In 1970, the Trinity Old Boys Football Club began playing its home games in the F Grade of the Western Australian Amateur Football League. Its success was immediate and soon the club was filled with Old Boys of the College. It was a place to see friends, socialise, relive old times and practice heroics on the field of play. The determination, courage and grit instilled in them as students at Trinity was benefiting them now as they worked hard to establish the club. They won two flags in the seventies and started a tradition of success.
These initial visionaries had a dream that was soon to come to fruition. Across the river students of Aquinas College had been collecting Alcock Shields for decades. Built high on the Mount, the school had fostered a winning tradition. The students who left Aquinas were used to success and they were proud of it. The mighty red and black of Aquinas had been haunting school boy footballers for years. They were brazen and bold, courageous and cunning. They knew how to make a footballer at Aquinas. They were looking for a home, and so in 1981 the Trinity Aquinas Amateur Football Club was born. It would be bolstered by the additional playing power of Mazenod College.
Since its formation TAs has continued to grow and prosper to the point where it is now one of the largest clubs in the renamed Perth Football League. Our league side has featured in the A-grade competition – the level immediately below the WAFL – every year for more than two decades. In addition to our A-Grade league side, we field a number of teams which cater for all standards of players. Foremost amongst these teams are the Colts sides, of which Trinity and Aquinas leavers traditionally supply the core.
Our Colts sides have traditionally been very strong, largely courtesy of a production line of quality footballers – and quality young men – from Trinity, Aquinas, Mazenod and the local South Perth Junior Football Club. Over the past few seasons our Colts have flourished and produced some excellent results.
With TAs flourishing on and off the field, our first A-grade premiership became the final frontier. In season 2012, TAs would fall six points short in a pulsating grand final against University. Season 2015 saw the appointment of decorated West Coast and Collingwood star Quinten Lynch as the club’s A-Grade coach and in 2016, under his guidance, the club finally won its first A-Grade flag. The following year, under coach Daniel Spencer, the league side produced a remarkable finals campaign to secure back-to-back A-Grade premierships after finishing the regular season in fifth spot.
In Season 2022, an enormous amount of work off the field culminated in the club adding its inaugural women’s team, while an extra senior men’s side – the “Fifths” – was also added. The club was now the largest it had been in its history, with hundreds of players featuring across five senior men’s teams, two colts sides and one women’s team.
The women’s team would be an extraordinary success, bouncing back from a narrow grand final loss in its inaugural season to secure their first premiership in the C2 grade in 2023. The women’s has team shown what can come with dedication and perseverance and are destined to remain an integral part of the TAs journey into the future.
For the men’s A-grade side, 2023 brought the heartache of a five-point grand final loss to Curtin Uni Wesley after a near perfect regular season that resulted in the minor premiership with 16 wins and two losses. There is no doubt the A-grade side will use that disappointment in steeling themselves for another crack at a premiership in 2024.
As TAs look to the future, it proudly sits within the top echelon of community football clubs in Perth, with a footballing and social culture that has – and will continue to – deliver on-field success, friendships and lifelong memories for the many young men and women who pull on its jumper.