Barassi Line

The Barassi Line is an imaginary line that runs from Arnhem Land in the Northern Territory, down through Birdsville, Queensland, through southern New South Wales (north of the Riverina), bisecting Canberra and to the Pacific Ocean. Despite Australia's otherwise homogeneous nature, Australian rules football is the main football code played to the west and south of the line, and on the other side rugby football (rugby league and rugby union varieties) are the most important codes.

The term 'Barassi Line' was first coined by Professor Ian Turner in his "1978 Ron Barassi Memorial Lecture" [Referenced in cite book | last = Hutchinson | first = Garrie | authorlink = | coauthors = | year = 1983 | title = The Great Australian Book of Football Stories | publisher = Currey O'Neil | location = Melbourne | id = ] , one of a series of lectures named after Ron Barassi, Sr., who played a handful of Australian rules football games for Melbourne in the Victorian Football League (VFL) before enlisting to fight in World War II and subsequently dying from shrapnel wounds.

The Barassi Line itself was named after Ron Barassi junior, the former Barassi's son. At the time, the VFL consisted of 11 clubs in Melbourne and one in regional Victoria, and Barassi jnr was a former star player for Melbourne and Carlton and a premiership-winning coach with Carlton and North Melbourne. Barassi jnr believed in spreading the Australian rules football code around the nation with an evangelical zeal, and had foreseen a time when Australian rules football clubs from around Australia, including up to four from New South Wales and Queensland, would play in a national football league with only a handful of them based in Melbourne. At the time, Barassi's claims were largely ridiculed. [Hess, Rob and Nicholson, Matthew. Beyond the Barassi Line: The Origins and Diffusion of Football Codes in Australia]

Territory Wars Begin

While both Australian rules and rugby have been played to various extents on both sides of the Barassi line since the turn of the century, at least in terms of professional spectator sport, the theory of popularity has held true.

By the late 1980s, football codes in Australia began to realise that access to national markets (particularly television) were critical to their ongoing survival.

Australian rules has not entered the Canberra market at the top level, and there are clubs from both rugby codes based there in the Canberra Raiders (league) and the ACT Brumbies (union). Despite the lack of both Australian rules and soccer professional clubs, there remains support for these codes. The Sydney Swans field a reserves side in the traditionally strong AFL Canberra competition.

In 1990, the Victorian Football League changed its name to the Australian Football League to pursue a more national focus and by 1997, with six of sixteen clubs in the Australian Football League (AFL) based outside of Victoria, only two were behind the Barassi Line (Sydney Swans and Brisbane Lions). Both of these clubs have experienced the extremes of hardship and success over the decades. For Australian rules, an increasing number of players have been produced from the other side of the Barassi line (particularly due to interstate migration trends and grassroots participation in the sport), especially from Cairns, Brisbane and the Gold Coast and more recently Sydney. The AFL has increasingly scheduled season matches in Canberra, Cairns, Sydney and the Gold Coast to increase its importance beyond the Barassi line.

The rugby codes have also attempted to expand beyond the Barassi line with mixed results.

In rugby league, by 1998 the New South Wales rugby league had changed its name to the National Rugby League and set up clubs in Perth, Adelaide and Melbourne and to some extent later spurred the Super League war. Only the Melbourne club (Melbourne Storm) continues to exist, though despite backing from media interests and a large national supporter base the club struggles to draw large crowds in Melbourne. The WA Reds went into hiatus, however they field a team in a NSW comp with plans to join a national competition as a Perth based team in 2011.

Professional rugby union clubs have been tried in Perth and Melbourne. While the Melbourne Rebels and Perth Spirit, clubs from the unsuccessful Australian Rugby Championship lasted just one season, the Super 14 club Western Force, founded in 2005 continues to exist successfully in Perth on the other side of the Barassi line, with more members than any other club in the competition. However the western side of the Barassi line has produced very few rugby football players at the elite level.

The Story Today

As a result, to date, Australian rules football and rugby football have 2 professional clubs a piece on the other side of the Barassi Line, each with mixed success. Though all three codes continue to seek opportunity to expand their presence on the other side of the line.

Meanwhile, the Barassi line has had a seemingly positive effect for Association football in Australia, which has seen it grow in almost all regions, with the new national A-League competition increasing in popularity.

The Future

Most recently, the AFL has announced two new teams on the other side of the line - the Gold Coast Football Club and the Western Sydney Football Club.

See also

Aussie Rules behind the Barassi Line

*Australian rules football in New South Wales
*Australian rules football in the Australian Capital Territory
*Australian rules football in Queensland

Rugby League behind the Barassi Line

*South Australian Rugby League
*Victorian Rugby League
*Western Australia Rugby League
*Tasmanian Rugby League
*Northern Territory Rugby League

Rugby Union behind the Barassi Line

*Victorian Rugby Union
*Northern Territory Rugby Union
*South Australia Rugby Union
*Tasmanian Rugby Union

References