Vale Max Basheer AM 1927-2025

Max Basheer led the SANFL as president for longer than any of his predecessors.

He also guided South Australian football through its greatest challenges and changes with no loss of relevance nor independence to the game’s oldest State league. This is his lasting legacy.

By Michelangelo Rucci

Max Basheer’s name stands taller than any other on the nine pavilions at Adelaide Oval. It is the appropriate lasting tribute for the man who endured – and survived – more turmoil and crises than any other South Australian football administrator as the longest-serving SANFL president (1978-2003).

But the true lasting legacy of Basheer’s reign is the independent and sound status of the SANFL today as the Australian game’s oldest and best State league.

Basheer died on the evening of Sunday September 14, aged 98. He is being remembered as a titan who – in a rare style of leadership – always put the interests of South Australian football and the national game ahead of personal ambition.

“Max put his pride in South Australian football ahead of his ego,” says fellow national Hall of Famer Kevin Sheedy.

“How many people do you know in football who can put aside their ego for the betterment of the game?”

South Australian Football Commission chairman Rob Kerin paid tribute to Basheer by recognising his enormous contribution to the game in SA.

“The greats of our game are often remembered by their accomplishments on the field but when we remember those who have had such profound impact off the field, there are few others like Max,” Mr Kerin said.

“Across nearly 50 years of service, including 25 as League president, Max’s selfless contribution to the League was immense; always guided by an abiding passion to strengthen and grow the game.

“He was instrumental in establishing Football Park and securing the entry of Adelaide Football Club and Port Adelaide Football Clubs into the AFL – achievements that stand as enduring testaments to his vision and leadership.”

From Kalangadoo in the South-East, Basheer’s love of Australian football played out on the field with the amateur ranks at Adelaide University during the 1950s after being denied a path to league status in a transfer battle between SANFL clubs North Adelaide and his preferred Sturt.

With no obstacle to administrative channels, Basheer’s off-field contribution to South Australian football began in 1954 as the honorary solicitor to the SA Amateur Football League.

He joined the SANFL as a tribunal jurist but always will be known as its most-important league president during the most-demanding era of South Australian football.

Basheer as league vice-president in 1978 succeeded – after masterminding an appeal for votes to defeat rival, Magarey Medallist Ken Eustice – Judge Don Brebner at a time when the SANFL would need more than a ceremonial president draping the Magarey Medal on the game’s best player at the end of each season.

Basheer took the presidency while the SANFL was amid a challenging “cold war” with the Victorian Football League over the concept of a national football competition (that would not be just an extended VFL series).

Within a year he was dealing with a Royal Commission on the lighting of Football Park. The battles with the VFL – while more and more SANFL stars were lured to Melbourne – continued through the 1980s to present Basheer with his Churchillian test in 1990: The threat posed to the SANFL by Port Adelaide’s wish to defect to the VFL.

As a sign of his political nouse, the legally adept Basheer stepped outside the strict constitutional confines of his SANFL presidency to save the league in a critical meeting with his VFL counterparts at the Southern Cross hotel in Melbourne.

It was the biggest risk Basheer ever took in football administration – and delivered the biggest reward to the SANFL and South Australian football. As Sheedy notes, this was the moment Basheer cared more for the league than his own career.

The VFL leader of the time, Ross Oakley, recalls: “I arrived at that meeting with (fellow VFL executive) Alan Schwab just as a trolley with food and drink – plenty of drink – was being wheeled into the room. I knew we were in a for a long afternoon. It was a classic Max moment – he was not leaving without a deal. He had a way of getting things done.”

But, as Leigh Whicker – Basheer’s long-time right-hand man as league chief executive – recalls, this meeting with the VFL demanded Basheer to take an unprecedented step.

“Max put $1 million on the table without prior approval from the league directors; it was his ace – and the rest is history,” Whicker said.

Basheer in 2020 – on the 30th anniversary of the greatest storm in South Australian football – reflected on the moment saying: “Leigh said I had no authority to do it. And I said, ‘I’m going to do it’. I’ll take the blame and the responsibility.”

A master raconteur who could hold an audience in the palm of his hand at football functions or at dinner, Basheer was even more commanding around a committee table.

At the SANFL meeting three days later, only one league director questioned – but did not rebuke – Basheer for his unconstitutional play to secure the first AFL licence based in South Australia.

The SANFL had won the war to control the first AFL franchise based in Adelaide and set critical terms in the licence agreement, such as all AFL games in South Australia being played at the SANFL-controlled Football Park at West Lakes.

“There are three major moments in Max’s presidency,” Whicker said.

“The development of Football Park and the two AFL licences with the Crows (1990) and Port Adelaide (1994). They were enormous tasks.

“With each challenge – that led to major change in our football – Max worked through difficult situations with an uncanny ability to negotiate through every trap with extreme efficiency.

”He was highly respected in the legal community for such wisdom; in Australian football, Australia wide, he was admired for his wise approach. Max did not bowl people over. He did his research. He worked through the issues methodically and he came to understand the people he was negotiating with to ensure their would be a fair resolution. His end game always was: Get a result that was fair for the game of football in South Australia.”

Oakley often was on the other side of the negotiating table.

“Max was one of a kind,” Oakley said. “He had South Australian football interests absolutely at heart in everything he did. You can say that was his job; he was there to represent the SANFL. But I can tell you, Max was passionate, very passionate about South Australian football. He would not be pushed around and he would not be driven into decisions.
I have nothing but immense admiration for what Max did and how he did it for South Australia. He was one out of the box.”

Sheedy, who came to know Basheer from an Australian tour of Ireland during the 1980s and more so through mutual friend and fellow SANFL commissioner David Shipway, recalls being challenged by Basheer on the national agenda for Australian football.

“Max said to me, ‘Kevin, you know the game is not just Victorian?’,” Sheedy said. “He made me think. I came to appreciate this even more by understanding Max’s passionate ways for South Australian football. He would never let it be downtrodden. He made sure South Australia did not miss out on its rightful position in Australian football. And he certainly would not have the SANFL mistreated. He liked a fight, Max did. And he made sure the VFL got one whenever it tried to take over the game. It was a good thing.

“On that trip to Ireland, Max made me think what this game of Australian football was all about. He was cunning. He was shrewd. He could see the storm brewing. But more importantly he knew how to win the political games of chess.”

Magarey Medallist John Halbert saw Basheer’s leadership skills while serving as an SANFL commissioner from 1996-2007.

He noted Basheer’s strength was in being well armed with information and advice before entering a political stoush.

“Max never came to a commission meeting without having canvassed opinions from people he trusted,” Halbert said.

“Leigh Whicker, Bill Sanders, Norm Grimm, they were among the people Max would turn to when he needed to understand the consequences of important decisions in football. He took advice from people with good knowledge – he consulted to be well briefed.

“Max survived challenges to his leadership – from (Magarey Medallists) Ken Eustice and Geof Motley, (North Adelaide leader) Jamie Coppins and (businessman) Rob Gerard – because he knew how to gather support from key people in South Australian football with a vision about the best interests for the game.

“I had confidence in Max because he was a good thinker, a good legal man. But most of all I knew that from Max’s long tenure in the game he was renowned for working out what was best for South Australian football.”

Sanders, a former administrator at SANFL club Woodville and then the inaugural chief executive and later chairman at the Adelaide Football Club, recalls Basheer’s strength emerging with the formation of the independent SA Football Commission in 1990.

“Before then we had league directors from the 10 SANFL league clubs motivated by self interest – and survival of their clubs,” Sanders said.

“Max was responsible for the viability of all football in South Australia. And he had a real ability to force that outcome at every meeting – do what is right for football. He had this ability to negotiate through self interests to work a decision that was in the best interests of the game of Australian football – and the league.

“From the 1970s to the 1990s, amid great challenges, Max used much tact, diplomacy and negotiating skill to steer us through some big issues. None was greater than that meeting with the VFL at the Southern Cross Hotel in Melbourne.
Max stuck out his neck. He was prepared to sacrifice his presidency to save the SANFL. How many others would have done the same?”

Basheer commanded respect by his ability to keep communication lines open amid tough moments.

“Max was a tough adversary on many, many occasions,” Oakley said. “But there was this way about Max. You knew at some point he was going to be standing before you, eye to eye, wanting to solve a problem rather than letting it fester. He had that enduring feature – probably from his legal background where lawyers are seeking to find solutions in conflict.”

Sheedy adds: “If Max disagreed with you, he did so with good reason. I liked that about Max. I knew what I was getting in any debate with Max. It was his great strength. No, one of his great strengths; he had many. Not too many Victorians get invited to Max’s place for dinner. I am proud to have been one of the very few – and often left with much to think about when trying to win a point on Max.”

Oakley recalls “Max could be one of the boys when he wanted to be”.

“But when it became official,” added Oakley, “his great strength was standing firmly on what was right for the game not for himself.”

Whicker was Basheer’s league chief executive from 1984 until the end of the record 25-year presidency (that overwhelmed the previous record stint of 14 seasons by fellow lawyer Thomas O’Halloran from 1926-1939).

“Max was a true chairman; he directed the league and he let the SANFL chief executive and executive team run the business,” Whicker said. “He would not interfere. But he was on the phone two or three times a day to be supportive.

“Max guided the league when internally we had the challenges posed by our clubs driven by self interest; and externally from many fronts, in particular the VFL. Max was the boss, but I always was comfortable with him as chairman at the commission table. I knew Max had a great love for the game and always considered the best interests of South Australian football.

“If you want to know why there is still an SANFL today – and not an AFL-SA – it is because Max refused to have South Australian football and the SANFL become sub-ordinate to the VFL or AFL. When the West Australians caved in in 1986 – to develop a West Coast for the expanding VFL competition – the pressure on the SANFL was immense.
But Max was determined to have South Australia stand firm until we could be part of a national competition on our terms. It was important that this included a strong and independent SANFL.”

This legacy is noted by Basheer’s successors as league president, including John Olsen, a former State Premier and chairman at the Adelaide Football Club.

“It is not just the longevity of service it is the quality,” said Olsen, the SANFL president from 2014-2020. “In that context, Max Basheer has no peer. He gave exemplary and exceptional service to Australian football and the growth of the game.
“His negotiating skills were second to none as he positioned South Australian football and laid the foundation for independence, growth and participation.

“Max was tough, forthright and relentless, but always with the SANFL’s well being at heart. A principled man, his contract was a handshake you could rely on.

“He served about as long as Tom Playford did as State Premier, and no one will ever climb that mountain of service again.”

• Awarded SANFL League Life Membership, 1972
• Inducted into South Australian Football Hall of Fame, 2003
• Inducted into Australian Football Hall of Fame, 2005
• South Australian Amateur Football League commissioner, 1954-1960
• SANFL commissioner, 1962-1966
• SANFL senior vice-president, 1967-1978
• SANFL management committee, 1969-1979; chairman, 1978-1979
• SANFL commissioner for country and junior football, 1971-1978; chairman, 1978
• Football Park finance and development committee, 1975-1989; chairman, 1978
• SANFL president, 1978-2003
• SA Football Commission chairman, 1990-2003
• Australian Football Hall of Fame committee, 1996-2002
• SA Football Hall of Fame committee, 2001-2016
• Awarded SANFL life membership, 1972
• Member of the Order of Australia for services to the game of Australian football, 1988
• Awarded AFL life membership, 1996