The Mighty Yarras!
History
The Club was formed in 1967 initially as the South Yarra Presbyterian Football Club and played it’s first year of Competition in 1968 when the Club finished 5th in E Grade of the Eastern Suburban Churches Football Association. The Club won its first Premiership in its 4th season (1971) in addition to appearing in the finals in 1969 and 1970. The Club also won premierships in the ESCFA in 1988 and in the first year in the Southern Football League in 1993. (The Southern Football League was “born” out of a merger between the ESCFA and the South East Suburban Football League). Success also came in season 2008 with two premierships (3rd Division Seniors and 3rd Division Reserves). This was the first time that the Reserves had appeared in a Grand Final. The Club waspromoted to the SFL Second Division in 2009 for the first time ever but unfortunately lost both the Firsts and Reserves Grand Finals to Heatherton by 15 pts and 22 pts respectively.
The home ground in the early days was at Fawkner Park – then in 1985, the Club moved “home grounds” to the Howard Dawson Reserve in Burke Road, South Camberwell to gain access to better training facilities even though the ground was a lot smaller and after 10 years, moved to the T.H.King Oval in High Street, Glen Iris at the start of the 1995 season. Prior to the commencement of the 2006 season, the Club was forced to go into “recess” for the season but the new Committee worked extremely hard to resurrect the Club culminating in the fielding of our Firsts and Reserves once again in 2007 – this time at another new ground, the Fritsch Holzer Reserve in Camberwell Road, East Hawthorn (400 metres on the City side of Camberwell Junction). The Club continued its comeback by fielding a fourth side in 2008, a Colts / Club 18 which competed in the Colts competition of the Southern Football League. In 2009, the Club fielded 5 teams (Firsts, Reserves, Thirds, Masters and Veterans).
As well as changing grounds, the Club has changed its name several times over the years. Commencing as South Yarra Presbyterian FC in 1968, the first change was in 1972 when the Club became known as South Yarra Methodists FC. Then it was South Yarra Uniting FC and finally, South Yarra FC in 1982 and more recently with incorporation, the South Yarra FC Inc.
In 2000, the Club fielded an Over 40’s team for the first time in the Superules Competition. Because the facilities at Glen Iris are utilised by the Glen Iris Junior FC on a Sunday, the Masters team played their home matches at the Harry Trott Oval at Albert Park until 2005, playing matches every second weekend. In 2006, Heatherton Ground was the used as the home ground whilst Fritsch Holzer Reserve has been the home ground since 2007. The team has been operating for 10 years and during that time, has forged a close alliance with the Sacred Heart Mission in St.Kilda, Hawthorn Salvos and Reclink Australia (an organisation who provide recreational opportunities for disadvantaged people). This alliance has provided the homeless, recovering alcoholics, recovering drug addicts and other underprivileged people, a chance to get back into the mainstream of society by playing with a Suburban Football Club every two weeks. This association continues to develop with close alliance to the Reclink competition. In 2009, RECLINK and IOOF were sponsors of the Masters and the newly formed Veterans team (Over 47's). Since 2000, the South Yarra FC has introduced in excess of 60 RECLINK players and officials into the Lions Masters, Veterans and Reserves teams.
The Club also supported two teams from 2000-2002 who played competition football in the FIDA competition (a competition for the intellectually and physically disabled) but due to unacceptable facilites for the players, Port Colts took over the running of these teams.
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