At the beginning of the season, the nearly broke NSWRFL had met and kicked out its founders Henry Hoyle, Victor Trumper and J J Giltinan.

[7] Conflict over whether there was an agreement between the two clubs not to play a final[8] caused a deep-seated resentment towards Souths by Balmain which lasted many years.

Arguments have raged as to what led to Balmain's actions, and the day's events have caused the 'Tigers' and the South Sydney Rabbitohs to generally harbour nothing but ill-will towards each other ever-since.

While most clubs trained indoors at night or on fields under moonlight, Souths and Easts had exclusive use of the lights of the Sports Ground.

When the Balmain Union club held its first meeting of 1908, all the district's league supporters attended and voted against the election of every official for the coming season.

By the start of the 1909 season, the NSWRL was in a dire financial crisis – its founding fathers, James Giltinan, Victor Trumper and 'Harry' Hoyle, all lost their positions.

Under the stewardship of North Sydney's Alexander Knox, the NSWRL convinced the clubs to forgo their gate receipts from matches, and hand it all over to the league.

Balmain's complaints were quickly overtaken by outside events when more than half of the 1908 Wallabies team suddenly defected to rugby league for a series of matches against the Kangaroos.

Knox publicly criticised the NSWRL officials who were involved in 'bringing-down' the NSWRU via paying huge sums to the Wallabies.

Funded by entrepreneur James Joynton-Smith, the three 'Wallabies v Kangaroos' matches did not earn enough gate-money to fully cover his costs or those of the NSWRL.

Balmain were seemingly aggrieved at the demotion of importance of the Final, and asked the NSWRL to ensure it was played on a separate day.

On the day of the Final the Balmain players arrived outside the ground in the early afternoon, well before the scheduled kick-off time of 2 o’clock.

Despite very heavy rain and the protests of the Balmain footballers, enough of a crowd turned up to clear the debts of Joynton-Smith and the NSWRL.

He had convinced Balmain to forfeit the Final in the hope that the NSWRL would not earn enough money to pay off its debts or be able to reimburse Joynton-Smith.

With the NSWRL bankrupted, Balmain and Norths officials would lead the formation of a new rugby league body – one in which they, and not South Sydney and Easts, would be the dominant office-holders.

Further meetings were held, attempting to instigate legal proceedings and investigate forming a new league, but they eventually stalled.

In the opening round of the 1910 competition, the NSWRL scheduled a 're-match' between Souths and Balmain at Birchgrove Park to appease the local supporters.

The Referee thought it necessary to praise the Birchgrove crowd for their behaviour, offering: "Naturally they like to see their favourites win, and what district does not?

In the present instance, however, their team had to play second fiddle, but as sports they took the defeat in good spirit, and liberally applauded the visitors".

[10] ^ b: Western Suburbs forfeited on 26 June and were not listed in fixtures after a match they did play on 10 July, so it is probable that they dropped out.

^ c: The Sunday Sun reported that Western Suburbs received a forfeit from Newtown on 24 April and that the match was played.

[19] [20] The third grade final was played on 21 August as a curtain-raiser to an Australia versus New Zealand Maori match, "A good game ended in a win for the South Sydney team by 2 points to nil.