Brighton Football Club

The Brighton Football Club was an Australian rules football club which played in the Victorian Football Association (VFA). The club was based in the Melbourne suburb of Brighton, and was nicknamed the Penguins. After suffering financial hardship throughout the 1950s, Brighton moved to Caulfield and became the Caulfield Bears in the mid-1960s. History An advertisement in The Argus on 8 June 1859 announced a meeting to be held on the 9th of that month, at the Devonshire Hotel, to form the Brighton Football Club. There are references to an active Brighton Park club in 1867, and Brighton Football club in 1872, 1878, 1882 and 1883. Those clubs may or may not have been connected. The club is believed to have been formed in 1885 and seven years later became a foundation member of the Metropolitan Junior Football Association. They won a premiership in 1903 during their sixteen years in the league and in 1908 joined the VFA as one of the teams to replace Richmond, who had shifted to the Victorian Football League (VFL), and West Melbourne, who had merged with North Melbourne in a failed attempt to do the same. During this time, Brighton played its home matches at the Brighton Beach Oval, before shifting to Elsternwick Park in 1927. Brighton first played finals football in the VFA in 1926 with help from former Fitzroy player Gordon Rattray who coached the club. They made it all the way to the grand final before losing to Coburg, the club that would beat them again in the grand final the following season. They were runners-up in 1938.