The Tasmanian State Premiership was an Australian rules football tournament which was contested at the conclusion of the season, initially between the reigning Tasmanian Football League (TFL/TANFL) and Northern Tasmanian Football Association (NTFA) premiers, and then from 1950 also by the NWFU premiers, to determine an overall premier team for the state of Tasmania. The state premiership was contested 57 times between 1909 and 1978.
History
The Tasmanian State Premiership was an official match that determined the winner to be awarded the title of Tasmania's best domestic football team. It started as an unofficial North versus South club match in 1904, and from 1909 it gained official status on the Tasmanian football calendar.
It ran as a match between the premiers of the TFL/TANFL and NTFA, alternating between the TCA Ground (Upper Cricket Ground) and the NTCA Ground until North Hobart Oval and York Park became the premier venues in the South and North. A perpetual trophy known as the Bulldog Cup, established in 1915 but not awarded until the next State Premiership in 1920, was awarded to the State Premiers throughout the competition's history.
In 1950, the NWFU was added to the state premiership on a trial basis; under the arrangements that year, the NTFA and NWFU premiers played off against each other in a preliminary final, and the winner faced the TANFL premiers. The following year, due to feelings that the football season was too long, that the state premiership tended to draw lower crowds than other special fixtures, and a dispute over whether or not the Queenstown Football Association should also have been eligible to compete, it was decided to abolish the fixture. However, the TANFL and NTFA premiers still played an informal state premiership game at the end of the 1952 and 1953 seasons, and the state premiership was formally re-instated in 1954 with the TANFL, NTFA and NWFU all competing. On a rotating basis, one of the three leagues would host and qualify directly for the final, and the other two leagues would play off in the preliminary final.
There were a total of 57 formal State Grand Finals between 1909 and 1978, with sixteen different clubs taking out the title: North Hobart (12), Cananore (10), City/City-South (7, plus one unofficial), New Town/Glenorchy (5, plus one unofficial), Launceston (5) and North Launceston (3, plus two unofficial) won the most titles. TANFL clubs won 33 of the 57 state premierships; NTFA clubs won 17 state premierships; and NWFU clubs won 6 State Premierships from 24 opportunities.
There were several occasions when competing teams would have a guernsey clash; in these circumstances, it was most common for each team to wear its league's intrastate representative guernsey, rather than its own club guernsey.
In 1972, 1973 and 1975, the Tasmanian State Premiers were invited to contest the Championship of Australia, a knock-out tournament which featured the premiers of the VFL, SANFL and WANFL.
In 1974 the Tasmanian regional premier teams, namely City-South, Burnie and North Hobart, sent a combined team featuring players from each premier team to contest the Championship of Australia.
By the 1970s, the State Premiership had begun to show a decline in interest from football patrons and was taken less seriously by the clubs and on 1 October 1978, the final match was played at West Park Oval between Cooee and Sandy Bay in front of a crowd of only 3,860.
The 1979 State Premiership series did not proceed, but the idea was not dead. In 1980 the three regional leagues contested a State Premiership series in the first 6 weeks of the season. This was sponsored by Winfield cigarette company and the State Premiership was won by Hobart.
In the period between 1981 and 1985 the leagues could not agree on the most viable format for a Tasmanian state premiership competition. Finally in 1986 two NTFA Clubs determined to field a senior team in the TFL. The two teams accepted were North Launceston and East Launceston. Within a short 6-week period of commencement East Launceston fully merged with City-South and became South Launceston.
In 1987 two Clubs from North-west Tasmania, Cooee (named Burnie Hawks) and Devonport (named Devonport Blues) joined the TFL and it became a truly Statewide Premiership Competition. There were 6 teams from Southern Tasmania, and 2 each from Northern and North-west Tasmania.
Since 1986 the winners of the Tasmanian Football League premiership are considered 'state premiers'. The seasons from 2001 to 2008, when the Tasmanian Devils were playing in the Victorian Football League and the local clubs played in regional competitions, there were no 'state premierships' contested.