State of Origin officially started when Western Australia defeated Victoria by 94 points at Subiaco Oval on October 8th 1977. However the states of Australia have been playing against each other since 1879 (to current) with various interstate carnivals and games being held all around the states and territories of Australia.
History of Interstate Carnivals
The first ever interstate games was held in 1879 with the VFA beating SA twice by a margin of 7 and 3 goals. The first major interstate carnival with seven teams (Victoria, Queensland, Tasmania, New South Wales, South Australia, New Zealand and WA) was in 1908 with the VFL undefeated (see results).
From 1908 to 1993 the carnivals were played every 3 – 5 years all around the country. Thanks to Full Points Footy who has a list of the years including results. Between 1908 and 1975 Victoria won 18 times (WA twice and SA once).
History of VFL/ AFL State of Origin
The biggest problem of the Interstate carnivals was the unevenness of the competition. With most of the better players of the various states playing in the VFL it meant that they were automatically playing for the VFL instead of their home states. Examples were players like Malcom Blight, Graham Moss, Polly Farmer and the Daniher brothers who all played for their own state and also Victoria.
What followed was a campaign by the WA league for players to be selected according to the region of origin rather than the league they play in. What followed for 20 odd years was a more even competition until the demise of the state of origin games in 1999 which saw Victoria undefeated since 1991.
The downfall of State of Origin
The 1970s and the 1980s was the best era of state of origin especially the 1989 Victoria vs SA game with over 90, 000 fans seeing Victoria beat SA. However it did not last with the 1990s becoming a farce with one sided games and the introduction of the Allies (TAS, ACT, QLD, NSW, NT) so in 1999 the last ever State of Origin game was played (see results of the games).
Some argue that the demise of the State Of Origin was due to coaches like Michael Malthouse (then West Coast Eagles coach) who coached WA during the 90s and continually did not play his stars so they were not injured and missed games for the regular season.
Others argue that seeing the games were just meaningless exhibition games that didn’t produce a national champion. It had no pride of winning the hard fought games as the regular season had a premiership cup.
Others argue that seeing the AFL is now a national competition with the players playing all around the country, the desire to beat the croweaters or the sandgropers or the Big V is gone.
AFL Hall of Fame Tribute Match
This last ditch effort to revise the state of origin games has had mix reactions and it wont be until Saturday 10th May until we see if it has been successful or not.
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May 7th, 2008 at 10:27 am
Footage of the Big V being smashed!!
http://youtube.com/watch?v=UhMJOzSPda0
Footage of EJ Whitten:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=NdfXrwX6vOU
The Herald Sun is including some footage every day, will add them hear. Please add your own or own memories etc
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May 8th, 2008 at 1:06 pm
Vic loosing to SA in 1993
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XO2pYBL29l4
and some photos (although mainly Vic vs SA – you can tell its been collected from a Victorian)
http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/gallery/0,22010,5031542-19894,00.html
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January 5th, 2009 at 9:32 am
How do I find out who played in the State games in the 80′s. I need to track down a player who played for SA (ex Collingwood) – a bit of a no name – played off the half back line.
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January 5th, 2009 at 9:52 am
@The Fly – Thanks for your comment and I look forward to seeing you around on K2K more.
In question to your querry, I would
1) Suggest to google the persons name
2) Look at this page of SA State of Origin players
3) Also look at this page of AFL in SA
4) and if all fails I would get in contact with either Collingwood or SA football and they should helped (I tried once with Cricket Victoria and they were helpful).
Hope that helps and I would love if you could let us now how you go.
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