TOPIC:

Hi all, I thought I would set this thread up to try and take a look at two aspects of our competition over the years, The first area of interest is the obvious one, being the number of premierships each side has won since the introduction of zones in 1970. Equally, and secondly, I would be interestted to debate how many outsiders people would allow before each premiership could no longer be called a zone premiership.

Is 11 out of 20 zone players acceptable?
Or would people go higher, 16 and more?

The Zonal system was skewed & pretty much since destroyed as from 1996/7 with the "introduction" of Mandurah - and then further fractured by two separate Alignment Model programs , the current abortion of a structure is a ridiculous shambles that makes little sense in a lot of mapped areas.
It has definitely seen the clubs' focus shift on how to replace the annual AFL raided talent.

Great Idea Arky.
Perhaps we can explore this without the vitriol about alignments etc - let's see what facts we can gather before we draw conclusions.
If WAFL supporters on this site have access to Year Books etc and can look at the broader squads at the clubs then that would be great too. That way we can see how the zones feed the club's reserves team and to see if they add depth or just the odd gems. It would also be interesting to see which zone clubs players come from. In other words it may not be a whole zone that it important but a particular part of a zone.
Another point that might be factored in, if anyone has information about it is whether a player from a zone was traded off for non-zone players and what effect that had, eg Cable to Nth Melb and Farrant, Pretty, Doughety etc come back. Obviously that can't happen now but it does go to Southerner's point about how the impact of the AFL affects WAFL lists.
looking forward to an interesting discussion

Good posts guys

A look at the zones is really interesting.Population demographics of suburbs. And old and new country towns.
Perth where a strong club in the 1970's.Coming off there great period of the late 60" s.Good recruitment and local players like Wiley and Buzz.But there rural zone are old country towns now.With declining population growth.
East Freo had a local club Bull Creek/Leeming that produced 3. Brownlow medalists. Those suburbs are older 1970' s suburbs now.Not as many young families.Not the Midwest champions of the past.
East Perth have Ellenbrook but there traditional metro suburbs don't even field teams anymore.They have a great south west zone.
Why West Perth went North.
Swans have been lucky with eastern suburbs population growth and PH+ Bunbury.
Subis zones are also north.
SFreo where raped by Peels inclusion but seem to produce plenty of talent from there zones..
Claremont can remember there colts winning GF after GF full of Albany and Mt Barker players.
Great topic Ark needs a lot more investigation and ananyalist.

There is a lot I could write about the zones, but I am having trouble postting. The zone is hoplessly compromised something highlightted by EF's demis over the last twenty years. They have had a stong zone for most of the time, losing players to the AFL.

At the other end of the scale -- even if all players played 110 games for their clubs before they wen east, bassed on talent alone, EP and Peel would not have won flags at all. Subi and WP and SD, the PFC may have, but with South, Cl and Old Easts out in front

Zones can only lead to success over time -- Subi's 1986 side had around 16 locals, all of whom debutted for our colts between 1979 -- Brian Taylor and Dwayne Lamb and 1983-4 -- MacNish and Breman. We can only get back to such a system by liftting the AFL's draft age limit.

People are right too, to stress the uniquness of zones, almost to the point where there are zones within the zone itself. Again, taking Subi, Balga has produced one league footballer -- Darren Rumble; the Gold Fields on the other hand, a plethora of great footballers

Fascinating topic Ark, can't wait to read more. Is it true that zones were set up in 1970 based on the teams's recent performances and that weaker teams given better zones etc?