,545 |
| Coleman Medallist | Kelvin Templeton (Footscray) |
| Brownlow Medallist | Peter Moore (Collingwood) |
The premiership was won by the Carlton Football Club for the twelfth time, after it defeated Collingwood by five points in the 1979 VFL Grand Final.
The season saw the beginning of the league's expansion into the interstate and Sunday television markets, with two Sunday matches played in Sydney, New South Wales.
Night series
Collingwood defeated Hawthorn 12.8 (80) to 7.10 (52) in the final.
Premiership season
Round 1
Round 2
Round 3
Despite being formally a part of Round 3, the Carlton vs Essendon match was played as a stand-alone match on the Saturday before Round 1, and was therefore the opening match of the season.
Round 4
| Round 4 | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Wednesday, 25 April (2:10 pm) | Hawthorn 29.15 (189) | def. | South Melbourne 15.5 (95) | VFL Park (crowd: 37,276) | Report |
| Wednesday, 25 April (2:10 pm) | Melbourne 16.23 (119) | def. | Richmond 15.19 (109) | MCG (crowd: 44,708) | Report |
| Saturday, 28 April (2:10 pm) | Fitzroy 11.16 (82) | def. by | Carlton 20.19 (139) | Junction Oval (crowd: 21,577) | Report |
| Saturday, 28 April (2:10 pm) | Collingwood 31.21 (207) | def. | St Kilda 3.11 (29) | Victoria Park (crowd: 29,380) | Report |
| Saturday, 28 April (2:10 pm) | Footscray 20.8 (128) | drew with | Essendon 19.14 (128) | Western Oval (crowd: 26,981) | Report |
| Saturday, 28 April (2:10 pm) | Geelong 10.13 (73) | def. by | North Melbourne 19.9 (123) | Kardinia Park (crowd: 21,353) | Report |
| |||||
Round 5
Round 6
Round 7
Round 8
Round 9
Round 10
Round 11
Round 12
Round 13
Round 14
Round 15
Round 16
Round 17
Fitzroy's 190 point winning margin is the biggest in AFL/VFL history
Round 18
Round 19
Round 20
Round 21
Round 22
Ladder
| Pos | Team | Pld | W | L | D | PF | PA | PP | Pts | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Carlton (P) | 22 | 19 | 3 | 0 | 2772 | 1986 | 139.6 | 76 | Finals |
| 2 | North Melbourne | 22 | 17 | 5 | 0 | 2574 | 2083 | 123.6 | 68 | |
| 3 | Collingwood | 22 | 15 | 7 | 0 | 2501 | 1974 | 126.7 | 60 | |
| 4 | Fitzroy | 22 | 15 | 7 | 0 | 2699 | 2198 | 122.8 | 60 | |
| 5 | Essendon | 22 | 12 | 9 | 1 | 2236 | 2127 | 105.1 | 50 | |
| 6 | Geelong | 22 | 12 | 10 | 0 | 2149 | 2140 | 100.4 | 48 | |
| 7 | Hawthorn | 22 | 10 | 12 | 0 | 2332 | 2336 | 99.8 | 40 | |
| 8 | Richmond | 22 | 9 | 13 | 0 | 2451 | 2512 | 97.6 | 36 | |
| 9 | Footscray | 22 | 7 | 14 | 1 | 2015 | 2463 | 81.8 | 30 | |
| 10 | South Melbourne | 22 | 6 | 16 | 0 | 2424 | 2666 | 90.9 | 24 | |
| 11 | Melbourne | 22 | 6 | 16 | 0 | 2093 | 2759 | 75.9 | 24 | |
| 12 | St Kilda | 22 | 3 | 19 | 0 | 1857 | 2859 | 65.0 | 12 |
Rules for classification: 1) points; 2) percentage; 3) number of points for.
(P) Premiers
Finals
Elimination final
Qualifying final
Semi finals
Preliminary final
Grand final
Carlton defeated Collingwood 11.16 (82) to 11.11 (77), in front of a crowd of 113,545 people at the MCG.
Awards
- The leading goalkicker was Kelvin Templeton of Footscray with 91 goals
- The Brownlow Medal was won by Peter Moore
- The reserves premiership, known as the Commodore Cup, was won by North Melbourne. North Melbourne 13.14 (92) defeated Collingwood 9.13 (67) in the grand final, held as a stand-alone night match at VFL Park on Friday, 28 September, before a crowd of 6,047.[1]
Notable events
- The record for greatest winning margin was set twice during 1979.
- In Round 4, Collingwood defeated St Kilda by 178 points, breaking the record set sixty years earlier, in the 1919 VFL season by South Melbourne.
- Collingwood's new record was broken only three months later in Round 17, when Fitzroy defeated Melbourne by 190 points, a record which has yet to be broken.
- Fitzroy's score of 36.22 (238) in the same game also set the record for highest score in a VFL/AFL game. This beat the record set by Footscray in the 1978 VFL season by twenty-five points, and remained the record until 1992.
- Fitzroy made the finals for the first time since 1960, ending a nineteen-year finals drought.
References
- Stephen Rogers and Ashley Brown (1998). Every Game Ever Played. 6th ed. Victoria: Penguin Books.
- 1979 Season – AFL Tables
- "Murphy shines in Roos' win". The Age. Melbourne, VIC. 29 September 1979. p. 40.