The premiership was won by the Williamstown Football Club, after it came from fourth on the home-and-home ladder to defeat minor premiers Footscray by 18 points in the Grand Final, played very late in the year on 22 October.

In November 1920, the state Railways Commission announced that the East Melbourne Cricket Ground was to be closed at the end of 1921 to allow for the Flinders Street Railyard to be expanded.

[3] The North Melbourne committee formally resolved that it would seek to amalgamate with Essendon (L.) for the 1922 season; then, on 30 June, it suddenly disbanded as a senior club.

The club opted to disband immediately, rather than play out the season, because it believed that the Association would have banished it from playing anyway when it became clear that it was trying to amalgamate with a League team; and that by disbanding immediately, rather than waiting to be banished, it gave its players the opportunity to request transfers to other clubs prior to the July 1 deadline – an opportunity taken by eighteen players.

[5] True to North Melbourne's expectations, the Association disqualified it for its actions by a majority of 13–2, although by this stage the club was already defunct.

Since the breakaway of the League in 1897, the Association had been trying, mostly unsuccessfully, to establish and maintain a presence in inner city Melbourne, where the potential for gate takings was higher.

[7] It was on these grounds that the Association protested to Mr David Oman, the state Minister for Lands, requesting that he veto Essendon's (L.) move to North Melbourne; the ground was owned by the Melbourne City Council, so the Minister for Lands had the final say on its use.

On 11 August, Mr Oman upheld the Association's protest, and refused Essendon (L.) permission to use the North Melbourne ground.