On Saturday 28 October 1916, the former Olympic champion swimmer and the later Lord Mayor of Melbourne, Lieutenant Frank Beaurepaire, organised an Australian Rules football match in aid of the British and the French Red Cross.

[2] Both agreed that, if at all possible, the game should be played in London, rather than on the Salisbury Plain:[3] Despite not being an athlete himself,[5] Monash firmly believed in the power of sport to boost troop morale and keep his soldiers fit for war.

Keatinge Johnson,[10] then Commander of the A Group Training Brigade on Salisbury Plain, to be responsible for the arrangements; and, if possible, he was asked to select two first-class teams.

[27] The match was promoted as the "Pioneer Exhibition Game of Australian Football in London":[28] As well as providing a clear explanation of the game, which made it easy for spectators to follow, the official printed programme[30] provided the names and numbers for the members of each squad's extended list of "possibles" — 25 for the Third Australian Division, and 26 for the Combined Training Units — from which the 18 players for the day in each team were to be selected.

Consequently, the lists of squad members and match officials in the programme[31] not only contain typographical errors (e.g., "Pubiaco" for "Subiaco"), but also some outright mis-identifications of specific individuals and/or their original football teams, all of which have been corrected and are accurately identified below[32] — which, allowing for the changes due to differences in age, health, and physical fitness, and the consequences of their military service (such as being gassed while serving in France), are clearly those of the same individual that appears in the relevant team photograph taken on the day — except, that is, for the goal umpire "S.M Keen", the Third Division's [13] "L. Martin, University", and [23] "L.V.

Brown, Brighton", and the Training Units' [14] "Maxfield, Fremantle", [19] "Bennett, Ballarat", and [21] "McDonald, Essendon",[31] whose respective identification-puzzles (as of June 2022[update]) seem impossible to resolve.

), post-injury and post-wound levels of physical fitness-for-football,[33] (post-gassing) respiratory capacities, and/or immediate demands of their military duties might make them suddenly available (or, not available) — for instance, Jack Cooper's condition had only just recovered enough from being gassed in France for him to be able to play for the Training Units team[34] — it is not surprising that the names of two of the unexpectedly-available-on-the-day players (i.e., Alf Moore and Billy Orchard) were missing from their respective squad's list in the published programme.

[65][66] The eighteen players that took the field were: Eight of those listed in the official programme as members of the Third Division's squad;[30] who, although "selected to go to London and hold themselves in readiness if required to play" (Minogue & Millar, 1937), did not take the field that day: The Training Units played in the red guernsey which had been made in London especially for the match, that had a large white kangaroo on its left breast, and in white shorts.

The eighteen players that took the field were:[103] Eight of those listed in the official programme as members of the Training Group's squad;[30] who, although "selected to go to London and hold themselves in readiness if required to play" (Minogue & Millar, 1937), did not take the field that day: The game was played at Queen's Club, West Kensington, on the cold, bleak, overcast, and windy late-Autumn afternoon of Saturday, 28 October 1916,[137] before a crowd that was estimated at 3,000, by many,[138] 5,000, by some,[14] and as many as 6,000 by others.

[46] There's no doubt that the considerably smaller-than-expected crowd — almost exclusively limited to those expressly invited to the match,[139] and those Australian servicemen who took advantage of the leave that Monash had granted them on the day — was entirely due to the consequences of the inclement weather.

[146][147] According to the records supplied to Vic Johnson by Italo Cesari in 1954, the Training Units players' positions were:[148] The two captains met in the centre of the ground.

The match started off at a brisk, enthusiastic pace, with both sides competing strongly and, to the spectator's delight, displaying the game's characteristic "high marking and long kicking".

Kicking with the wind, and in "a particularly fierce last quarter" that was "full of fire and color [sic]" in which "both sides [were] striving mightily", with "their military blood up, the 36 men played with fanatical fervor [sic]", Les Lee, Hughie James, and Dan Minogue gained ascendancy in the ruck, and the Divisional team drew away from the tiring Training Units team, scoring four goals (and 3 behinds) to 3 behinds, and winning the match by 16 points.

[3] Overall, the accurate, interesting, and matter-of-fact press reports of the exhibition match (collectively) provided a strong and long-overdue contrast to what Richardson usefully identifies (at 2016, p. 307) as the "misguided mythology" that was ever so firmly embedded in the questionable characterisation — echoing the widely quoted sentiments of Henry Newbolt's poem Vitaï Lampada — made early in the war, of the Australian "digger" as a fierce footballer playing on another field.

[173] Ten weeks later (20 December 1916), Brosnan's second article not only contained a detailed first-person account of the events of the day from The Winner's London-based correspondent, E.A.

[15] Observing that, notwithstanding the significant fact "that these were scratch teams which had few chances of getting together", the presence of "such a galaxy of stars" meant that "the individual play was at times brilliant and spectacular", and recording that he, Bland, as a first-time spectator, came away from the match with the strong impression that the game "was faster than either Soccer or Rugger", he also reported that "the "high marking" which seemed to be the feature of the game which attracted most [spectator] attention was extraordinarily good".

The contents of an entirely different fifth article (apparently written on 29 October 1916), taken from The Referee of London, was published in The (Emerald Hill) Record of 6 January 1917.

[15][176] With the reasonable intention of providing their British readers with some sense of the experience they had missed in person, the reports described the similarities and differences between the Australian game and those their readers already knew: rugby union, rugby league, and soccer — the pitch upon with it was played, the layout of its goal-posts, its requisite skills, its rules, its scores, its four quarters, the standard player positions, the level of athleticism demanded of its players, etc.

Also, unique features of the game, such as the stab-kick, high marks, bouncing the ball on the run, and being able to kick in any direction were stressed: and, in particular, the (to the British) extraordinary spectator practice, displayed on the day to some considerable extent by the Australians present: that of barracking.