Anzac Day Football: From Rotating Ritual to Monopolized ‘Tradition’, 1960–2025

Drawing on Hobsbawm and Ranger’s concept of the ‘invented tradition,’ this paper argues that the post-1994 framing of Anzac Day football obscures a longer and more complex history dating back to 1960, when the Victorian Football League (VFL) first scheduled games on the occasion. It examines how Anzac Day football evolved from a rotating, inclusive fixture shared among all clubs into what quickly became recognized as a singular ‘tradition’ centred on Collingwood and Essendon from 1995. Despite the longer history, the earlier decades have been simplified or ignored in prevailing accounts and in public memory. The paper also examines how the VFL, initially reluctant to participate, was drawn into Anzac Day football under pressure from the RSL (Returned & Services League of Australia) and the Victorian Government, and how its relationship with the RSL remained tense at times in the decades that followed. Through detailed engagement with archival records, contemporary reportage, legal documentation, and other primary materials, it sheds new light on the largely overlooked and underappreciated history of Anzac Day football spanning over six decades, with 1995 serving as a dividing line between past and present practices.