Inside the meeting of 63 Adelaide Crows train-on list players at the Arkaba Hotel | Graham Cornes

It’s been 34 years since the turmoil of that 1990 SANFL season when the VFL’s wanton greed forever changed football in this state, writes Graham Cornes.

It is not often that you get a chance to witness history being made. Even rarer is the opportunity to participate in an historic event.

In the history of South Australian football there has been no bigger moment than the creation of the Adelaide Football Club.

It’s only been 34 years since the turmoil of that 1990 SANFL season when the VFL’s wanton greed forever changed football in this state.

With indecent haste the Adelaide Football Club was established, a squad of prospective players from the 10 SANFL clubs was selected and over the course of six weeks, they trained as they had never trained to gain selection on the Adelaide Football Club’s final playing list.

Interim Board members Ed Betro, Adrian Sutter and Rick Allert at the Arkaba Hotel.

There were 63 players on that original train-on list, which did not include younger players like Ben Hart, Shaun Rehn, Damien Mellow, Jonathon Ross and Peter Turner.

Those youngsters had not trained with the inaugural squad but were considered vital to the club’s future and would be included in the club’s final 1991 playing list of 52.

Less than five months after the formation of the club, the Adelaide Football Club played its first game for premiership points.

First Club Champion Mark Mickan.

The triumph of that first game against Hawthorn on March 22nd 1991 has been well recorded and celebrated but I’ve always felt that those 63 players in the original train-on list have, for far too long been unrecognised and under-appreciated.

The club has taken the first steps to rectify that.

On Thursday night a large group of players, officials, medical staff, employees from the very first days of the Adelaide Football Club assembled with current board members and officials at the Arkaba Hotel for a nostalgic evening of recognition and celebration.

It was the instigation of board member, Stephen Roche who recognised that while football is played in the now, great clubs have been built on the sacrifices of those who have gone before. It truly was a great night; informative too.

Adrian Sutter, one of the inaugural board members spoke of the very first board meeting in October 1990.

It was held at the city office of the company he worked for. After running the gauntlet of the waiting media, they sat down to plan the formation of a new club.

“We had no agenda, no stationery, no name, no chief executive, no team, no jumper, no colours, no coach, no team”, he recounted.

Slowly, after Max Basheer had been appointed Chairman of the new entity, it started to take shape, beginning with the appointment of the club’s first chief executive, Bill Sanders.

Sanders, who had left the security of long-term employment with a bank, gave the greatest insight into the early days of the Adelaide Football Club.

The story of the portable ATCO hut for which Bill’s wife, Anne made the curtains, has often been told, but before that there was the bolt-hole beneath a staircase in the western grand stand.

Three of us, Sanders, football manager, Neil Kerley and I shared an impossibly small area as the club and the team was taking shape.

“But we didn’t have any money”, Sanders wailed. Fortunately, the SANFL was in a position to advance funds. “Which we had to pay back”, he bemoaned.

The first real injection of funds came with the first trial game against Essendon.

Mark Bickley and Darel Hart celebrating.

Kevin Sheedy, cunning as a fox had offered to play the Crows in our first trial game on February 1 1991.

It was agreed that after paying Essendon’s travel and accommodation expenses, the two clubs would share the gate-takings.

The expectations of the Essendon chief executive, Roger Hampson were not particularly high, given that the average crowd for an Essendon trial game in Melbourne was about 1500-2,000. It astounded everybody, especially Hampson, that an estimated 50,000 crammed into Football Park for that historic first clash.

Seeing the dollars signs Hampson demanded that Essendon’s share of the gate be taken in cash.

Two days later when all the accounts had been reconciled, Essendon sent a courier to take a special container, crammed with $52,000 in cash back to Windy Hill.

As a matter of interest, at the end of the season, Sanders perused the Essendon balance sheet. The income from trial games was listed as less than $2000!

The club’s financial concerns eased somewhat when the membership and season ticket packages went on sale and were sold out.

But Sanders also had a few tricks up his sleeve.

On hearing that a moratorium was going to be placed on salary cap breaches which were rife in the AFL at that time, he acted. If a club confessed to its salary cap breaches it would be excused and not face sanctions.

Sanders quickly signed several young players to contracts that were enhanced by an untraceable cash component. He then declared the breaches to the AFL’s salary cap investigator. Both club and players escaped sanctions.

Rodney Maynard, Grantley Fielke, Simon Tregenza and Scott Lee. Picture: Supplied

But that summer of 1990-1991 was all about the players as they battled to reach new levels of fitness and skill and try to meld into the one team unit.

It was difficult when the groups came from ten different teams.

Darryl Hart said it as succinctly as his gruff voice would allow: “I hated everyone”, he said. “And I guess they hated me.” But slowly they did attain new levels of friendship and team spirit.

When it came time for the final playing list be announced, 21 of the train-on players would miss out on final selection.

It’s one of my saddest moments. They had trained over summer, committing to a 13 day out of 14 regimen.

It was the toughest bloc that most had ever experienced.

There was no pay and no guarantee of a contract at the end of it all, yet they rolled up to every session full of optimism and enthusiasm - until that final list was announced.

They had been a vital part of the formation of the first Crows team, yet they missed out.

Every one of those initial train-on players were invited on Thursday night. Surprisingly quite a few came.

They could have been disenchanted with the Adelaide Football Club, yet they came.

Former South ruckman, Darryl Heath flew down from Cairns, Robbie Thompson who eventually played five games for the Crows came down from the Gold Coast.

Trevor Clisby who didn’t play a game for Adelaide but was a much-liked member of the first list, came from Sydney. “Chopper” Handley, now a ranking police officer attended.

They all may not have played but they should know they were an important part of the creation of the Adelaide Football Club.

For those who have forgotten or those who didn’t know, here are the 63 players who were selected and invited to that first train-on squad: (Apologies if I’ve missed anyone.)

Andrew Jarman, Scott Hodges, David Brown, Darren Smith, David Pitman, Darren Bartsch, Paul Rouvray, Rod Jameson, Stephen Schwerdt, Matthew Kelly, Andrew Payze, Simon Tregenza, Bruce Lindner, Danny Hughes, Tony McGuinness, Chris McDermott, Daryl Hart, Alan Bartlett, Trevor Clisby, George Fiacchi, Grant Fielke, John Klug, Clayton Lamb, Scott Lee, David Marshall, Rodney Maynard, Romano Negri, Stephen Rowe, Nigel Smart, Robbie Thompson, Stephen Williams, Bruce Lindsay, Peter Bennett, McGregor Grummett, Bruce Abernethy, Robert Handley, Eddie Hocking, Matthew Liptak, Rudie Mandemaker, Peter McIntyre, Scott Morphett, Michael Murphy, Paul Patterson, Greg Phillips, Peter Schwarz, David Stoeckel, Grant Tanner, Tom Warhurst, Wayne Weidemann, Michael Whitford, Mark Mickan, David Hutton, Russell Johnston, Jason Bastian, Mark Bickley, Paul Bulluss, Scott Field, Brian Haraida, Darryl Heath, David Niemann, Paul Pisani, Adam Saliba and Stuart Whitehouse. Garry McIntosh was named but declined to attend.