Sydney University Football Club (SUFC), purportedly established in 1863, is widely celebrated as “The Birthplace of Australian Rugby” and is the oldest rugby union club outside of Great Britain. But is this claim historically accurate? As their ‘old rivals’, Wallaroo FC offers a compelling counter-narrative.

Institutional Teams and Open Clubs
While newspapers show that in 1865 the students at the University of Sydney were playing football games among themselves, and one match against a football club, they themselves did not formally constitute a club until 1871—the year after the founding of the Wallaroo FC in 1870.

In the context of rugby history, a major distinction is made between “institutional” teams (affiliated with hospitals, schools, or universities) and “open” clubs (independent, non-affiliated clubs open to any member of the public).

Similar to the ‘oldest surviving club’ claims in England of Guy’s Hospital (1843) and in Ireland with Dublin University (1854), the Sydney University footballers in the 1860s at most had an internal ‘club’ or association.

At no time in the 19th century—and probably all but the final years of the 20th century when professional rugby union arrived—has anyone other than current or (at times) former students been able to join and play rugby for the Sydney University’s XV.

They were not a rugby club like Blackheath or Richmond. They were not an ‘open’ club. They were a team.

“A game of football was played on the University grounds on Saturday last, between the Sydney Football Club and members of the University.”
— The Sydney Morning Herald, 26 August 1865

They were no more of a club than the teams of the schools and colleges were.

Sydney University Football in Mid-Late 1860s
In 1870 the rules of the University team were described* as having been framed from the Rugby School rules. In 1865 the two captains of the students first recorded ‘in-house’ match were both educated at British schools devoted to rugby. Despite these, in the intervening years it appears none of the external games played were under rugby rules.

Contrary to accepted belief, the University team of 1865 was not at the time regarded as a club and did not take part in the city’s first ever formal game of football between recognised teams. Instead this honour falls to a series of meetings between newly formed clubs ‘Sydney FC’ and ‘Australian FC’ (the latter being a football club branch of ‘The Australian Cricket Club’).

Match reports from these games, and of the subsequently played University vs Sydney FC game, fail to reveal what rules were followed. The evidence suggests they all played Victorian rules, or something very close to it, particularly as Sydney FC’s 1866 reports mention negotiations for a visit from Melbourne FC. Newspapers also provide added clarity.

“A football club, the first in the colony, has recently been formed and named the Sydney Football Club.”
— The Illustrated Sydney News, 15 July 1865

“Judging from the large number of public who assembled on Hyde Park on Saturday last to witness the match between the Sydney and Australian Clubs, we think that it is not likely to lose ground by its importation from the old country. The only clubs at present formed for its promotion are the Sydney and the Australian.”
— Bell’s Life in Sydney, 22 July 1865

“The rules adopted by the Sydney club, and it is understood by the Australian club, are the same as those under which the game is played in Victoria.”
— The Sydney Morning Herald, 4 June 1866

In 1866 and ’67, the University’s footballers played a total of six games, all against the Civil & Military Cricket Club’s football team. All that ensued in 1868 was a one-off game with a new Sydney FC, then in 1869 two outings arranged with certain officers and crew of the visiting Royal Navy sloop HMS Rosario.

While as the decade closes some of the match reports of University’s games do mention offside, mauls and carrying the ball, it is as much a criticism of these features in a football game as it is validation that a rugby-like game is actually taking place. Perhaps the University captains were conceding changes from rugby rules in the interest of securing a game of any kind at all.

“I must here say that the code of rules under which these matches are played, a strange combination of Rugby and other rules, is not by any means the best that could be selected.”
— Bell’s Life in Sydney, 27 July 1867

What is clear is that by the end of the 1869 winter, with a paltry total of just four matches played at all in the city over 1868-69 seasons and all of its football clubs defunct, there was no advancement of football being made in Sydney, let alone the rugby code. If the University footballers were attempting to provide stewardship, it was not succeeding.

Significantly, no ‘club’ match so far involving the University team, or anyone else, could still yet be said to have been the first game of rugby in Sydney.

The Rise of Wallaroo — the First ‘Open’ Rugby Club
In May 1870, the first ‘open’ club in Australia dedicated to playing football under rugby rules was formed: the Wallaroo FC. The club’s stance was that they would only play by rugby rules or not at all.

The club’s debut game was against a combined “sixteen gentlemen of the Army and Navy” side (military officers). Following the Rugby School tradition, the match was contested over two Saturdays (18 and 25 June 1870) after the first afternoon ended in a goal-less deadlock. This was the first rugby football match played in Sydney.

Any number of instances in newspapers can be found over the ensuing decades stating that Wallaroo were founded in 1870 and the Sydney University footballers formed a club later.

“In 1870 the first football club, the Wallaroo, was formed. Before that the University students, although they had no regularly formed club, played several scratch matches with members of the army or navy or any team that could be got together. After the formation of the Wallaroo Club the University formed a club…”
— Australian Town and Country Journal, 16 December 1893

The Evidence of the 1871 Founding of the SUFC
This is supported by making a comparison with the University’s cricket club, which in various forms first came to life in 1854. Since 1857, notices alerting the University’s students/cricketers about upcoming matches and meetings are replete in the city’s newspapers, including from 1863–69 when the University’s football club was purportedly operating.

Yet at this time, there are no instances of anything similar in the newspapers regarding the University’s football doings. And, as shown in the various 1860s era quotes above on this page, the University team was not regarded to be a football club.

Tellingly, the first newspaper appearance in relation to the University’s footballers is indeed in 1871 and ‘after the formation of the Wallaroo Club’; the language and details recorded are consistent with a formal meeting, and it was held in a city hotel rather than at the University**.

This meeting made it clear they were moving from an informal setup to a constituted football club with formal membership and rules. Other than still limiting who could join the club, this mirrored the structure of the other clubs and marked the formal founding of today’s SUFC.

1871, 1865 or 1863?
By the mid-1870s, where meetings of other clubs were noting their fifth or fourth annual meeting and report since coming into existence, the SUFC was silent in this aspect. Then, in 1876, this was suddenly addressed by neatly aligning the annual report with the year of the first newspaper stories of University footballers playing matches (1865). This occurred without any accompanying explanation and was referenced in meetings for the rest of the 19th century.

“The committee of the University Club, in presenting this their eleventh annual report…the club both as regards the number of members and strength in the field has never been surpassed during the eleven years of its existence.”
— The Sydney Morning Herald, 8 April 1876

This retrospective dating by the University club members mirrors the methods used by Guy’s Hospital and Dublin University to determine their founding years (although all three ‘clubs’ this only extends to a date of formation, not a verified date of when they first played a football game under rugby rules).

In any event, today the SUFC disports via its club badge and history that it was in fact founded even earlier, in 1863.

However, if 1863 were accurate, why after the 1876 meeting and the ensuing decades did no footballer of that mid-1860s era ever come forward to contend 1863 was the relevant season and not 1865? And where are the stories about the SUFC club founders of 1863? Who were they? [Link]

The True Birthplace of Australian Rugby?
Rugby football was first played in the Australian colonies at Christ’s College in the late 1840s in Tasmania [link], and in Victoria in the 1850s by Melbourne clubs such as South Yarra [link]. It is acknowledged that neither of these have any continued lineage to today’s Australian rugby scene.

But then, as shown on this page, nor directly does rugby have a patriotic home and continuous committed existence at Sydney University either until the 1880s.

The true birthplace of Australian rugby is the work and leadership of the Wallaroo FC. From its founding in 1870—declaring it would only play matches by rugby rules—to taking steps to encourage new clubs to form, and then starting and directing the meetings of 1874 that ultimately resulted in the formation of ‘The Southern RFU’ (today the NSWRU). It was not the SUFC that called for or who led these meetings.

SUFC: Devoted to Rugby?
There is also the question of exactly when SUFC became devoted to rugby. As noted, the University teams of the mid-to-late 1860s were not playing by rugby rules. Even after the club’s formalisation, their loyalty wavered.

In 1877, SUFC proposed at NSWRU meetings to abolish carrying the ball and scrummages—the very elements that define the rugby game. These modifications would have effectively forced all Sydney clubs to switch en masse to soccer or Victorian rules. It took a decisive “counter-charge” from Wallaroo FC delegates to bury the proposal and, ironically, save SUFC from itself.

In retrospect, this 1877 move by SUFC sparked a crisis in local football. It gave Victorian rules (now AFL) the opening it needed to plant its flag in Sydney via the formation of the NSW Football Association in 1880. Only then at a public meeting about the rules of football did a chastened SUFC go to great lengths to declare they still adhered to rugby and would not join the Victorian rules supporters.

Perhaps it was 1880, and not before, that SUFC first truly declared its permanent allegiance to the rugby code.

* Australian Town and Country Journal 2 July 1870
** SUFC 1871 meeting – see The Sydney Morning Herald 23 June pg.1, 24 June pg.4 & 12 July pg.5; The Empire 26 June pg.2

Note 1: a Sydney University football club playing under Victorian rules existed from 1887-89, however there is no indication that this arose from a split within the University’s rugby club and players.
Note 2: there is no contemporaneous reports to verify claims made from the early 1900s & since repeated that in 1869 the University played Newington College (Wesleyan Collegiate Institution), nor what rules were used if it did happen, and in any event these teams were not clubs.

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