The 1995 Australian Football League season was the 99th season of the elite Australian rules football competition and the 6th under the name 'Australian Football League', having switched from 'Victorian Football League' after 1989. Carlton won its 16th Premiership and at the time was the club with the most VFL/AFL Premierships. This was the first season in which the Fremantle Dockers participated.
The Fremantle Dockers made their debut in the competition.
*They played their first game against at the MCG and won their first game against at Whitten Oval.
The first ANZAC Day clash between and was held in round 4 which ended in a draw.
won a record 16th premiership, winning twenty games for the home-and-away season, also a new record. They won their 16th consecutive match in the grand final, comfortably beating 21.15 to 11.14.
*Amidst these records, they also suffered the rare ignominy of losing to the bottom team while atop the ladder in their Round 9 game. In this game, they failed to score a goal in the first half and became the fifth premier team to have kicked a season's lowest score.
reached the finals for the first time since 1982, finishing 3rd and making the preliminary finals.
*They won their first 7 games, winning their first five games for the first time since the early 1980s.
*They were on top of the ladder for the first time since 1982.
made an exceptional late season charge to reach the finals for the first time in team history.
*The Bears sat 14th after 15 rounds with a win/loss record of 4-11 and a percentage of 83.2%.
*In Round 16 at the Gabba against Hawthorn, the Bears trailed Hawthorn by 45 points at three-quarter time, but scored nine goals to one in the final quarter to pull off a seven-point victory. It remains the largest three-quarter time deficit ever overcome in VFL/AFL history. The Bears were still in 14th place at the end of the game.
*Brisbane won its next two games against bottom eight opposition to reach 12th place, but were to face Carlton, Richmond and Essendon in the following three weeks. Against all odds, Brisbane lost to Carlton by only 14 points, then thrashed the Tigers by 77 points and beat Essendon by 32 points.
*At the start of the final round, Melbourne, Collingwood and Brisbane sat 8th, 9th and 10th respectively, all on nine wins. Brisbane needed to beat Melbourne, and rely on Sydney beating Collingwood to reach the finals. Brisbane beat Melbourne by 21 points of Friday night, then watched on Sunday as Sydney scored eight final quarter goals to overhaul Collingwood by 23 points.
*The Bears finals appearance was short-lived, as the eventual premiers Carlton beat them by 13 points in the first week of the finals in a very high standard game
*However, the 10 wins and 12 losses of Brisbane in 1995, remains the worst record of a team in VFL/AFL history which qualified a team for the finals.
