Footy at the 1956 Olympics | Know Your History with Shannon Gill (12.03.26)

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11 o'clock on Thursdays is no your history time with Shannon Gill. We're taking our cues here

from Andrew Dylan who last week was talking about Aussie rules as an exhibition sport at the Olympics.

In 1956 in Melbourne where Australian rules football was the exhibition sport. So I think our sport

is a sport that should be on that stage and we'll work closely with the Olympic Committee on

what form that takes. And this is classic no your history material. What on earth took place in

1956 when the vaffa be to combine VFL VFA team ahead of the bronze medal match of soccer at the MCG.

Shannon, hello Jared, I know go behind the curtain. I think as Andrew Dylan said those words in

that press conference, I saw a text message from you saying this has got no your history written

all over it. So we vaguely know the outline of this. Yeah, we do. But what the hell was the detail

of it? And the details good. And I actually I spoke to someone who played in the game this week.

So good. So I'll talk about that in a second. And this is where we hand over to you. So 1956,

what I've had callers in the past of those who attended the Melbourne Olympics. What do you know

about the Aussie rules exhibition game that was played as part of the Melbourne Olympics?

The 40 wings temper text is 043 98 1116. The difference is temper and the email is

waitly at sen.com.au paraphernalia photos anything you've got we would love you to share it with us.

Now I know when this when Andrew Dylan said that there were some

disingenuous commentary from people about all the AFLs trying to be an Olympic sport and that

was never the case. I think just get that on the record. That was never the case. He was talking

about an exhibition game like what happened in 1956. Now I've lent heavily on the MCC libraries

come through with the goods here. They there is an edition of their magazine called The Yorker

which has had a really great piece on this a little while ago some years ago by guy called David

shout out to David and the MCC library for assisting on this one. So at the time in the Olympics

there was a precedent that there would be two demonstration sports played at an Olympic Games.

One would be a local sport and one would be an international sport. So for example in the 1932

games in LA American football was played a match between two grid iron teams. So two college grid iron

teams which makes sense that was the local sport. Now I'm seeing text messages already. I sent this

to you. Nice. And we'll get to that. We will get to that. We will get to the games play this game.

Just any on the question. Anyway so after Melbourne gets the Olympics and we talked a little

bit about Melbourne getting the Olympics last year and the whole kerfuffle around what stadium it

was going to be played like why why wouldn't it have been played at the MCG. There is discussion

about what sports could be the demonstration sports. Specifically what could be the local sport.

Now you would think that this is a no brainer. We have a local sport that it's home is in Melbourne.

It was born in Melbourne. Born at the MCG where we're going to do the Olympics that it would be

Australian rules. Now people people argued about this which is feels like a no brainer but it

wasn't like bizarre. So they talked about Australian rules and surf lifesaving as being the two

possible sports which I kind of get surf lifesaving. Now the sports that are of the sun a guy

called Peter Bennett. Now you would think the sun would be plumping for Australian rules football.

No he says neither surf lifesaving or Aussie rules are truly national and it should be golfer tennis

which that kind of defeats the purpose. There's not a local sport golfer tennis ahead of his time

though. Yes. For what the Olympics would have become but he is the editorial reads the Victorian

Olympic Council waivers between surf lifesaving and amateur Australian rules. Football is its

choice for the national game of the 1956 Olympics in Melbourne. This is they're all very strange

as neither has any claim to be our national sport. Peter, too shate that is a very strange

position to take. It's quite weird particularly when you're the sporting editor of a Melbourne

newspaper. I would have thought you were probably going to plump for Aussie rules. Some other

suggestions which there's some logic in this the age suggests boomerang throwing could be

the local demonstration sport which okay there's some logic to that but look

Saturday prevails and by 1954 it took till 1954 to make the decision. But the most ingenious

suggestion so far is that there's nothing more Australian could be organized than an exhibition

of boomerang throwing by the aborigines to read the quote read the newspaper piece which I get

that that that makes more sense than some of the other suggestions I'd say but but no Australian

rules got the gig but there was lots of issues with how Australian rules was going to be showcased

which we will we will get to. What was the international sport? The international sport was

baseball so baseball has continued at times in the Olympics at different times so so baseball was

the international sport and Australian rules was the local sport. So Australian rules wins the day

they win the day. Now this is the scenario so the Melbourne 56 Olympics was held November 22 to

December 8 so out of 40 season now even so the VFL season was actually brought forward a fortnight

to accommodate this so the grand final was held on the 15th of September and just for a bit of

context the northern stand or the Olympic stand as it was as it was also known was opened in 1956

specifically for the Olympic Games but it was opened during the 40 season and it got a test run

on grand final day 115,000 people turn up on grand final day and they reckon more actually got in

because they broke in too they knocked down some doors to get in so that was the highest ever

crowd for a 40 game now can say that that 115,000 was not topped during the Olympics so the Olympics

didn't actually top that for the closing or opening ceremonies but as far as this Australian rules

there was a big issue the issue was who would play now the Olympics at the time was strictly an

amateur event and while the demonstration sport being Australian rules was not a competition for

medals it was under the auspices of the IOC and under their rules at the time that how things

have changed now that we see NBA players or play in the Olympics no professional players could

step foot onto an Olympic venue and play any sort of sport even if it was a demonstration sport

so anyone who had ever been paid to play was ruled out of playing in this exhibition match so

this is a this is a really problem because while we don't recognise you know the 1950s is the

professional era or we see the professional era as the day when players stopped working day jobs

and football became their day jobs but the players still got paid in the 50s to play and back in

that time even back further so even though they weren't getting paid much they were deemed professionals

so the vast majority of VFL players got paid so they were ruled out of playing in this special

one-off exhibition match so they had to find amateur players to play now there's a whole story

about amateurs and professionals which I think is probably more or almost more of an English and

an English cricket thing about where amateurs had one change room and professionals had another

change room the whole concept in really basic terms was that some who has significant

professional careers outside of sport would actually choose to play as amateurs and not take

money to play it was this sort of purity thing and that they were in in English terms they were

sort of the higher class people who already who who had money already into need to and money

now that did filter through to here as well Dennis Cordner who ended up captaining the VFL team

on this day he was an industrial chemist he chose to play as career as an amateur and others

chose others would choose amateur status some so they could continue to compete as amateurs in

other sports so there's some people that would compete in athletics and want to compete as amateurs

so anyway that's the amateur professional divide so what do they do so there is the vaffa still

today the Victorian Amateur Football Association which is obviously amateurs because that amateurs

in the name so that league was happening they had a representative team that would play in

representative games so it made sense that well there's already made amateur team of reasonable

quality that we can get to play so that's going to be one team you know then they scour the VFL

to find well how many amateurs are there in the VFL there's not many that A are amateurs and B

can be bothered playing a game in December so they found a group that who could play but not

enough for a full team so eventually they joined together with the VFA who players still got paid

in the VFA but found a bunch of amateurs in the VFA too that's where Lindsay Gays comes in so

Lindsay and his brother Barry were amateurs in the VFA now Lindsay didn't actually play in the game he

was an emergency unfortunately so that sort of ruins ruins the romance of Lindsay Gays playing

football in this but he was picked in the squad I believe he might have a Guernsey I've seen the

Guernsey yeah so he got all the spoils out of it VFL players declare status amateur footballers who

play for VFL teams must sign the same declarations of amateur status as actual competitors in the

Olympic games if they intend competing in the proposed exhibition of Australian rules at the games

the ruling decided on by the VFL was announced at last night's league meeting so this is quite

weird that that how involved it was to get this game going and I spoke so so there's Tobin plays

he played one game for North Melbourne as a 17 year old in 1956 he's of the famous Tobin family the

Tobin brothers so he plays one game for North Melbourne as a 17 year old in 1956 he's playing

mainly under 19s so he was selected late in the season now at the time Des's father was the VFL

delegate for North Melbourne and there was a little bit of insider trading here Des's father knew

that this game was coming up because he'd been to some meetings and he also knew that they were

battling to get aside to get up for this special game because there was no amateurs in the league

so Des's father recommends to Des do not take any money for this game and retain your amateur status

because you will be a chance to play in this special game that's coming up that no one's really

quite aware of just yet so and the funny thing with Des this is so he only played that one VFL

game but he was picked to play in this game as an amateur so there's a bunch of there's some

experience VFL players who are amateurs a few a bunch of sort of 17 and 18 year olds who

were still amateurs by virtue of the fact that they were just playing under the means and they

might have got a game here and there and then a bunch of VFL players so a lot of those 17 year old

18 year olds actually became really great players and we'll talk about that a bit later

all right so we're going to name the teams the Guernseys and then what did it actually look

like as the curtain raised or bronze medal soccer match at the MCG know your history of the

1956 Australian rules exhibition game at the Melbourne Olympics Shannon Gill taking us through it

in rules it's a fever there they even climb the roof and sit on the main rich pole

played in a huge mark double with 18 aside Australian rules was one of two demonstration

games played in the main stadium at Melbourne it's certainly interested in the thousands who've

only seen soccer union league or gridiron the two demonstration teams at the Olympics were

privileged to meet the chairman of the organizing committee the honorable Sir Wilfred Kent Hughes

but the foremost international football game is soccer you can pick an IOC film just from the first

three words the official film of the 1956 Melbourne Games Shannon Gill with no your history here

yeah I didn't get the best the best showing from that film I got to say but what they did get

Guernseys have you seen these Guernseys I have seen the I've seen one of them yes okay the great

yeah I've seen the VFL VFA one okay the VFL VFA one was a green Guernsey white color and coughs

Olympic rings on the front and then the vaffer one was the was the reverse was white with green

collar and cuffs and the Olympic rings on the front they look spectacular these Guernseys I've

got to say there's somewhat I've read somewhere in that that they produce replicate Guernseys

into coincide with the 2000 Olympics and sold them I've never seen one and I clearly didn't know

because I reckon I would have bought one so they were they were the Guernseys they wore now this

game was played on Friday December 7 which is the the second last day of the Olympics as you said

the bronze medal soccer match it was it was the curtain razor to the footy game we could run a

pole on who might have played the bronze medal soccer match and no one will get close it's it's

mind blowing Bulgaria V India which just in 1956 what happened with India and soccer like what what

went on there because what could what could have been now there are problems there are problems

of how they're going to stage this game and beforehand Bruce Welsh who's ahead of his time in the age

describes this the game that's coming up we should give this the full pop right okay game on MCG

senders will not be so hot by Bruce Welsh the exhibition of Australian rules football listed for

the MCG on the second last day of the Olympic Games looks like being one of the greatest sporting

fastest seen in Melbourne hot take Bruce so this is because of the athletics track so the athletics

is held earlier in the games it's a a sender athletics track but they the track can't be ripped up

and replaced by grass in this in this time frame but they also decide they're not going to cover

with dirt or grass so while the sort of the the little barriers around the track are gone the lane

markings are gone there is this sender track inside the playing field which raises all sorts of

questions in the first place bizarre in the first place is what what this track was and I'm struggling

to even explain what it was and the players themselves have talked talked about the fact that they

were getting their their stops stuck in the track and how they could this like obviously the the

track ran around the the edges of the ground so the goal square was a sender track all I sort of

stuff the the ground is actually reduced by about 30 metres anyway because of everything that's

going on and if you look at the closing ceremony of the games there's this it just looks like the

the athletes are marching on a dirt track it looks ugly it's not the way we know it today so

but even more bizarre one of the rules for the Olympics is that once the Olympic flag was

hoisted high on the main field in the main stadium it had to stay there for the duration of the

games right the Olympic flag this is not up on the top of the stand or it's planted it's in the

in the grass area where the field events would take place forward pocket city and forward pocket

city end yep on the ground but they can't take it down so this is the equivalent of playing around

the tree yes in the corner of the oval I once played cricket in England on a ground with a tree

in the middle of it and that was bizarre but this is so they they actually I believe they they

brought the boundary line in around the around flag all around the the flag how where is Bruce

Wilkes peace calling for this to be scrapped so so for for all for all it went on the other things

that were talked about too is that they had to just they did end up covering like the long jump pit

with grass and dirt mercifully those the steeple chase areas they had to sort of cover up so

as as there's as I said there's they would run on the ground or he told me they would run on the

ground and all of a sudden there'd be a drop where the cinder track was and so it was not an easy

thing to play on it's amazing this game actually happened yeah obviously like in today's you know

none of this would happen in today's today's environment but this did happen then

all right so we need teams the fact that the vaffa beats the VFL VFA has always been the unanswerable

question you're going to go some way toward answering that for us and then the reaction

so I don't know how hot a ticket Bulgaria in India was for the bronze medal match how how

hot a ticket was this it did it have the Melbourne buzzing we'll find out in a few moments time

Shannon Gill is running no your history on the exhibition game of the 1956 Olympics so some

messages Hayden can we reinstate the 1956 VFL PA very good AFLX coming to an Olympics near you that's

from Jeff another Jeff was my former teacher Jeff Tundbridge declared ineligible as he accepted

petrol money for traveling from ballerat and receiving a meat pie before each game who won need the

final score steady on we're getting there all right Shannon pick up the story for us so the

final scores with it the vaffa one which is quite ridiculous in in a way final scores 12-9-81

the VFL VFA team 875 now the first quarter the vaffa came out hot 6-1 to the VFL VFA team one goal

so how did this actually happen now again I've spoken from the horse's mouth spoke to Dez the

who was playing for the VFL so I don't know if these are excuses from Dez but this is what he

told me so at the time he says that the difference between the VFL and a league like the vaffa was

much less pronounced than what we now know so there were players in the vaffa team who could have

easily been successful VFL players but had prioritized their career over a VFL career because the

the rewards and the prestige were not as it is today an example being Tony Capes doctor who was a

doctor end up being the president of footscrap many years later but he was a player who Dez believed

would easily have been a very good VFL player but didn't chose not to play the vaffa team was

also a rep team that regularly played so they were used to playing together they were picked as a

team and had that sort of that team function that the VFL and VFA team didn't because they were

very much cobbled together and the VFL VFA team had some great players but they were a bunch a lot

of teenagers played and many of the guys would become great players but seven of the players were

actually in their first season and a lot of them were teenagers so they were to a degree a bunch

of kids and as we said Lindsey Gates didn't play he was an emergency he's brother Barry played in

the VFL VFA team so there's that's the reasons given as to how the vaffa beat the might of the VFL

because the the might of the VFL was not that mighty okay so we should go through the VFL VFA team

for some name recognition here so Dennis Cordner captain from Melbourne Keith Woolnow vice captain

from Northgate Ray Gabbitch from Collinwood Brian Gray Collinwood Ken Turner Collinwood Jeff

Westercott Footscray Brendan Edwards Hawthorne Brian Colopy Melbourne Laurie Dwyer North Melbourne

Ray Olsop Richmond Frank Dunnan Richmond Vick Nase Smith Richmond Brian Walsh St Kilda Neil McNeil

South Melbourne Dave Plunkett Box Hill Jack Sasella Coburg Barry Gays Peran Dez Tobin North

Melbourne TJ Hussey Northgate was a reserve Keith Marshall Sanderingham a reserve sadly there's

no Lindsey Gays is reserve on that list but he he was so some of the recognizable names there who

are early in their career yeah so Brendan Edwards goes on to be a great player who would have

won a normal Smith in today's today's game there's a whole bunch of Collinwood premiership players

there Dennis Cordner this was actually his last game of football he he had won the flag that year

with Melbourne retired but came out of retirement for one night only to play this game so so yeah

there's some there's some names Laurie Dwyer ends up being a great player for North Melbourne so

there's a whole bunch of them what is maybe more interesting is that there's a whole crew of

vaffer players who get the call up to play the VFL the next year so impressed so impressed the

scouts yeah so four players debuude in the VFL that next season all the season after now the most

successful a guy called Dick Fenton Smith who do you think Dick Fenton Smith would have played for

Melbourne he did he did so he kicked four goals in this game was named second best for the vaffer

recruited by Melbourne given the number one jumper was given number one before he played again

and plays in a flag in his first season ends up playing three seasons two grand three grand finals

two flags and there would be an argument to say that his performance that day lifted him to be

elevated to become a VFL player that's so good so just having a look through the vaffer team that

they're drawn from collegians old male bernians university blacks old scotch old paradians gloriously

the Commonwealth Bank yes university blacks Ivanhoe amateur powerhouse ormond coberg amateurs

and uh division old paradians yes yeah so it's yeah and and they were a team that played in

national amateur competitions and so forth all right so the vaffer wins the reactions we will do

next Shannon Gill's history of the Australian rules exhibition game at the Melbourne Olympics

never as Texas Shannon I was on the ground staff at the mcg between 1987 and 2001 when the

ground was reconstructed while the new great southern stand was being built the oval was excavated

to a depth of 1.5 meters to allow for new drainage sand and sand to be installed during excavation

the base of the Olympic running track was still there I got myself a jammed in full of cinder

that I still have cheers and they're fantastic they love to say it's fantastic

what why didn't they remember the running track it just makes it very long zero so a lot of this

that's very odd okay so we played the game and you've done a great job here the ages reporting of it

so it comes under a photo of this crowd endeavoured to catch a glimpse of the Duke of Edinburgh

driving his Lagonda sports car as he left the main stadium yesterday after watching the Australian

rules football demonstration headline visitors were rude about our football

wild start reporter now this is all worthy of reading this is such a good piece so no one put their

name to it I think this is the first takeout yeah and that was happening then too a perplexed

American look down on the main stadium turf yesterday turned in his seat and asked what gives

with these guys in the white butcher's coats the ghosts of a thousand football matches side

sacrilege and four victor and four victorians made menacing gestures in the general direction of the

Americans left eye this was our football he was talking about internationalism was out nationalism

the fiercest variety was in at the Olympic Games yesterday Australian rules football was being

demonstrated and Victorian hackles were high butchers coats indeed at least our football goal umpires

don't look like the complicated buffoons who pass from pies in American baseball misgivings so

you rightly point out this piece fluctuates between pride in the game and pointing out the

ridiculousness of what is taking place Dennis Cordner in green and white with colored rings on his

chest a scandalous masquerade then I do like our state robbery most of the insults came from the

traditional source the fiercely jealous and unoriginal state of New South Wales where men pick up

a football and run with it yet call it football foreign observers were divided into two broad groups

the first nearly all of them English and French dismissed the game as merely another example of new

world foolishness second and they included men from both hemispheres and three continents

thought it looked fun Chicago journalists Jim Danaway thought it looked like one long fumble

at first later he began to appreciate it how did our game play Shannon would you say on recollection

look the game itself they actually described the game it wasn't the higher standard game because we

didn't have the higher standard players so probably wasn't the greatest showcase the the ground

was in its state that it was in wasn't the greatest showcase either apparently 36,000 people turned

up on that day but apparently apparently 20,000 left before the before our footy game because I've

got this the wrong way around yeah so the Olympic bronze medal match was the courage to our

exhibition game between the Vaffa and the amateurs of the VFL it started at 4.30 in the afternoon

this game twilight was a twilight game I wonder they could catch on so all happened before

other thing about this so I love this part there's has got there's my man there's has got all his

gear he's got the he's got the goons he's got the photo of the team but what he's also got is a

medal because every participant in the 1956 Olympics got a medal just for competing so just

for everyone who thinks participation trophies are the death of society this was happening in 56 as

well so if you even if you you might want a bronze medal you also got a special Melbourne Olympics

medal all of our 40 footballers that took part got a participation medal because they didn't compete

for medals but they competed in the Olympics and he still has the medal that's so great

other legacy piece of that about this there were cameras they're covering the games because this

is the birth of TV in Australia what they did on the day and Russell Jackson wrote a piece about this

some years ago which is really really interesting they did a test run on a closed circuit TV inside

the ground where they broadcast and filmed the footy game which is seen as if not the first one

of the first proper attempts at broadcasting footy even though it didn't see the light of day

and this was a test run for what would happen later and apparently it came up better than anyone

thought yeah so it's got a significant place in the evolution of footy other sports

cheffield cricket cheffield shield kept playing through the Olympics the last day of the Olympics

stop for no closing ceremony victoria were playing Queensland at the junction oval Neil Harvey made a

turn oh great detail Melbourne Cup now this is interesting Jared hmm the Melbourne Cup it was

reported in January 56 that the Melbourne Cup was going to change their the Melbourne Cup kind of

was going to change its whole schedule for the Olympics so what they're going to do is they're

still going to have the spring the the Flemington Melbourne Cup carnival in its traditional time slot

but instead they're going to move the Melbourne Cup from the Tuesday and move it to two Saturday's

time on the 17th of November to act as a great entry point for the whole world has come to Melbourne

for the Olympics they'll get there for their weekend before the Olympics starts and they can

come and experience the Melbourne Cup what a great idea great idea but it didn't happen

oh it didn't they didn't know in 56 Melbourne Cup is to be run at Flemington on Saturday

November 17 as the highlight of the VRC's Olympic year meeting the traditional Melbourne Cup

holiday with this year falls on Tuesday November 6 will be retained and a race meeting staged

but they next yeah what a great idea they ended up having some special games themed meetings later on

but but they did consider it I feel I feel it's a missed opportunity not to have the Melbourne Cup

on the eve of the game it would be a good precedent to have yeah all right so that's what happened

in 1956 and the AFL has been invited to participate at the 19th at the 2032 Brisbane games is there

there's a desire to display what our sporting culture is and Aussie rules and rugby league are to

be a part of that the answer for the NRL is much easier it seems like Suncorp's not going to be

an Olympic stadium and Peter Vlandings has floated origin brilliant makes sense what does so we're

in season here what does the AFL do to participate in the Olympics it's a hard one and as with everything

broadcast rights might dictate it let's for arguments sake let's say that seven had the free to

broadcast rights for 40 and seven had the free to air Olympic rights it may be that there is a push

to maybe shut down 40 as much as possible during the Olympics because why have them cannibalise

each other so what we actually what we do know is nine's got nine's got the reasons yeah okay so

there we go so there we go so there is there is an opportunity there that 40 may continue but what

does that look like the now opening of the news I've got to float this one too opening of the

new stadium so stadium Australia in Sydney opened in 99 ahead of the Olympics could we open the

2032 season by opening the Olympic stadium with gather round at the new Olympic stadium and well

ahead of the games that might be something the AFL could look at but then the game alongside the

Olympics what where would you play it and what would you do the gab is going to be the venue for

cricket and the Olympic stadium as we've just learned from history will not be appropriate

to stage now a game in the way that it's configured so if you're going to make a pop you need to

be in Brisbane but there won't be a stadium for it and it's not quite the same if it's on the

Gold Coast is even though it's in the same state something in the Gold Coast ahead of the week ahead

you could I mean depending on when cricket is played could you play a game at the Gava the weekend

ahead of the Olympics and then do a can have a drop in pitch it's going to be difficult if you

staged it right and we got the right representative game imagine how powerful it could be as part

of a games if you get it wrong you could end up with the greatest sporting fast in history

as our man the other the other thing I say is if I'm an AFL player in 2032 I want to go to the

Olympics so I think part of you would be saying you can we can we have a buy can we can we just

shut down the season for a week you get to play in this representative game and be out the final

of the hundred meters it seems like a good train off at great research thank you next week

VFA on TV oh okay that is so timely VFA on TV you can participate weightly at scn.com.au Shannon

Gills know your history monster energy everybody knows weight monster zero ultra that's the OG

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