PENGUIN

Affiliated: Various junior Leagues and Associations 1890-1909, 1911-21 and 1938-45; NWFU 1910, 1922-37 and 1945-86; NTFL 1987-present

Home Ground: Penguin Recreation Ground

Formed: 1890

Colours: Royal and light blue

Emblem: Two Blues

Premierships: 1932, 1977, 1980, 1985 (4 total)

Cheel Medallists: Fred Odgers 1924; R.Stott 1926; 'Nip' Smith 1927 (3 total)

Wright Medallists: Gerry Plapp 1931 (1 total)

NWFU Western Division Best and Fairest Award: A.Crawford 1947 (1 total)

Wander Medallists: Colin Moore 1958; Ricky Smith 1972 (2 total)

NWFU Top Goalkickers: T.Dunham (44) 1956, (76) 1958, (76) 1960; D.Adams (41) 1962; F.Wooller (61) 1966; C.Reynolds (135) 1985 (6 total)

Penguin's Official 'Team of the Century': Click here

Highest Score: 30.20 (200) vs. East Devonport in 1977

Most Games: 432 by Bill Fielding

Record Finals Attendance: 9,828 for the 1985 NWFU grand final at West Park, Burnie: Penguin 21.9 (135); Smithton 13.9 (97)

Located between Burnie and Ulverstone on Tasmania's north west coast the small seaside town of Penguin takes its name from the colonies of fairy penguins which frequent the area.  As far as football is concerned, the locality has made something of a name for itself in recent years as a regular and reliable producer of AFL talent, including Richmond's Gale brothers, Brendon and Michael, Russell Robertson of Melbourne, and Justin Plapp of Richmond and St Kilda.  Much more importantly, however, the town's senior football club 'the Mighty Two Blues' has, for well over a century, provided local inhabitants with regular high quality exposure to the greatest of games.  If the standard of football on display has declined in recent years - respected sports commentator Tim Lane recently described Tasmania's major football competitions, the SFL and the NTFL, as "really only fourth tier" (see footnote 1) - it would be facile to measure football's importance in purely qualitative terms.  Football in Tasmania, perhaps more than anywhere else in Australia, has always represented a vital element in community life, and while the institutionalised rape and pillage carried out by and on behalf of the AFL and its clubs has inevitably undermined this state of affairs to some extent, the local football club retains a certain social significance which is quite independent of the perceived quality of its 'product'.

With the exception of a one season stint in the newly formed NWFU in 1910, the Penguin Football Club, which was formed in 1890, spent the period until 1922 competing in various junior Leagues and Associations, winning a solitary flag in 1913.  Between 1922 and 1937 the side once again participated in the NWFU, contesting consecutive grand finals against Latrobe in 1932 (won by 21 points) and '33 (lost by 51 points).  In 1938 Penguin joined Wynyard, Cooee and City in establishing a new competition, the still extant Darwin Football Association; it reached the grand final in 1938, losing by 5 goals to Wynyard, but thereafter was unsuccessful.

Penguin's 1969 Adelaide Carnival Representatives
	Utility, Philip Lade.		Ruckman, Bob Cheek.

The Two Blues rejoined the NWFU fold in 1945 when that competition reformed after World War Two, but it would be more than thirty years before the side contested a grand final.  However, once the breakthrough was made, albeit with a disappointing 32 point loss to Ulverstone in 1976, it seemed the monkey was well and truly off the club's back.  During the NWFU's final ten seasons of competition between 1977 and 1986 Penguin emerged as one of the competition's leading clubs, as the following table confirms:

Prominent players for Penguin in this period included triple club champion Bill Fielding, dual winner Garth Barrett, Barry Valentine, Michael King, Chris Reynolds, Kevin Brown and Andrew Baldock.

Penguin entered the NTFL when it was formed in 1987 and have endured a somewhat forlorn time in that competition since, contesting the finals only intermittently, and managing an overall success rate in its first fourteen seasons of just 36.4%.  In both 1998 and 1999 the senior side failed to win a single match.  Nevertheless, as was intimated at the outset, success in football is not, or ought not to be, everything.  For the 500 or so loyal souls who attend the Two Blues' weekly outings throughout the winter (see footnote 2), while most would no doubt wish earnestly for a premiership, ultimately it is the club, and the game itself, which matter above all.

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Footnotes

1. Quoted in Australian Rules Football in Tasmania 2002 edited by John Stoward, page 8. Return to Main Text

2. Penguin's average attendance in the 2001 season (when the side finished 9th out of 12 clubs) was 526.  Premiers Burnie by comparison attracted a league high average crowd of 739, while wooden spooner Smithton was watched by a weekly average of 385.  Return to Main Text