1979 VFL season
83rd season of the Victorian Football League (VFL)
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The 1979 VFL season was the 83rd season of the Victorian Football League (VFL), the highest level senior Australian rules football competition in Victoria. The season featured twelve clubs, ran from 31 March until 29 September, and comprised a 22-game home-and-away season followed by a finals series featuring the top five clubs.
| 1979 VFL premiership season | |
|---|---|
| Teams | 12 |
| Premiers | Carlton 12th premiership |
| Minor premiers | Carlton 14th minor premiership |
| Night series | Collingwood 1st Night series win |
| Brownlow Medallist | Peter Moore (Collingwood) |
| Coleman Medallist | Kelvin Templeton (Footscray) |
| Attendance | |
| Matches played | 138 |
| Total attendance | 3,574,281 (25,901 per match) |
| Highest | 113,545 |
The premiership was won by the Carlton Football Club for the twelfth time, after it defeated Collingwood by five points in the 1979 VFL Grand Final.
The season saw the beginning of the league's expansion into the interstate and Sunday television markets, with two Sunday matches played in Sydney, New South Wales.
Night series
Collingwood defeated Hawthorn 12.8 (80) to 7.10 (52) in the final.
Home-and-away season
Round 1
Round 2
Round 3
Despite being formally a part of Round 3, the Essendon vs Carlton match was played as a stand-alone match on the Saturday before Round 1, and was therefore the opening match of the season.
Round 4
| Round 4 | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Wednesday, 25 April (2:10 pm) | Hawthorn 29.15 (189) | def. | South Melbourne 15.5 (95) | VFL Park (crowd: 37,276) | Report |
| Wednesday, 25 April (2:10 pm) | Melbourne 16.23 (119) | def. | Richmond 15.19 (109) | MCG (crowd: 44,708) | Report |
| Saturday, 28 April (2:10 pm) | Fitzroy 11.16 (82) | def. by | Carlton 20.19 (139) | Junction Oval (crowd: 21,577) | Report |
| Saturday, 28 April (2:10 pm) | Collingwood 31.21 (207) | def. | St Kilda 3.11 (29) | Victoria Park (crowd: 29,380) | Report |
| Saturday, 28 April (2:10 pm) | Footscray 20.8 (128) | drew with | Essendon 19.14 (128) | Western Oval (crowd: 26,981) | Report |
| Saturday, 28 April (2:10 pm) | Geelong 10.13 (73) | def. by | North Melbourne 19.9 (123) | Kardinia Park (crowd: 21,353) | Report |
| |||||
Round 5
Round 6
Round 7
Round 8
Round 9
Round 10
Round 11
Round 12
Round 13
Round 14
Round 15
Round 16
Round 17
- Fitzroy's 190-point winning margin remains, as of 2026, the biggest in AFL/VFL history.
Round 18
Round 19
Round 20
Round 21
Round 22
Ladder
| (P) | Premiers |
| Qualified for finals |
| # | Team | P | W | L | D | PF | PA | % | Pts |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Carlton (P) | 22 | 19 | 3 | 0 | 2772 | 1986 | 139.6 | 76 |
| 2 | North Melbourne | 22 | 17 | 5 | 0 | 2574 | 2083 | 123.6 | 68 |
| 3 | Collingwood | 22 | 15 | 7 | 0 | 2501 | 1974 | 126.7 | 60 |
| 4 | Fitzroy | 22 | 15 | 7 | 0 | 2699 | 2198 | 122.8 | 60 |
| 5 | Essendon | 22 | 12 | 9 | 1 | 2236 | 2127 | 105.1 | 50 |
| 6 | Geelong | 22 | 12 | 10 | 0 | 2149 | 2140 | 100.4 | 48 |
| 7 | Hawthorn | 22 | 10 | 12 | 0 | 2332 | 2336 | 99.8 | 40 |
| 8 | Richmond | 22 | 9 | 13 | 0 | 2451 | 2512 | 97.6 | 36 |
| 9 | Footscray | 22 | 7 | 14 | 1 | 2015 | 2463 | 81.8 | 30 |
| 10 | South Melbourne | 22 | 6 | 16 | 0 | 2424 | 2666 | 90.9 | 24 |
| 11 | Melbourne | 22 | 6 | 16 | 0 | 2093 | 2759 | 75.9 | 24 |
| 12 | St Kilda | 22 | 3 | 19 | 0 | 1857 | 2859 | 65.0 | 12 |
Rules for classification: 1. premiership points; 2. percentage; 3. points for
Average score: 106.5
Source: AFL Tables
Finals series
Finals week 1
Finals week 2
Preliminary final
Grand final
Season notes
- The record for greatest winning margin was set twice during 1979.
- In Round 4, Collingwood defeated St Kilda by 178 points, breaking the record set sixty years earlier, in the 1919 VFL season by South Melbourne.
- Collingwood's new record was broken only three months later in Round 17, when Fitzroy defeated Melbourne by 190 points, a record which remains as of 2026.
- Fitzroy's score of 36.22 (238) in the same game also set the record for highest score in a VFL/AFL game. This beat the record set by Footscray in the 1978 VFL season by twenty-five points, and remained the record until 1992.
- Fitzroy made the finals for the first time since 1960, ending a nineteen-year finals drought.
Awards
- The leading goalkicker was Kelvin Templeton of Footscray with 91 goals
- The Brownlow Medal was won by Peter Moore
- The reserves premiership, known as the Commodore Cup, was won by North Melbourne. North Melbourne 13.14 (92) defeated Collingwood 9.13 (67) in the grand final, held as a stand-alone night match at VFL Park on Friday, 28 September, before a crowd of 6,047.[1]