Talk:Champion of the Colony

message: Instead of deleting the page wouldn't it make more sense just to remove the winners from the list prior to say 1900? Surely some of the later winners have reliable references? Crickettragic (talk) 11:20, 10 March 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Deletion

message: I offer the following information in the hope that this historically valuable article will not be deleted.
*(1) In the times before the Federation of Australia in 1901, given that New South Wales, Victoria, South Australia, etc. were "Colonies" and not States, how else might one have spoken of an individual that we would now describe as "The State Champion" or "The State Title Holder", other than as the "Champion of the Colony"?
**For example, a search in Google Books for champion-of-the-colony will reveal a reference to such an individual, in track and field athletic in the Sydney Morning Herald of 1888 .
**Thus, there is nothing strange, unusual, or extraordinary in such a title.
*(2) Given that the first award was presented in 1858 — 19 years before the formation of the VFA — it is not astonishing that those upon whom this award was bestowed, besides the fact that they were in what we might, from a 2008 perspective, consider to be the VFL/AFL "pantheon", would have been overall a rather strange lot, indulging in what might well have been considered child-like pursuits at the time. I can't remember precise sources, but there was historically an enormous problem in the USA with adult sport (even in the 20th century), due to the fact that many religious groups thought that once one became an adult one should put away childish things. Also, in those times, none of the sports we now recognize as net-ball, track-and-field, swimming, tennis, soccer, rugby union, cricket, etc. etc. had not yet been established (the implication here is that the rudimentary forms of AFL/VFL not only could not be "understood" in their own right, there was nothing except children's games from which they could be "understood" by analogy.
**Thus, it is not surprising that there is very little mention of any individual so awarded in any wide range of sources.
*(3) Given that the award was presented in every year of the VFA competion, and was only bestowed upon individuals that played in the VFA give a further strong indication that this award was Melbourne-centred; and, on the basis that the VFA was the elite competition in the Colony of Victoria in 1877, it is not at all unreasonable that one would automatically assume that the the individual that was undoubtedly best player in the Colony would, in fact, be playing in the VFA.
**Thus, it is not astonishing that we now have a second division in the passage of time: the first being "Champion of the Colony (pre-VFA), and the second, depending upon your VFA/VFL allegance, either "Champion of the Colony (pre-VFL) or "Champion of the Colony (VFA).
*(4) Given that, immediately the eight breakaway teams created the VFL, in every year of the Award's existence from 1897 to 1945, the award was only given to VFL players, give further strength to the argument that the "Champion of the Colony" was in fact given to the best player in the VFL.
**Thus, given that there was no longer a "Colony of Victoria" after Federation, it is not astonishing that we now have four divisions in the passage of time:
***(1) the "Champion of the Colony (pre-VFA) from 1858 to 1876,
***(2) "Champion of the Colony (pre-VFL) from 1877 to 1896,
***(3) "Champion of the Colony" (VFL) from 1897 to 1901, and
***(4) "Champion of the Season" (VFL) from 1902 to 1945 — with one common factor: the best player in the best competition.
*(5) Right throughout the article, and the discussion above, it seems that most are unaware that the title "Champion of the Colony/Season" was the name given by Melbourne's ever-so-strong-advocate-of-Aussie-Rules newspaper, The Argus (founded in 1846), to whomsoever The Argus determined was, in its opinion, the "Player of the Year".
**Thus, it is not surprising that the "Player of the Year" was decided amongst players in the Melbourne-centred elite competition of the day. Furthermore, this explains the significant absence of references to such an award in other sources that might be derived from other contemporary newspapers and magazines, etc. that were owned by other publishers.
*(6) A further problem is with the statement in the article to the effect that "it was awarded based on votes from Melbourne's leading football journalists". There is a serious problem with this assertion. Whilst the award was certainly centred on the The Argus newspaper and, therefore, on "football journalists", and whilst it certainly would have been administered by journalists, it was not the results of votes cast by those journalists, it was the results of a Logies-type popular public vote.
**This is strongly supported by the evidence of a photograph taken in 1909 -- it appears on page 72 of 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.  -- dealing with the manner in which Essendon's Bill Busbridge was "named by the Argus as the Champion Footballer of Victoria this year". The photograph shows seven men around a table, with the top of the table and the surrounding floor covered in voting slips. The photographs caption reads: "The men from the "Argus" count the 105,000 votes for the champion player.". Thus, assuming the softest option in interpreting this equivocal caption (viz., that the total votes cast numbered 105,000, rather than 105,000 votes being cast for Busbridge alone) we can only conclude that, given the entire season, from beginning to end, was comprised of 94 matches, if there was a 3-2-1 voting system, the three votes per match would have required 374 different journalists -- and, moreover, each of those journalists would have had to attend six matches simultaneously each Saturday afternoon.
*(7) Why did it continue after the Brownlow Medal began in 1924? Why did it cease after 1945?  The answer to these questions is simple. Many were dis-satisfied that "their" champions were not being recognized by an award that firstly only considered the "fairest" players and then selected the "best" from that group. Meaning that, whilst triple Brownlow winner Dick Reynolds won the "Champion of the Season" twice, Jack Dyer, with no Brownlows, won the "Champion of the Season" three times. It ceased after 1945 because (a) it had outlived it usefulness, (b) the costs involved in its administration were no longer matched by benefits to The Argus, and (c) given that the Brownlow, having been suspended in 1942, 1943, 1944, and 1945, was reinstated in 1946, 1946 was a good time to stop.
*(8) I am also somewhat concerned with the lack of historical understanding displayed in the "cheap shot"  that an absence of knowledge of the 1897 geographical location of Fred McGinis and nature of the the utterances of Roy Cazaly proves that there was no such thing. Firstly it is axiomatic that an absence of evidence is never evidence of absence. Second, the intemperate "cheap shot" shows an entirely anachronistic demand that, in 1897, the notification of bestowal of such an award would have met with the circus attending, say, the declaration of the 1967 Brownlow Medal winner, with all sorts of people, fans, journalists, photographers, and many other sorts of Harry Beitzel-type opportunists invading one's privacy. If any notification was actually performed, other than simply publishing it in the newspaper, in the absence of the internet, television, radio, telephone, etc. it would have been through a telegram. Third, in 1927, players were far too busy working in their day jobs to attend 2007 Brownlow Medal-type presentation ceremonies.
*(9) I would suggest, therefore, that this article is retained, and the lead section be re-written to read something like this:
:::The Champion of the Colony (1858-1901) — or the Champion of the Season (1902-1945) once the "Colony of Victoria" had become the "State of Victoria" upon the Federation of Australia on January 1, 1901 — was the title given by Melbourne newspaper The Argus to the winner of its annual "Player of the Year".
:::It was determined by a Logie-style popular public vote, it was administered by Argus staff, and it was last awarded at the end of the 1945 VFL season.
:::Prior to the Brownlow Medal's introduction in 1924, the title of Champion of the Colony (or Champion of the Season) was most prestigious individual award in the elite Victorian Australian rules football competition that was centred on the city of Melbourne.
:::The Argus "Player of the Year" competition, which ended in 1945 (the Brownlow Medal was suspended during the war years 1942 to 1945), continued for some time after the introduction of the Brownlow Medal, because many thought that the Brownlow's award criteria of "fairest and best" had excluded many of the best players (viz., the Brownlow did not chose the best amongst all the competition's players, it only chose the best of a far smaller set, the competition's "fairest players"). 
Anyway, that's the way I see things. Please fix up the article; and if you want to use any of the above, please feel free to do so. Lindsay658 (talk) 01:06, 15 March 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Further to what is listed at the Sport and History site: At  “Old Boy” refers to Cameron being “the champion of the season” in 1912.Lindsay658 (talk) 07:11, 21 February 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  "Champion of the Colony" 

message: You still can't publish original research here.  The article as it is, is a very poor assessment of the topic.  It is focused too much on the doubts, rather than the FACT that the AFL for the past 15 years has treated it as a real award.  My advice to the "amateur historians" is to get a reliable source to publish your analysis - and the most obvious outlets would be the AFL Record or a major Melbourne paper.  Until then, the reliable sources are the AFL publications, which still (AFAIK, I haven't seen AFL 2010/11 yet) publish it as fact.  I'm going to rewrite the intro to give a more balanced view of it, rather than just degrading it as a hoax, which it obviously isn't.The-Pope (talk) 03:33, 19 February 2011 (UTC)
thread_title: Great investigation work, but...

message: The Fitzroy City Press, when reporting the proceedings of a special celebration on Wednesday 19 October 1898, states that Mick Grace had been presented with a gold medallion by the Fitzroy Football Club,in recognition of Grace "attaining the grand position of champion footballer of Victoria". Note (a) "champion footballer of Victoria", and (b) "1898".Lindsay658 (talk) 06:27, 25 August 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: Also, another award to Grace in 1900 season..Lindsay658 (talk) 06:43, 25 August 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: Explanation of the point being made the above -- This means that, unlike the article, which asserts the following — 1898, Dick Condon; 1899, Mick Grace; and 1900, Fred Leach — these contemporary newspaper reports have Mick Grace winning in 1898 and 1900, but not in 1899. Also, in support of 1898: .Lindsay658 (talk) 23:21, 25 August 2011 (UTC)
thread_title: Another Item

message: Just came across this talkpage, and the comments above do make for interesting reading. Considering this award is supposed to have been made by the Argus for some period, I thought I'd have a look on Trove (a wonderful source, if anyone hasn't heard of it). Lo and behold, four separate articles from the Argus in 1909 regarding an award for the "Champion of the Season" or "Football Champion". here and here. This was apparently a public competition, with readers required to send in a clipping with their choice for the winners of the award for both the VFL and VFA. Over 100,000 different votes were cast, though I can't imagine there being a way to stop people casting more than one vote. These articles do appear to confirm that Busbridge won the 1909 VFL award, and a John McKenzie of Brunswick won the VFA award (Results), and more importantly, that such an award did, in fact, exist. I'd be interested to hear people's responses to this, and I'll try and dig some more up on other years. IgnorantArmies?! 13:25, 8 September 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: And there are apparently no other references of any sort to this award on Trove. How weird. The only explanation I can think of is that this was a once-off. I'm now leaning back the other way on this... IgnorantArmies?! 13:38, 8 September 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: The latest editions of the AFL 2010/11 season guides has changed the intro to match the idea that it was created in the 1950s by Mullen.The-Pope (talk) 13:55, 8 September 2011 (UTC)
thread_title: From the horse's mouth...

message: From Dr Mark Pennings' exhaustive 12-year research and subsequent book on the first two decades of Australia football:
"I did not find any official reference to a ‘Champion of the Colony’ because this award did not exist…in later years, journalists for newspapers like The Age, Australasian, and The Sportsman offered different opinions (often differing) about who was the best player during the year, or by reputation, but there never was an official award."
'''
‘The Origins of Australian Football: Victoria’s Early History: Amateur Heroes and the Rise of Clubs, 1858 to 1876’, pp xix, 32. Ref here  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 124.168.106.161 (talk) 09:09, 11 December 2012 (UTC)
thread_title: The verdict is in..."

message: I think it is time for this list to be removed, indeed I'd prefer the whole article to be deleted. However, if others want the text retained simply to tell the tale of this "hoax" of recent years then so be it.
Further discussion about the non-existent Champion award has been published here:
http://www.footyalmanac.com.au/the-champions-that-never-were/
RossRSmith (talk) 00:10, 8 June 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: I maintain that this list has notability, even if it was never a contemporary award. Almost everything we know about players from the early era of football is based on the opinions of sportswriters of the time; and Mullens' list (despite its acknowledged errors) is still the best consolidated list from a reliable source that we have which summarises the views of those contemporary sportswriters. By way of example, if Mullens' research led him to conclude that H.C.A. Harrison and George Coulthard were the best players in the colony in multiple years during the 1860s and 1870s, that is still a strong verifiable endorsement of their prowess as leading footballers of their time. I'm happy to amend any reference to CotC to ensure it is not described as a contemporary award; but I'm strongly opposed to eliminating all references to CotC on the basis that it was not an award. Aspirex (talk) 01:06, 25 October 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree.  Not sure that you should even call them errors, or just discrepancies. The-Pope (talk) 03:50, 25 October 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: Looking more closely at the discrepancies, I agree. The one about G. S. Bruce in particular – he was definitely a member of the Richmond Cricket Club in 1858 Richmond cricket&searchLimits=l-decade=185|||l-year=1858, and since football was largely played by members of cricket clubs at the time, I would argue that it is not a "factual error" to state that he was a footballer from the Richmond Cricketers. Aspirex (talk) 22:10, 25 October 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: And likewise, it is clear that Wills played cricket for Corio (but not, it seems Corio Bay) in 1857 corio cricket&searchLimits=l-decade=185|||l-year=1857. Given the fact that no independent football club of any name is known to have existed in the pivot at the time, I'd argue that the "factual error" should really be viewed to Mullens' credit – acknowledging Wills as being part of the Geelong Football Club only after that club existed, and being forced to come up with some other term for the pre-club era. Aspirex (talk) 22:32, 25 October 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  Update