1953 VFL season

The 1953 VFL season was the 57th season of the Victorian Football League (VFL), the highest level senior Australian rules football competition in Victoria. The season featured twelve clubs, ran from 18 April until 26 September, and comprised an 18-game home-and-away season followed by a finals series featuring the top four clubs.

1953 VFL Premiership season
Teams12
PremiersCollingwood
(12th premiership)
Minor premiersGeelong
(8th minor premiership)
Matches played112
Highest attendance89,149
Leading Goalkicker MedallistJohn Coleman (Essendon)
Brownlow MedallistBill Hutchison (Essendon)

The premiership was won by the Collingwood Football Club for the twelfth time, after it defeated Geelong by twelve points in the 1953 VFL Grand Final.

Premiership season

In 1953, the VFL competition consisted of twelve teams of 18 on-the-field players each, plus two substitute players, known as the 19th man and the 20th man. A player could be substituted for any reason; however, once substituted, a player could not return to the field of play under any circumstances.

Teams played each other in a home-and-away season of 18 rounds; matches 12 to 18 were the "home-and-way reverse" of matches 1 to 7.

Once the 18 round home-and-away season had finished, the 1953 VFL Premiers were determined by the specific format and conventions of the Page–McIntyre system.

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

Round 15

Round 16

Round 17

Round 18

Ladder

1953 VFL ladder
Pos Team Pld W L D PF PA PP Pts
1 Geelong 18 15 3 0 1546 1079 143.3 60 Finals
2 Collingwood (P) 18 14 4 0 1518 1229 123.5 56
3 Footscray 18 13 5 0 1309 959 136.5 52
4 Essendon 18 13 5 0 1529 1177 129.9 52
5 Carlton 18 10 8 0 1409 1310 107.6 40
6 Fitzroy 18 10 8 0 1208 1421 85.0 40
7 North Melbourne 18 9 9 0 1388 1287 107.8 36
8 South Melbourne 18 9 9 0 1385 1323 104.7 36
9 St Kilda 18 5 13 0 1065 1561 68.2 20
10 Richmond 18 3 14 1 1220 1501 81.3 14
11 Melbourne 18 3 14 1 1137 1420 80.1 14
12 Hawthorn 18 3 15 0 974 1421 68.5 12
Source: VFL ladder
Rules for classification: 1) points; 2) percentage; 3) number of points for.
(P) Premiers

Finals

First Semi-Final

Team 1 Qtr 2 Qtr 3 Qtr Final
Footscray 3.7 3.8 4.11 6.13 (49)
Essendon 1.0 3.7 4.7 5.11(41)
Attendance: 68,533

Second Semi-Final

Team 1 Qtr 2 Qtr 3 Qtr Final
Geelong 3.1 6.4 7.12 8.12 (60)
Collingwood 2.3 5.7 7.8 13.12 (90)
Attendance: 70,292

Preliminary Final

Team 1 Qtr 2 Qtr 3 Qtr Final
Geelong 0.6 2.7 6.10 8.15 (63)
Footscray 2.1 3.4 4.5 5.7 (37)
Attendance: 58,615

Grand final

Team 1 Qtr 2 Qtr 3 Qtr Final
Collingwood 2.4 5.6 10.10 11.11 (77)
Geelong 2.2 3.9 5.11 8.17 (65)
Attendance: 89,149

Awards

Notable events

  • Because Anzac Day fell on a Saturday, there was a fortnight between Rounds 1 and 2. On the evening of Friday 24 April a night-time exhibition match was held between Collingwood and Fitzroy, under lights, at the Royal Melbourne Showgrounds for the benefit of St Vincent's Hospital. Collingwood 9.13 (67) defeated Fitzroy 4.19 (43) before a crowd of 22,000.[1]
  • Footscray won its first final since joining the league in 1925, their twenty-ninth season. This came after making the finals six times previously and being eliminated each time (1938, 1942, 1944, 1946, 1948 and 1951).
  • In Round 2, John Coleman kicked 11 of Essendon's 13 goals.
  • In Round 5, Fitzroy came close to becoming the first (and only) VFL/AFL team to be held scoreless in their match against Footscray at the Western Oval, which was played amidst heavy rain and a burst water main. Allan Ruthven managed their only scoring shot, a goal, with about six minutes remaining in the match.[2] To date, it remains the longest amount of time a team has been kept scoreless in a match.
  • In a streak spanning from 1952 until 1953, Geelong won 23 consecutive matches and played 26 consecutive matches without defeat; both of these remain VFL/AFL records as of 2021. The winning streak ended in Round 14, when Collingwood defeated Geelong by 20 points. At the time, Geelong had a 13–0 record and a four game lead over second-place, but won only three of its eight remaining games for the season.
  • Overall it was a low-scoring season: Footscray's 959 points against remains the lowest average points conceded per game since 1919; the season's highest score of 21.10 (136) was the lowest since 1924; and, for the first time since 1927, there was no match where both teams scored more than 100 points.
  • The Collingwood Grand Final team contained three sets of brothers: Lou Richards and Ron Richards; Bob Rose and Bill Rose; Bill Twomey Jr., Pat Twomey, and Mick Twomey.
  • Collingwood supporter and businessman John Wren suffered a heart attack at the 1953 Grand Final and died one month later.

References

  1. Hugh Buggy (25 April 1953). "Magpies rout Maroons in third quarter". The Argus. Melbourne. p. 30.
  2. Hugh Buggy (25 May 1953). "One goal debacle nears record". The Argus. Melbourne. p. 12.
  • Maplestone, M., Flying Higher: History of the Essendon Football Club 1872–1996, Essendon Football Club, (Melbourne), 1996. ISBN 0-9591740-2-8
  • Rogers, S. & Brown, A., Every Game Ever Played: VFL/AFL Results 1897–1997 (Sixth Edition), Viking Books, (Ringwood), 1998. ISBN 0-670-90809-6
  • 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. ISBN 0-670-86814-0
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