The 1981 Victorian Football League season was the 85th season of the elite Australian rules football competition.
Essendon defeated Carlton 9.11 (65) to 6.5 (41) in the Final.
Grand final
Carlton defeated Collingwood 12.20 (92) to 10.12 (72), in front of a crowd of 112,964 people. (For an explanation of scoring see Australian rules football).
In the 1980/81 offseason, the East Perth Football Club from the West Australian Football League made a unilateral bid to join the VFL, potentially as early as 1983. East Perth's vision was for two WAFL clubs to join the league, as part of a transition to a national competition, and to limit the drain of talent from and provide an opportunity to play the highest level of football in Western Australia. The application was rejected.
A protest by Richmond against the eligibility of defender Doug Cox to play for St. Kilda led to the Saints temporarily losing the points for their first two wins after Round 8. They were reinstated after Round 17 due to changes in the relevant rules, but a fine of $5000 remained.
On 27 May, South Melbourne was fined $20,000 for poaching Stephen Allender from Carlton. Although Allender lived in South Melbourne's zone and was playing for VFA club Port Melbourne when recruited, he was residentially tied to Carlton and would remain as such until November 1983, because he had lived in Carlton's zone until February 1979. Carlton ended up granting him a clearance to South Melbourne, but South Melbourne was deemed to have broken the league's poaching laws by having "negotiated with an agent acting for a Carlton player".
In Round 11, Kevin Bartlett became the first to play 350 VFL games, after having broken John Rantall's record for most games played during 1980.
Carlton's Grand Final full-back, Scott Howell, was a member of the only three-generation set of AFL/VFL Grand Final players. His father Jack E. “Chooka” Howell had played for Carlton in the 1947 Grand Final against Essendon. His grandfather, Jack P. "Chooka" Howell, had played in the 1918 Grand Final for South Melbourne against Collingwood.
Malcolm Blight (North Melbourne) and Alex Jesaulenko (St Kilda) became the final ever playing coaches in VFL/AFL history. Jesaulenko retired as player after Round 8, becoming the last captain-coach; Blight was sacked as coach after Round 16, making him the last person ever to be a playing coach of a club. (Blight was not captain during his time as playing coach.) Playing coaches have since been prohibited under salary cap regulations instituted in 1987.
The State Government granted the VFL once-off permission to trial two Sunday matches in Victoria during the season; it was the first time the VFL had been granted this permission since the once-off Sunday match in 1970 which coincided with a royal visit. Under the conditions of the trial, alcohol was not allowed to be sold at or brought to the games, and the games could not be televised. The two matches were Essendon vs Collingwood in Round 18, and South Melbourne vs Carlton in Round 19.
On 7 August, the VFL's entire senior umpiring panel resigned over a contract dispute, due to the VFL's refusal to commit to negotiating a collective agreement with the Umpires' Association, rather than individual agreements with each umpire. The VFL hastily arranged for Round 19's matches to be umpired by a team of junior umpires, all aged between 18 and 22, from the state's minor leagues; both the junior umpires' association and the VFL umpires' association gave their approval for the juniors to serve as strikebreakers. The dispute was resolved the following week, and the senior umpires returned for Round 20.
In Round 22, South Melbourne played its last senior VFL match at the Lake Oval (also known then as Lakeside Oval). The team relocated to Sydney in 1982 and eventually became known as the Sydney Swans.
On the way to VFL Park for the Preliminary Final, the Geelong team bus failed to pick up Gary Sidebottom. Apparently, due to a breakdown in communications, no Geelong officials had told Sidebottom that he was going to play, so believing that had not been chosen, Sidebottom was not at his usual stop when the bus passed.
The Grand Final was the last match played with the old MCG scoreboard, which was given to Manuka Oval in 1982 after the MCG installed a new colour video scoreboard. The old scoreboard still resides at Manuka Oval today.
