Collingwood Football Club

Formation and early years

The Collingwood Football Club was established on 12 February 1892.

Collingwood played its first game in the Victorian Football Association (VFA) against Carlton on 7 May 1892. The club won the VFA Premiership in 1896.

In 1897, Collingwood, along with fellow VFA clubs Fitzroy, Melbourne, St Kilda, Carlton, Essendon, South Melbourne and Geelong split from the VFA and formed the Victorian Football League (VFL). Collingwood won its first premiership in 1902, defeating Essendon by 33 points.

1920s and 1930s: Four consecutive premierships

Collingwood was the most successful club of the 1920s and 1930s, appearing in 13 out of a possible 20 Grand Finals during the period. Collingwood were premiers six times during this time, including four consecutive premierships between 1927 and 1930, a VFL/AFL record, and two consecutive premierships in 1935 and 1936. The club's coach during this period was Jock McHale, who served as coach from 1912 to 1949. Collingwood also had three Brownlow Medallists during the period, with Syd Coventry winning in 1927, Albert Collier in 1929 and Harry Collier in 1930

1950s: Melbourne rivalry

In the 1950s, rival club Melbourne enjoyed an era of unprecedented success, winning five premierships in six years (the last coming in 1960, and having been runner up in 1954). Collingwood lost two Grand Finals to Melbourne in this decade, but bounced back to win premierships in 1953 and 1958. Collingwood's 1958 premiership is much cherished by the club as it prevented Melbourne from equalling Collingwood's record four premierships in a row.

The 1958 premiership was however to be Collingwood's last for 32 years, as the club was to suffer a string of Grand Final defeats in coming decades.

1959–89: "Colliwobbles"

A string of eight Grand Final losses, often by narrow margins, between 1960 and 1981 gave rise to a perception that the club was prone to "choking", a phenomenon wittily dubbed "Colliwobbles". Whether this perception is accurate remains a subject of debate; however, the club's record in recent years has been much improved, having won two and drawn one of its last six Grand Finals. Lou Richards ceremoniously buried the Colliwobbles at Victoria Park after the club's 1990 premiership.

1990–present

The 1990 premiership team, coached by Leigh Matthews and captained by Tony Shaw, had a one-sided grand final win against Essendon, the Magpies recording a 48-point victory and ending a 32-year premiership drought which included eight grand final losses and one draw.

After this, however, the club lapsed into a state of decline; their status as a potential powerhouse at the beginning of the decade was reduced with each passing season and the club ultimately received a second wooden spoon in 1999. Within a few years, with a change of coach, playing list and club president, Collingwood reached and lost consecutive grand finals in a close contest in 2002 and a "blow out" in 2003, both to the Brisbane Lions.

Following those Grand Final losses, Collingwood struggled for the next two years, finishing 13th in 2004 and second-last in 2005; the latter meant Collingwood was eligible for a priority pick which the club used to recruit Dale Thomas. Collingwood made a return to the finals in 2006, but were defeated by the Western Bulldogs by 41 points. The 2007 season saw them finish sixth on the ladder at season's conclusion, and in the finals they knocked out the grand finalists of the past two years, Sydney, in the elimination final and then West Coast in an overtime thriller at Subiaco Oval in the semi-final. Having earned a preliminary final against Geelong, the Pies challenged the eventual premiers, only to fall short by five points. Nathan Buckley would announce his retirement at season's end after playing just five games in 2007 due to injury.

Collingwood finished eighth in 2008 and were assigned an away final against Adelaide at AAMI Stadium. After at one point trailing in the match, the Pies went on to end Adelaide's season and earn a semi-final meeting against St Kilda. Having defeated the Saints in both their regular season meetings, the Pies lost convincingly, ending their 2008 season. The 2009 season saw Collingwood finish inside the top-four for the first time since 2003, but in the qualifying final were beaten by minor premiers St Kilda convincingly. Having won a second chance, the Pies struggled against Adelaide for the second year in a row before John Anthony kicked the match-winning goal with a minute left to send them into another preliminary final meeting with Geelong. But the season ended abruptly for the Magpies, with an 73-point loss to the Cats.

In 2010, Collingwood finished as minor premiers, and after wins in the qualifying and preliminary finals, reached the first Grand Final against St Kilda. The match finished as a draw, forcing the first grand final replay in 33 years. Collingwood won the replay by 56 points. The club won a second consecutive minor premiership in 2011, and qualified for the Grand Final after a three-point victory against Hawthorn in the preliminary final. However, Collingwood was then beaten by Geelong by 38 points in the decider, after trailing by seven points at three-quarter time. Star midfielder Dane Swan won the 2011 Brownlow medal with a then record 34 votes.

In 2012, Collingwood once again finished in the top-four but in their first final they were convincingly defeated by Hawthorn forcing them to play in the next week against West Coast. They started their game against the Eagles trailing but after half-time they powered through to win by 13 points. The next week they were beaten by eventual premiers Sydney at ANZ Stadium, the first time the Swans had defeated the Magpies since 2005. The 2013 season was a mixed one for Collingwood, losing to Gold Coast and suffering a fifth consecutive loss to Hawthorn in Round 21, before being unceremoniously knocked out of the finals series by Port Adelaide at the MCG in the first week. Coach Nathan Buckley delisted several high-profile older players at the end of the season, including Alan Didak, Darren Jolly and Heath Shaw.

Over the next two seasons, Collingwood would start the years with win-loss records of 8–3, but finished those seasons poorly and missed the finals. 2014 was the first season since 2005 where they did not make finals. In 2016, Collingwood had missed the finals again. After being defeated heavily by Sydney, their season never looked on track.

Jumper

Teams of the Collingwood Football Club have, throughout the club's history, worn guernseys of black and white vertical stripes. The all white jumper, with the three black vertical stripes is the iconic strip that the club is most associated with. The current incarnation of the guernsey is mostly black, with white stripes on the front and lower half of the back, and white numbers. The main clash guernsey is the reverse of this: mostly white, with black stripes and black numbers, worn in away matches against clubs with a predominantly dark guernsey such as Fremantle Football Club and Port Adelaide Football Club. A secondary clash guernsey, introduced in 2011 and used only in matches against North Melbourne, is black with only two white stripes on each side instead of three.

Traditionally, Collingwood has worn a mostly white guernsey with black stripes. The club switched to the mostly black guernsey with white stripes in 2001.

Song

"Good Old Collingwood Forever" is the team song of the Collingwood Football Club. It is sung to the tune of "Goodbye, Dolly Gray", a popular Boer War and First World War song.

The current version of the song played at the ground was recorded in 1972 by the Fable Singers.

Rivalries

Supporters

Collingwood is a working class suburb and the Collingwood Football Club supporter base traditionally came from the working class (though its supporter base today goes far beyond). Many of the club's supporters who regularly attend games still come from the working class or from lower socio-economic groups, leading to jokes from supporters of other clubs which typically stereotype their Collingwood counterparts as poor, crude and ignorant. Collingwood supporters have a reputation for being "one-eyed"—heavily biased toward their team and against the opposition.

Collingwood is traditionally reviled by non-Collingwood supporters ("You either love 'em or you hate 'em"). The dislike of the club by outsiders is said to have originated during the 1920s and 1930s, a period of great success for the club which drew the envy and resentment of other clubs. In this period, Collingwood was also perceived as a Catholic and Irish club, at a time when these groups were looked down upon by the rest of Australian society and subjected to a considerable degree of social exclusion.

Until recent years, racial vilification of opposition players in VFL/AFL games was not uncommon. According to a 2001 study, Collingwood's old home ground of Victoria Park had a reputation as one of the worst venues for such vilification, though it has also been said that the problem was similar at all grounds. Collingwood has however been involved in several high-profile incidents of this type, such as those involving indigenous players Nicky Winmar in 1993 and Adam Goodes in 2013. Michael Long's accusation of racial vilification against Collingwood ruckman Damian Monkhorst in 1995 also led directly to the establishment of the AFL's racial vilification regulations. Collingwood club president Eddie McGuire has been credited for taking a stand against racial vilification by club supporters and for harshly dealing with offenders.

Membership

In 2011 Collingwood reached 70,000 members for the first time creating a new AFL record, beating the previous AFL record of 58,249 set by Collingwood in 2010,.

The club's membership base leads to large crowd pulling power which has caused the AFL to be accused of favouring Collingwood when scheduling to maximise the league's attendance figures. However the AFL states that this is due to other clubs requesting home games at the MCG against Collingwood.

Off field

Collingwood was one of the last clubs to abandon its traditional stadium, the famous inner-city Victoria Park. Collingwood now plays home games at the MCG. It now also has its headquarters situated in the former Glasshouse Entertainment Centre. Due to a sponsorship deal, this facility is known as 'The Holden Centre'.

Collingwood continues to be financially viable through the loyal support of its huge following and numerous sponsors. After finishing 2nd in 2002 and 2003 the team fell to 13th and 15th (out of 16) in 2004 and 2005 respectively. This trend has plagued the club since the glory days of pre-World War II VFL football. Since 1958, the club has won only two VFL/AFL Premiership (the inaugural AFL Premiership in 1990, and in 2010). Despite this, the club still has won more individual games, more finals and made more grand final appearances than any other club.

On 9 March 2007, former Collingwood and Fitzroy defender Gary Pert was appointed the Magpies' CEO, seven weeks after Greg Swann departed for Carlton. In accepting the key Magpie post, Pert quit as a club director and as managing director of Channel 9 in Melbourne. In a press conference, it was stated that Collingwood has budgeted to turn over about $50 million this year. McGuire hopes the new administration will soon double that figure. "A finance administration review has come up with how we are going to turn Collingwood in to its next phase of its life", McGuire said. "What do we do to make ourselves go from a $45 million a year turnover business to a $100 million turnover business? "They sound like big figures but in 1999 we turned over $13 million, so that is where we are heading as a football club."

The club made an operating profit of $5.23 million for the 2013 season, revenue increased from $2.6 million to more than $75 million.

Sponsorship

The Collingwood guernsey is the most valuable sports sponsorship in Australia. Collingwood has different guernsey sponsors for home and away matches, generating an estimated $6.3 million worth of media exposure for the primary sponsor and $5.7 million for the secondary sponsor. These sponsorships are ranked first and second in Australia. High-profile sponsors include Emirates, Holden, CGU Insurance and Westpac.

Club

Records—other levels

Premierships

Head-to-head results

Played: 2,485 Won: 1,504 Drawn: 26 Lost: 955 (Last updated – End of 2016 Season)

Team of the Century

Collingwood announced its team of the century on 14 June 1997, celebrating 100 years since the beginning of the VFL. Gavin Brown was added as the fourth interchange player in 2002, when the team was named in 1997 only three interchange players were permitted on a team.

Captains

This list comprises every captain of the club. This list does not include deputy captains filling in due to an injury to the named captain, but does include captains named after a player retires or steps down during the season.

Current coaching staff

Reserves team

The VFL/AFL operated a reserves competition from 1919–1991, and a de facto AFL reserves competition was run by the Victorian State Football League from 1992–1999. Collingwood fielded a reserves team in both of these competitions, allowing players who were not selected for the senior team to play for Collingwood in the lower grade. After the AFL reserves competition was disbanded at the end of 1999, the club fielded its reserves team in the new Victorian Football League during the 2000 season.

In 2001, Collingwood reserves team was dissolved and the club entered into an affiliation with the VFL's Williamstown Football Club, such that Williamstown served as a feeder team and reserves players for Collingwood played senior football for Williamstown. Collingwood ended its affiliation with Williamstown after the 2007 season. The reserves team was re-established, and has competed in the VFL since 2008.

The reserves team currently splits home games between Olympic Park Oval and Victoria Park, although they do occasionally play at the MCG as a curtain raiser to Collingwood home matches, and uses the AFL team's clash guernsey as its primary guernsey. The Collingwood VFL team is composed of both reserves players from the club's primary and rookie AFL lists, and a separately maintained list of players eligible only for VFL matches.

AFL Women's team

In April 2016, the club launched a bid to enter a team in the inaugural AFL Women's season in 2017. Meg Hutchins was appointed Women’s Football Operations Manager some weeks prior, and given the responsibility of crafting the bid.

The club was granted a license in June 2016, becoming one of eight teams to compete in the league's first season.

In addition to her role off-field, Hutchins would become one of the club's first players, along with marquees Moana Hope and Emma King. Collingwood selected a further 19 players in October's inaugural draft as well as three non-drafted players and two first time footballing rookies.

Dandenong Stingrays assistant and Victorian Metro Youth Girls head coach Wayne Siekman was appointed the team's inaugural head coach in July 2016.

The team operates its training and administration base within the existing Collingwood home at Olympic Park.

Brownlow Medal winners

Leigh Matthews Trophy winners

Coleman Medal winners

Instituted in 1981, retrospective awards were dated back to 1955; prior to that, the League awarded the Leading Goalkicker Medal

Leading Goal Kicker Medal Winners

Norm Smith Medal winners

E.J Whitten Medalists

Mark of the Year winners

Goal of the Year winners

Anzac Day Medal winners

^ Awarded retrospectively in 2011

Jason McCartney Medal winners

Bob Rose-Charlie Sutton Medal winners

All Australian Team

International rules representatives

Michael Tuck Medal winners

Jim Stynes Medal winners

Match records

Records set by players

In popular culture