1969 VFA season

There had been open conflict on clearances between the Association and the Victorian Football League since the Association introduced transfer fees on its players in April 1967. League clubs were forbidden from paying transfer fees by the League's player payment rules (the "Coulter Laws"),[1] and so the League terminated the 1949 clearance reciprocity agreement with the Association, allowing Association players to transfer directly to the League without a clearance, and vice versa,[2] and it also had a ban on approving clearances to the Association in place during much of the dispute.

Despite the opportunity to transfer without a clearance, only three players had made this move to the League between 1967 and 1969: Terry Alexander, and future Hall of Fame players Kevin Sheedy and Peter Bedford – in no case was the transfer fee paid. All were suspended from the Association for five years, and the severity of this suspension is thought to have deterred others – particularly those who were not guaranteed to win a regular senior place in the League – from risking the move.[3] The only player whose transfer fee was officially paid was 1967 Liston Trophy winner Jim Sullivan, who in 1968 attracted a $1,000 transfer fee to move to Claremont in the West Australian National Football League, a league which did not have the same payment restrictions as the VFL.[4] On the other hand, more than sixty players from the VFL, mostly reserves and fringe senior players, made the cross to the Association without a clearance in the same time.[5]

In November 1968, the Australian National Football Council intervened in an attempt to end the clearance dispute, by mandating that the two competitions were required to recognise the other's clearances;[6] the ANFC had long-standing rules requiring reciprocal recognition of clearances between interstate competitions, but a loophole meant that these rules had not applied to two competitions within the same state.[7]

In April 1969, the disagreement played out in the controversial case of Geoff Bryant. The Association approved the clearance of Bryant from Box Hill to the VFL's North Melbourne, and had set a transfer fee of $2,000 for Bryant's clearance. It was initially reported that the clearance had been approved without the transfer fee being paid, which could have occurred only if the Association had broken its own rules requiring the transfer fee. Association secretary Fred Hill responded to the press that this was not the case: that North Melbourne had indeed paid the transfer fee, and had done so secretly in defiance of the VFL's rules.[8] Box Hill president Reg Shineberg described to the press the clandestine circumstances under which he had allegedly received the fee – in $10 and $20 notes, under cover of darkness outside VFA House, from a man he did not know.[9] The VFL arbitrators investigated North Melbourne over the alleged breach of its payment rules, but the charges were dropped after the Association did not provide any written corroborating evidence to the investigation. Whether or not the illegal transfer fee was actually paid was never proven.[10]

On 11 April 1969, while the Bryant case was ongoing, the Association Board of Management agreed by a 41–2 majority to drop its transfer fee rule; but, it did not reinstate a clearance reciprocity agreement, and in Round 1, two League players were permitted to play in the Association without a clearance: John Ibrahim (from North Melbourne, fielded by Sunshine) and Alan White (from St Kilda, fielded by Caulfield).[11] The ANFC issued an ultimatum to the Association reinstate a clearance agreement with the League, but the Association refused, and yet more players crossed without a clearance (including Fred Cook, who went on to become the Association's all-time leading goalkicker); as a result, the Association was excluded from sending a team to the 1969 Interstate Carnival, which was held in Adelaide in June,[12] and was then finally expelled altogether from the ANFC in March 1970[13] – ending its twenty-year affiliation with the national body which had started in August 1949.

The Division 1 home-and-home season was played over 18 rounds; the top four then contested the finals under the Page–McIntyre system. The finals were held at the Punt Road Oval, in Richmond.

The Division 2 home-and-home season was played over eighteen rounds; the top four then contested the finals under the Page–McIntyre system.

• In the week leading up to the Division 2 Grand Final, Williamstown captain-coach Max Papley and team-mates Dallas Patterson and Bert Johnson were involved in a car accident. Papley suffered bruised ribs and Patterson suffered head lacerations, but both played in the Grand Final victory against Sunshine.[27]

• List of VFA/VFL premiers