History

Established in 1885, the Ballan Football Club commenced in a township of 745 people, where the Wheelahan and Mullane families created the drive to recruit farmers, miners and residents to band together in sporting mateship, and play Australian rules football.

After a few years of scratch matches against some local teams, they then joined the Melton and Bacchus Marsh District Football League. Many players commented on the dreaded away game to Rockbank. The township did not get its name because of grassy fields and comfortable facilities. The small oval and rocky playing surface created many a cut and abrasions!
In 1905, the club is now well formed and playing home games at the Cowie St oval. The town has 7 hotels to discuss the weekend game of football. The Ballan, Commercial, Hanrahan’s, Orwell, Shannon, Victoria, and Railway Hotels looked after the players thirst, and provided financial contributions to help offset the cost of running the footy club.

Premierships were not easy to come by, and it was not until 50 years after forming, that the 1936 premiership was won by the Ballan. A decade later in 1948 our second senior premiership was won. It was a strong playing club at the time with 4 local players Dan Wheelahan, Martin Wheelahan, Stan Mullane and Jack Mullane all being recruited to play with South Melbourne in the VFL in the 30’s and early 40s. We only have one other player since then that reached AFL standard and that was Matthew Francis who played with Richmond and Collingwood in the early 90s.
Success continued into the 50s with the 1956 premiership also going Ballan’s way. Ballan had many quality players during this 20-year period. Stan Mullane won the league Best and Fairest awards in 1932,34 and 1935. The legendary Jack Papworth also won 3 league best and fairest medals in the 50s and 60s. In more recent times, Kevin Murphy won 3 leagues Best and Fairest in the 60s and 70s, and we in more recent times had individual B&F winners Simon Wilkie, Andrew De Spirit and Shaun Campbell.

With the success of the club in the 30s, everyone wanted to know more information about game day and who was playing well. The unofficial scribe for the club was then the Ballan Times. Passionate supporter Charlie Cattran would write up details and highlights of each game, and he never had a shortage of readers. Charlie passed the information batten onto Ron Hadden at the Supermarket, who in the 60-70s produced an A3 sheet with all the game details on it. Sparra Mullane in the 70s produced a weekly newsletter which club legend Alan Blake would distribute at the entry gate. The Ballan News also carried a weekly article during this period.

With the changing population and residential growth between Melton and Ballarat, in 1973 the Ballarat and Bacchus Marsh Football league was formed. It only stayed a competition for 6 years, when the current league Ballan plays in, The Central Highlands Football League was formed in 1979. This league was a merger of the Clunes Football League, the Ballarat and Bacchus Marsh Football League, and later on, the Lexton Plains Football leagues. At times the league has had up to 18 teams involved in the competition.

In 1976 the club finally got a new, modern recreation pavilion and change rooms. The wood fired water heater required to have a shower, was now a thing of the past and the Tom Mullane honoured club rooms become our new home. The old clubrooms were rebuilt to become the Longroom and now holds many a pictures of past champions and treasured trophies.
The new clubrooms in 1976 seemed to inspire the Ballan Football Club. With the formation of the CHFL the Blues imposed themselves from the start contesting the first three grand finals. In 1979 they lost a nail-biting tussle against Clunes by 3 points before making amends a year later with a 16.11 (107) to 12.12(84) defeat of Dunnstown. The 1981 grand final produced another victory, this time at the expense of Springbank, with Ballan 25 points ahead at the final siren 20.24 (144) to the tigers’ 18.11 (119). Ballan never lost a game in that 1981 season and were coached by Peter Merriman. Since 1981, Ballan have not won another senior premiership.

In 2002 the Ballan Football club merged with the Ballan Netball club and changed their name to The Ballan Football and Netball Club Inc. This integration has provided a new energy around the club and an increase in the support base following the teams.
To provide a glimpse into the near future, in 2022 new clubrooms will be built, which will provide the Ballan Football and Netball Club and the broader Ballan community a great sporting environment to build as we progress and get stronger into the future, we’re all very much looking forward to this as Ballan grows bigger every year.

Go Blues!