Wandsworth Demons
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The Wandsworth Demons are an Australian Rules Football club who play in the British Australian Rules Football League. They are a founding member of the league and have been based at Clapham Common in south London since 1990.
The club fields three sides, one in each of the league's divisions, the BARFL Premiership, the BARFL Conference, and the BARFL London Social Division. Wandsworth are the most successful side in the Premiership with six flags whilst the reserves grade side, the Clapham Demons, started playing in the Premiership in 1999 and were a founding member of the Conference in 2001. The South London Demons began in the Social Division in 2007, winning the inaugural flag.
[edit] History
Two Australians living in Clapham in 1990, Sean Angle and Craig Stephens, sourced a list of names in the area and held the first training session on February 14, and the club was born. The club went on to win the inaugural season despite being regarded as underdogs in the Grand Final, beating Earl's Court by two points.
For the majority of the 1990s Wandsworth wore the jumpers of the Melbourne Demons club from the AFL, and these were replaced with the club's own design in the early 2000s, a jumper based on a pre-season cup jumper of the WAFL side the Perth Demons.
Their club song is sung to the tune of Battle Hymn of the Republic.
The senior team has always been a force in the league and has never missed finals. The club has played in nine Grand Finals, winning six of them and so claiming premierships in 1990, 1992, 1995, 1997, 1999, and 2003.
