Tommy triumphant with Tommy

By PETER CORNWALL

Tommy holding aloft Tommy.

There could not have been a more fitting finish to the 2025 Hostplus SANFL League season.

Tommy Lewis won just about everything else worth winning this year – the Magarey Medal, Bob Shearman Medal and The Advertiser and SANFL Now player of the year awards. And he’s since claimed the Bo Morton Medal as Sturt’s club champion.

While the premiership medal he earned added to a stunning collection he also was not far away from snaring the Jack Oatey Medal as best-afield in the Double Blues’ 31-point grand final triumph against Glenelg, finishing runner-up to dashing team-mate Angus Anderson in the voting after amassing 26 disposals, nine clearances and 10 tackles when it mattered most.

But there’s no doubt the prize he coveted most – the Thomas Seymour Hill premiership trophy.

As acting co-captain with 2024 Magarey Medallist Will Snelling, Lewis, Snelling and triple premiership coach Martin Mattner lifted the trophy with excitement and pride. And why wouldn’t you lift this trophy with pride?

The Thomas Seymour Hill premiership trophy has been the cherished prize for SANFL’s flag winners since 1963. The Double Blues this year are custodians to the iconic trophy for the 11th time – only Port Adelaide had held it more.

Port captain Geof Motley was the first to get his hands on the grand prize, after the Magpies beat North Adelaide by 33 points in the ’63 grand final at Adelaide Oval.

For the previous four decades premiership sides had been presented with an engraved bronze plaque but the retirement of Thomas Seymour Hill after 28 years of sterling service to the SANFL gave the league good reason to step it up and strike a distinctive trophy of the ilk of English soccer’s FA Cup to be presented straight after the big game in front of the bumper crowd.

It’s now such a well-known piece of silverware there’s a stunning cap that this year was released with the trophy on it and just one word – TOMMY.

The man whose name has been immortalised was TS Hill, OBE, a leading footy administrator from 1926 to 1963. He was born at Beulah Rd in the heart of Norwood when the local football club – soon to celebrate its 150th anniversary – was just 15 years old. He was Norwood’s secretary from 1926-35 and that led to bigger and better things as he succeeded Frank Marlow as secretary of the SANFL in 1935. He continued in this post until 1963 and also was secretary of the Australian National Football Council from 1938-47. He died in 1977, aged 84. By then, the trophy named in his honour had become synonymous with the SANFL.

The trophy is kept by the winning team for the year until being passed on to the next year’s champions. Each premier club is awarded a small version of the TS Hill premiership cup with the year engraved on it to display in their trophy cabinet.

How often has each club earned the Thomas Seymour Hill premiership trophy? The list after the Blues’ triumph this year is – Port Adelaide (15), Sturt (11), Norwood and Central (9), Glenelg (6), North and the Eagles (5), West (2) and South (1).