Afl Grand Final Quotes

That afternoon, Fremantle turned the football world on its head. Mark Harvey had been axed, to be replaced by Ross Lyon, a coach who had taken the Saints to four successive finals campaigns and three Grand Finals, and who was walking out of the final year of his contract. Forget the AFL finals were happening - this was the news of the week, if not the year!

The West Australian Football Commission (WAFC) got a second team but was not prepared to invest in that team because any investment would drain funds from other parts of the WA football system. The AFL also firmly wanted a second club in Perth to continue its growth as a truly national competition, but after seeing the Eagles play in three and win two of the five Grand Finals between 1990 and 1994, rival clubs were loathe to allow recruiting concessions that might create a second western juggernaut. Hence, the Dockers were not well resourced and light on for talent, left to fend for themselves and somehow expected to make money from day one. By the time the AFL established new clubs on the Gold Coast and in western Sydney nearly 20 years later, they had learned from previous mistakes and invested in those clubs to give them the best chance of success. The support and concessions those clubs received were phenomenal compared to Fremantle’s.