1996 WAFL season

The 1996 WAFL season was the 112th season of the West Australian Football League in its various incarnations.

It saw the league at a crisis point with attendances decimated by the rise of the Eagles and newly formed Dockers of the AFL. With serious financial problems for a number of clubs, especially Perth^[1] and Swan Districts but also Claremont, East Perth and West Perth,^[2] the league intensely debated whether to expand or contract the competition.^[3] The upshot was that 1996 would prove the final year of the eight-club competition that had been established with the admission of Swan Districts in 1934.

On the field, 1996 was notable for the decline of 1995 minor premiers Subiaco, who with the decline of top goalkicker Jason Heatley and the loss of other key players to the AFL,^[4] declined by thirteen wins, the largest in WAFL history since Claremont after the loss of Graham Moss to Essendon fell from only three losses in 1972 to only four wins in 1973. In the process, the Lions suffered a number of spectacular losses. In contrast, East Perth, after eleven years in the doldrums when they had won only eighty and drawn one of 236 games, rose under the coaching of former Collingwood defender Kevin Worthington to their first minor premiership since 1976 and despite lack of experience, nearly beat Claremont in a thrilling Grand Final. The Tigers, despite being fifth in 1995, won the Emu Export Cup to be early premiership favourites^[5] with the power of their lower grades,^[6][7] and despite some lapses ultimately lived up to that label.

The wettest Perth winter since 1974^[8] led to some notable low scoring, with Claremont kicking the second lowest score by an eventual premier team in a major Australian Rules league against Swan Districts and West Perth kicking three or fewer goals in successive games for the first time in 69 open-age seasons.