1934 VFL season

The 1934 Victorian Football League season was the 38th season of the elite Australian rules football competition.

Premiership season

In 1934, the VFL competition consisted of twelve teams of 18 on-the-field players each, plus one substitute player, known as the 19th 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 1934 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

Finals

Semi finals

Preliminary Final

Grand final

Richmond defeated South Melbourne 19.14 (128) to 12.17 (89), in front of a crowd of 65,335 people. (For an explanation of scoring see Australian rules football).

Awards

• The 1934 VFL Premiership team was Richmond.
• The VFL's leading goalkicker was Bob Pratt of South Melbourne with 138 goals (150 after finals)
• The winner of the 1934 Brownlow Medal was 19 years old Dick Reynolds of Essendon with 19 votes in his second VFL season.
• North Melbourne took the "wooden spoon" in 1934.
• The seconds premiership was won by Melbourne for the fourth consecutive season. Melbourne 15.18 (108) defeated Geelong 12.4 (76) in the Grand Final, played as a curtain-raiser to the firsts Grand Final on 13 October at the Melbourne Cricket Ground.^[1]

Notable events

• Bob Pratt kicked 150 goals in the 1934 season, reaching his hundredth in only 13 matches. The feat smashed Gordon Coventry's record of 124 goals in the 1929 season, and has yet to be broken.
• Gordon Coventry's second goal of the Round 5 game between Collingwood and Geelong was his 1000th career goal, making him the first player to reach that milestone.
• On 11 August, the regular South Melbourne centre half-back Laurie Nash played at full-forward for Victoria for three quarters (the selected full-forward Bill Mohr had broken his finger in the first quarter) and kicked 18 goals in a single match against the SANFL at the Melbourne Cricket Ground. Nash had kicked two goals from centre half-forward in the first quarter prior to Mohr's injury, then kicked two more in the second quarter, before dominating the match after half-time with another 14 goals.
• In Round 8, Fitzroy ruckman Colin Benham scored his famous "in-off the small boy" goal.
• In the third quarter of the round 10 match between Carlton and Collingwood, played at Victoria Park in a heavy cross-wind, Syd Coventry, in his last season for Collingwood, was knocked out after an altercation with Carlton's Gordon Mackie. As Coventry was being stretchered off the field, a vicious brawl broke out involving 20 players which required assistance of team officials and the police to break up. Up to ten players were seriously injured, but only Harry Maskell of Carlton was reported; however, after an investigation by the VFL, Maskell and Mackie were both found guilty and suspended for six matches each. A goal umpire and both boundary umpires were suspended for the remainder of the season for dereliction of duty in relation to the brawl.
• It is a matter of record that Dick Reynolds won the 1934 Brownlow Medal from Haydn Bunton, Sr by a single vote. Legend has it that Bunton, who had dominated in the last match of the season, tried to "suck up to" field umpire Jack McMurray as he walked off the playing field, and that Murray, sensing a blatant and improper attempt to influence his Brownlow voting, cast his votes for three other players.

See also

• Colin Benham's famous "in-off the small boy" goal

References

1. ↑ "Seconds' premiership". The Argus (Melbourne, VIC). 15 October 1934. 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

External links

• 1934 Season - AFL Tables