Monday, 4 September 2017

NEWS: West Australian Football Golden Era 1984-86 book published, 4 September 2017

Back cover of book (the can bar, Lathlain Park for Perth versus Swan Districts, 2 July 2011).
Paperback version
Message from the author Kieran James: "If you enjoyed this blog, the book is now finally available in paperback. Topic: West Australian Football Golden Era 1984-86. The book looks at the big games and main players in the Western Australian Football League (WAFL) over this period 1984-86".

SUMMARY: This book is the memoir of Kieran James, and details his experiences as co-founder of West Perth Football Club’s unofficial cheer squad from 1984 to 1986. The book shows how, because of neo-liberal ideologies and the corporatization of football, the new national league (the “expanded VFL” / AFL) relegated the WAFL to a second-tier league in 1987. This move took place over the heads of ordinary football supporters and two WAFL club presidents. Moves to bring the game closer to the people in 1984, such as holding the best-and-fairest award count night at Perth Entertainment Centre, should be seen in this light. This book will allow supporters to relive great teams, great players, and great matches from a wonderful era in WA football 1984-86 before West Coast Eagles joined the expanded VFL.

Hardcover version
AUTHOR BIO: Dr Kieran James is a Senior Lecturer in Accounting at the University of the West of Scotland, Paisley, Renfrewshire, Scotland.  He was formerly Accounting Professor at the University of Fiji from 2013-15. Alongside his high-school friend Michael Blewett, he was co-founder of the West Perth Cheer Squad (WAFL), 1984-86. He is the founder of the WAFL Golden Era website (established 18 December 2011) at http://waflgoldenera.blogspot.com which has had over 100,000 unique page-views as at 18/2/2017. Kieran is also a regular contributor to the Say NO to any AFL clubs in the WAFL Facebook group. He has published an academic journal article: “Where to now, Melbourne Croatia? Football Federation Australia’s use of accounting numbers to institute exclusion upon ethnic clubs” in Asian Review of Accounting (Vol. 19, No. 2, 2011). He is presently researching Fiji Soccer History 1980-89. His Fiji Soccer History website Nadi Legends Club can be viewed at the following URL: http://nadilegendsclub.blogspot.com. His email contact addresses are: Kieran.James@uws.ac.uk and Kieran.James99@yahoo.co.uk and his Facebook page is at: https://www.facebook.com/kieran.james.94 [Kieran James].
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2 comments:

  1. Tony.T4 September 2017 at 18:22

    In 1985 I went to an East Perth versus West Perth match at Perth oval. Since my mates were East Perth members we sat in the grandstand. (I'm a Subi supporter.) During the game it became apparent that there was a large group of West Perth fans at the back of the stand really giving it to the East Perth fans. The WP fans copped it in the media and there was even a Riggs cartoon about it in Monday's now-defunct Daily News.
    The thing is, the WP fans were hilarious and the EP fans were feral bogans. The was even on Royals fan, your textbook spotty, greasy bogan, who kept shouting, for no discernible reason, "What else did you get for Christmas?" The rest of the Easts fans couldn't mount much more than a collective grunt.

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    Replies
    1. Jack Frost7 September 2017 at 04:42

      Yes, that group of WP supporters in the grandstand existed for many years. We called them the Grandstand Falcons. I always thought WP supporters were more cheerful, easygoing, tolerant, and humorous and EP supporters always tried to act like super-serious tough-guys. WP had a more multicultural supporter base (Italians, Greeks, Croatians etc.) and this was probably also one factor which caused the two supporter bases to have different cultures and ethos.

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