Proposed VFL/AFL clubs are clubs that at various points in the history of the Australian Football League have been or were distinct possibilities but either did not or have not yet eventuated. Due to their association with the national Australian competition, they have drawn a large amount of controversy and media attention.
North was denied entry due to Essendon believing that it would take its recruiting areas.[1]
Port Melbourne
Port Melbourne was denied entry in favour of South due to its reputation of having unruly fans.[2] North Melbourne eventually gained admission in 1925, and Port Melbourne continued to play in the VFA.
VFL expansion (1925)
Between 1919 and 1925 the VFL sought expressions of interest from clubs wishing to gain admittance to the League. While Footscray, Hawthorn and North Melbourne were accepted in 1925, a number of existing VFA clubs were considered. The VFA clubs were Brighton, Brunswick, Port Melbourne and Prahran.[3]
One impediment that the VFL encountered when considering admitting existing VFA clubs to its ranks in 1925 was the existing recruiting districts; the VFL clubs' districts had been drawn up equitably in 1915, and clubs were unwilling to surrender portions of their districts to incoming VFA clubs.[4] One attempt to overcome this was the Public Service Football Club, which would draw its players from the public service rather than from a geographical district. The Public Service club was formally established in 1924 and was based at the newly built Motordrome, and it applied to join the VFL in 1925; but its application was rejected and the club disbanded without playing a game.[5]
North Melbourne (1907, 1921)
After the split between the VFL and VFA, North Melbourne became one of the stronger clubs in the VFA. In 1908, after University was admitted to the league, North Melbourne merged with West Melbourne and applied to become the tenth team in the league, under the name City Football Club; but, proposal was rejected and Richmond was admitted instead. North Melbourne and West Melbourne were kicked out of the VFA for attempting to defect, but North Melbourne returned to the VFA the same year under a new committee.
In another attempt to gain admission, North Melbourne proposed a merger with Essendon in 1921, when Essendon attempted to move to the Arden Street Oval after its home ground at East Melbourne was closed. The proposal was rejected and both clubs continued in their previous states. North Melbourne finally gained admission to the VFL in 1925.[1]
Footscray (1919, 1922, 1923)
In the decade following World War I, Footscray became a powerhouse of the VFA. It was a rich club in a strong industrial area, and was able to recruit players aggressively from the VFL. It first applied for membership of the VFL in 1919, and then again in 1922 and 1923. It was admitted in 1925.[6]
VFL expansion proposals
In the mid-1950s there were additional discussions and an attempt by a club to gain admission into the VFL.
Ballarat (1955)
In 1954 there was discussion within the VFL to expand the competition to include both Ballarat and Bendigo sides.[7] In 1955 the Ballarat Football Club officially applied to join the VFL. Although the application was referred to a special sub-committee that was to meet and make a recommendation, there is no evidence that the application was ever acted on by the VFL.[8]
The Fitzroy Football Club, while being a league powerhouse in the early 1900s, found itself in financial difficulties by the 1980s. A number of mergers and relocations were proposed by both the league and the club throughout the 1980s and 1990s, culminating in the club merging its playing operations with the Brisbane Bears in 1996.
National Competition proposals (since 1980)
While between 1925 and 1986 the same twelve clubs competed in the VFL, with the only exceptions being in 1942 and 1943 when Geelong went into recess due to travel restrictions, petrol rationing and loss of players to service in World War II, and in 1982 when the financially troubled South Melbourne relocated to Sydney, there were a number of developments in the 1980s when new clubs were proposed as the League became the pre-eminent competition in the country.
In the 1980s, the Los Angeles Crocodiles applied to join the VFL as the league's first non-Australian club. The club would have split matches mainly between Melbourne and Los Angeles; but nothing came of this.
[10][11][12]
In 1982 the Norwood Football Club had sought discussions with the VFL about admissions but these met with cold responses. When Port Adelaide were privately seeking admission into the AFL during 1990, the AFL approached the club but Norwood decided to follow the SANFL's decision with its intentions undecided at the time.[13]
Fremantle Sharks (1987)
In 1987, the first year after the admission of the West Coast Eagles to the VFL, traditional rival WAFL clubs East Fremantle and South Fremantle had discussions on the possibility of merging and joining the VFL as a second Perth-based team. The merged club was to have been known as the Fremantle Sharks, and to have played at South Fremantle Oval.[14]
Port Adelaide (1990)
Seven years before Port Power's debut season in the AFL, the SANFL club Port Adelaide applied to become the AFL's first South Australian club. During the 1990 preseason Port Adelaide played a practice match against the Geelong Cats at Football Park in front of 35,000.[15] However the bid met with legal issues within South Australia resulting in the SANFL creating the Adelaide Crows.[16]
Australian Capital Territory (1990)
The Australian Capital Territory Australian Football League expressed an interest in fielding a team in the VFL/AFL through the late 1980s, in large part to try to improve the profile of the sport in the ACT, since Australian rules football had lost already thin ground to rugby league and basketball since the Canberra Raiders and Canberra Cannons had begun competing at the top level of those two sports. In 1990, the ACTAFL began to arrange a deal with the AFL to field a Canberra-based team in the AFL Reserves competition from 1991, which the ACTAFL hoped would later lead to senior representation.[17] The ACTAFL had received assurances from the AFL throughout 1990 that the bid was progressing well; but progress abruptly stalled and the bid failed in August 1990 when Port Adelaide made its bid to join the AFL, drawing almost all of the AFL's strategic focus to the South Australian situation.[18]
Norwood-Sturt (1990s)
A rival bid proposed by Norwood and financially struggling Sturt to combat Port Adelaide's second bid was seriously considered during the early 1990s. When Port Adelaide won the second licence the Norwood-Sturt merger was still discussed but relations between the clubs quickly soured.[19]
Norwood Crows (1995)
During 1995 the Norwood Football Club, with the assistance of Wolf Blass, attempted to buy the Adelaide Crows and have them relocated to the Parade.[20]
Southport Sharks (1996)
By 1995 the Southport Sharks had reached 20,000 members began to lead the charge for a second Queensland team entering the Australian Football League. In 1996, the Sharks made their first bid to the AFL for inclusion in the national league, which was rejected by the AFL in favour of Port Adelaide's proposal. After which, the club continued to lobby for a licence.
Further attempts were made by the club to enter the AFL including purposed mergers with North Melbourne.[21]
The Melbourne Hawks would have consisted of the merger between the Melbourne and Hawthorn Football Clubs at the end of the 1996 season. Out of all the proposed merger combinations in the 1990s, it was seemed as ideal as it was known that Hawthorn had a football team which ranked as one of the best of all time but were in a dire financial situation, as opposed to Melbourne which had a sound financial base but were a club which had mostly struggled on-field since their last premiership in 1964.
Despite the controversial approval of the Melbourne Football Club board and members, the merger was voted out by Hawthorn members after a passionate campaign led by Don Scott.
Tasmania is traditionally a strong Australian Football state, and as such has been touted as being a location for an AFL club. The first serious proposal was made in the mid-1990s, as the League expanded further.[22] The licences were eventually granted to Fremantle and Port Adelaide.
The second Tasmania bid occurred in 2008 as the League announced that it wanted to expand further into Queensland and New South Wales. These licenses were granted to the Gold Coast and GWS.
Northern Territory (2018)
In October 2018, the Government of the Northern Territory announced that it would allocate $100,000 towards a "scoping study" to investigating whether the Territory should bid for an AFL licence when it becomes available. Chief Minister Michael Gunner and AFL Northern Territory CEO Stuart Totham met with AFL CEO Gillon McLachlan in Melbourne to discuss the potential bid. It was reported that an AFL licence would not become available until 2028 at the earliest.
Listed below are potential clubs that have been suggested by lobby groups, local governments or the AFL itself as regions that the league has expressed interest in granting licences.
Entry proposed for 2027.[25][26] The AFL consistently stated Tasmania was not a priority until 2021, when the Tasmanian government threatened to pull funding to Hawthorn and North Melbourne unless they were granted an AFL license as the 19th club. This proposal is going to a vote in August 2022, with the 18 AFL clubs to decide; a minimum of seven votes are required for their entry. This bid is supported by Hawthorn, Richmond, Collingwood and North Melbourne, but is opposed by Gold Coast Football Club president Tony Cochrane,[27] while the GWS and Brisbane Lions have confirmed that they are 'open minded' on the issue.[28][29]
Entry proposed for 2027-2030.[30][31][32] Official bid launched in 2021 after feasibility study completed in 2018. Business case continues to be developed along with stadium proposals. Collingwood president Eddie McGuire supports this bid as the 20th club.[33]
The AFL has stated Auckland is its next expansion priority pending construction of a suitable stadium, possibly by 2028. While Wellington has hosted all AFL premiership matches to date, the AFL has stated its preference is to locate a club in Auckland. The proposal has the support of AFL New Zealand and country's participation, with the average AFL attendance currently similar to that in the Tasmania, the NT and the ACT. The catchment population is highest of all AFL markets without a club.[34][35][36]
Not supported by the AFL. Canberra has had an open bid for a license since the 1980s, which has been overlooked by the VFL/AFL for decades including when the South Melbourne became the Sydney Swans in 1982, in 1985 prior to the sale of the club to Geoffrey Edelsten, in 1986 when it was overlooked in favour of Perth and Brisbane, in 1988 when the Swans folded and the licence was put out to tender, in 1993 ("AFL For Canberra Bid"), 1995,[37] a proposed relocation of the North Melbourne Kangaroos, and again in 2008 when licenses were awarded to Greater Western Sydney and the Gold Coast. In 2019, the AFL CEO Gillion McLachlan stated that Canberra now belongs to the Giants.[38]
Speculation by the media fuelled by the temporary home for AFLW, with millions spent on upgrading Maroochydore complex and the Lions' relocation to The Reserve, Springfield.[44][45][46]
^ In this regard, it should be mentioned that while the clubs are notionally independent bodies, the AFL retains ownership of five clubs - the GWS Giants, the Gold Coast Suns, Sydney Swans, Adelaide and Port Adelaide - and is also the sole voting member of three of those clubs (the Giants, Swans and the Suns).
