Midland Junction Football Club, nicknamed the Railways, was an

Australian rules football Australian football, also called Australian rules football or Aussie rules, or more simply football or footy, is a contact sport played between two teams of 18 players on an oval field, often a modified cricket ground. Points are scored by k ...

club that competed in the

West Australian Football League The West Australian Football League (WAFL) is an Australian rules football league based in Perth, Western Australia. The league currently consists of ten teams, which play each other in a 20-round season usually lasting from March to September, ...

(WAFL). The club played in the WAFL, the premier football league in Western Australia, from 1905 to 1910 and again from 1914 to 1917.Devaney, p. 309 They team wore black and gold hooped jumpers for the majority of the seasons they played in the WAFL. Charles "Wagga" Gast was Midland Junction's games record holder, playing 105 matches for the club. Based in the

Perth Perth is the capital and largest city of the Australian state of Western Australia. It is the fourth most populous city in Australia and Oceania, with a population of 2.1 million (80% of the state) living in Greater Perth in 2020. Perth is ...

suburb of Midland, the team drew the majority of their players from workers at the

Midland Junction railway station The Midland Junction railway station was an important junction station on the Eastern Railway of Western Australia until its closure in 1966. Its history started on 1 March 1886 when Frederick Broome, then Governor of Western Australia, turn ...

and

workshops Beginning with the Industrial Revolution era, a workshop may be a room, rooms or building which provides both the area and tools (or machinery) that may be required for the manufacture or repair of manufactured goods. Workshops were the onl ...

. The club was one of the most unsuccessful in the WAFL's history, winning only 24.8% of the matches they contested.

History

Originally from the First Rate Junior Association, Midland Junction joined the WAFL in 1905. With the admission of Midland Junction (and

East Perth East or Orient is one of the four cardinal directions or points of the compass. It is the opposite direction from west and is the direction from which the Sunrise, Sun rises on the Earth. Etymology As in other languages, the word is formed from ...

in 1906), the WAFL expanded to an eight team competition. In their first season in the WAFL, Midland Junction finished in the bottom two and won only two matches for the entire season. After several poor seasons, Midland Junction were demoted from the WAFL at the conclusion of the 1910 season and they subsequently rejoined the First Rate Junior Association (renamed in 1907 to the West Australian Football Association). In their first season back in the WAFA, Midland Junction won the premiership, defeating Cottesloe in the Grand Final. After two more seasons in the WAFA, Midland Junction returned to the WAFL in 1914. Midland Junction's second stint in the WAFL began much more successfully than the first. In 1915, the club won more matches than it lost for the first time and in 1916 they scored a resounding 78-point victory over West Perth. That victory, however, was to be the high point of Midland Junction's history. Midway through the 1916 season, the club was "decimated" as many of the team's players signed up to fight in

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

. This started a decline for Midland Junction which resulted in them losing every match in the 1917 season. After such a disappointing season and with many of their players still fighting overseas, Midland Junction elected to disband at the season's end. The club never reformed.

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* {{WAFL Australian rules football clubs in Western Australia Sports clubs disestablished in 1917 Former West Australian Football League clubs Midland, Western Australia 1917 disestablishments in Australia

History

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