Flinders FL

The Flinders Football Association was formed in 1912 with Laura, Appila, Booleroo Centre and Wirrabara as the founding members. There were no finals in the first season so the team with the most wins during the minor round would be awarded the premiership. Leading into the final fixture of the season Laura and Booleroo Centre were on the same amount of points and when Laura defeated Booleroo Centre, they were awarded the premiership.

In 1913, Booleroo Centre refused to play a match against Appila because umpire Hammill would be officiating. Appila protested to the association that Booleroo Centre had not fulfilled their obligation to play the scheduled return match at Appila. The association then expelled Booleroo Centre from the association and suspended all of their registered players until the end of the 1913 season.

Booleroo Centre were reinstated in 1914 but Laura transferred to Northern Areas. The league sent invitations to the Melrose and Murraytown clubs to join Flinders. Melrose accepted the invitation restoring Flinders to a four team competition once more.

During the period from 1928 to 1930, the Flinders association could lay claim to being one of the strongest in the state. After defeating the Quorn association in 1928, Flinders played in the 1929 Country Carnival where they were successful against Barossa & Light and Adelaide Plains, in 1930 they beat Port Pirie and Northern Areas. The early 1930s in contrast was a low point in Flinders football which saw the association shrink to three teams.

The Northern Football Carnival was first held at Port Pirie in 1949 on the June long weekend. The four leagues to contest the inaugural carnival were Port Pirie, Northern Areas, Broughton and Flinders. The carnival began on the Saturday with a qualifying match and then the finals played on the Monday. The carnival was hailed a great success with 2500 people attending Saturday’s games. A slightly larger crowd came on the Monday to see Port Pirie defeat Northern Areas in the final.

Pekina entered the Flinders association in 1952 and it was with great anticipation that their neighbours Orroroo awaited their first meeting. Although they were only situated 15 kilometres apart, Orroroo and Pekina had not played an official match against each other in more than 30 years. Apart from the old Orroroo association when Orroroo were divided as Emu’s and Kangaroos, the last known meeting was in 1919 and Orroroo won that game by more than 10 goals. The final result of their first meeting was a huge upset with Pekina winning comfortably by 32 points. The result could have been much worse for Orroroo as they were down by almost 10 goals at three quarter time.