Geelong were still unable to field a team due to the war, so the bye was retained.
New System
A new system was introduced so that each team received only one bye. There were still 16 rounds. The first 11 had every team competing - after round 11, the bottom placed team would drop out, and a new byeless draw would be made.
Premiership season
In 1942, the VFL competition consisted of eleven teams of 18 on-the-field players each, plus one substitute player, known as the 19th man. A player could be substituted for any reason; however, once substituted, a player could not return to the field of play under any circumstances. Teams played each other in a home-and-away season of 16 rounds. During the first 11 rounds each team played each other once and had one bye. At round 11, the eleventh team on the ladder dropped out of the competition. In the remaining rounds, the other ten teams played 5 matches each. During the 1943 season, the Melbourne Cricket Ground, the Lake Oval, and the Junction Oval were all appropriated for military use. Melbourne shared the Punt Road Oval with Richmond as their home ground, South Melbourne now shared Princes Park with Carlton as their home ground, and St. Kilda now played their home games at Toorak Park. Footscray, however, were able to return to the Western Oval as it was vacated by the defence authorities after a year. Once the 16 round home-and-away season had finished, the 1943 VFL Premiers were determined by the specific format and conventions of the Page-McIntyre System.
Round 1
Round 2
Round 3
Round 4
Round 5
Round 6
Round 7
Round 8
Round 9
Round 10
Round 11
Round 12
Round 13
Round 14
Round 15
Round 16
Ladder
Finals
Semi finals
Preliminary Final
Grand final
defeated Essendon 12.14 to 11.15, in front of a crowd of 42,100 people..
The seconds premiership was won by for the second consecutive season. St Kilda 11.14 defeated 8.6 in the Grand Final, played as a stand-alone match on 18 September at Victoria Park.
In the spiteful round 1 match between Essendon and South Melbourne, a vicious brawl broke out in the last quarter when South Melbourne's Jack "Basher" Williams felled Ted Leehane which involved a dozen players, team officials, trainers, fans, and police. Three players were reported: Williams received an eight-week suspension for striking Leehane, Dick Reynolds, Gordon Lane, and Perc Bushby, 1940 Brownlow Medal winner Herbie Matthews was suspended for four weeks for striking Allan Hird, and Bushby was suspended for two weeks for striking Williams in retaliation.
Entering Round 11, St Kilda and South Melbourne were tenth and eleventh on the ladder with two premiership points separating them; so, the match between those two clubs in Round 11 directly decided which club was eliminated after the first set of home-and-away matches. South Melbourne won the game by 35 points.
In round 5, Denis Cordner makes his debut for Melbourne in a team that also contains his brothers Don and Ted.
Munitions worker Bob Chitty plays for Carlton in round 15 despite losing the top of his finger during the week in a workplace accident.
Richmond'scentre half-forwardJack Broadstock went Absent Without Leave from his Army duties in order to play in the 1943 Grand Final. He was arrested by the Military Police upon his arrival at Princes Park, and it was only after some very persuasive talking by Richmond captain Jack Dyer, who was himself a policeman with the Victorian Police Force, that Broadstock's commanding officer dropped the matter and allowed him to play in the match. Broadstock went on to kick a goal and be one of Richmond's best players.
For the first time, no score of four or fewer goals was kicked in a VFL season. The only seasons since without a goal tally of four or fewer have been 1969, 1973, 1982, 1983, 2005 and 2008.
