<P> The Borough joined the Victorian Football Association (VFA) in 1886 and has played in every season since then . In 1897, Port Melbourne was left out of the group of eight clubs which formed the breakaway VFL competition, despite having regularly been about the sixth - or seventh - best performing team onfield . Historian Terry Keenan theorised that the likeliest reason for Port Melbourne's exclusion was the reputation for the poor behaviour that its players and spectators had developed over the previous decade; its rivalry with and proximity to the influential South Melbourne Football Club and the fact that the club had supported the gate equalisation measures which the breakaway clubs were trying to escape were also speculated to have contributed to the decision . </P> <P> The club, and the suburb of Port Melbourne in general, were heavily associated with wharf labourers and the union movement . During a 1928 waterfront strike in Melbourne, a wharf labourer protesting the use of scab labour was shot by police; as a result, the club banned any police from playing with them . The policy remained in place until the late 1950s . </P> <P> For most, the nickname of the Borough (or Boroughs) may seem strange, but its origins lie when the team was based in what was known as the Borough of Port Melbourne . The name stuck, even after the area was upgraded to the status of town and eventually city . </P> <P> Port Melbourne went on to become one of the strongest clubs in the VFA, and today still attracts some of the biggest crowds to its games . The club had very strong links with the Port Melbourne community, arguably the strongest community relationship within the VFA; local juniors often held stronger aspirations to play for Port Melbourne than for the VFL's South Melbourne--which by the 1950s was perennially struggling and to which the Port Melbourne area was zoned--and even players as highly decorated as Brownlow Medallists Peter Bedford and Bob Skilton regularly returned to Port Melbourne after their VFL careers . </P>

Port melbourne football club best and fairest winners