Since the 1980s, it has been suggested that Wills played or observed an Aboriginal football game, Marngrook, as a child growing up in the Grampians among the Djab wurrung, and incorporated some of its features into early Australian football.
The theory has provoked intense debate, amounting to a controversy dubbed "football's history wars".
In her essay "A Seductive Myth", published in the AFL's The Australian Game of Football Since 1858 (2008), Hibbins calls the proposed link an "emotional belief" lacking "any intellectual credibility".
She points out that neither Wills nor any of his fellow football founders mention Aboriginal games in existing documents, and states that there is no evidence of Marngrook being played in the vicinity where Wills grew up.
Since then, among the personal papers of ethnographer Alfred William Howitt, an interview has been found with a Mukjarrawaint man who recalls playing Marngrook in the Grampians.
Also, in his first-hand account of Aboriginal games, James Dawson, an Aboriginal rights activist, records the Djab wurrung word for football as "Min'gorm".
De Moore therefore argues that Marngrook was likely played around where Wills lived as a boy, "or, at the very least, that the local Aboriginal people knew of such a game".
That Wills knew of Marngrook, he adds, is speculative at best.

Proponents of a link point to the games' similarities, such as drop punting the ball and leaping, catching feats.
Academics Jenny Hocking and Nell Reidy write that Wills, in adapting football to Melbourne's parklands, wanted a game that kept the players off the ground and the ball in the air. "
It is here", they argue, "in the interstices between rugby and Australian football, that the influence of [Marngrook] can be seen most clearly".
Historian John Hirst countered that early Australian football was aligned with rugby-style roots, and bore little resemblance to Marngrook.
According to de Moore, Wills was "almost solely influenced" by Rugby School football, with local conditions also having an effect.

Flanagan promoted the Marngrook theory in his novel The Call (1996), an historical imagining into Wills' life, and argued in an essay addressed to Wills that he must have known Aboriginal games as it was in his nature to play: "There's two things about you everybody seems to have agreed on—you'd drink with anyone and you'd play with anyone."
He quotes Lawton Wills Cooke, a descendant of Horace Wills (Tom's brother), who said a family story had been passed down about Tom playing Marngrook as a boy.
Family historian T. S. Wills Cooke disputed that such a story existed, calling the Marngrook link "a bridge too far" and an example of historical revisionism motivated by political correctness.
Despite lacking in hard evidence, the theory is often presented as factual.
In Moyston, the self-proclaimed birthplace of Australian football, stands an AFL-endorsed monument, unveiled by historian Col Hutchinson, commemorating Wills' childhood in the area playing Marngrook.
Since the 1980s, it has been suggested that Wills played or observed an Aboriginal football game, Marngrook, as a child growing up in the Grampians among the Djab wurrung, and incorporated some of its features into early Australian football. The theory has provoked intense debate, amounting to a controversy dubbed "football's history wars". In her essay "A Seductive Myth", published in the AFL's The Australian Game of Football Since 1858 (2008), Hibbins calls the proposed link an "emotional belief" lacking "any intellectual credibility". She points out that neither Wills nor any of his fellow football founders mention Aboriginal games in existing documents, and states that there is no evidence of Marngrook being played in the vicinity where Wills grew up. Since then, among the personal papers of ethnographer Alfred William Howitt, an interview has been found with a Mukjarrawaint man who recalls playing Marngrook in the Grampians. Also, in his first-hand account of Aboriginal games, James Dawson, an Aboriginal rights activist, records the Djab wurrung word for football as "Min'gorm". De Moore therefore argues that Marngrook was likely played around where Wills lived as a boy, "or, at the very least, that the local Aboriginal people knew of such a game". That Wills knew of Marngrook, he adds, is speculative at best.
Proponents of a link point to the games' similarities, such as drop punting the ball and leaping, catching feats. Academics Jenny Hocking and Nell Reidy write that Wills, in adapting football to Melbourne's parklands, wanted a game that kept the players off the ground and the ball in the air. "It is here", they argue, "in the interstices between rugby and Australian football, that the influence of [Marngrook] can be seen most clearly". Historian John Hirst countered that early Australian football was aligned with rugby-style roots, and bore little resemblance to Marngrook. According to de Moore, Wills was "almost solely influenced" by Rugby School football, with local conditions also having an effect.
Flanagan promoted the Marngrook theory in his novel The Call (1996), an historical imagining into Wills' life, and argued in an essay addressed to Wills that he must have known Aboriginal games as it was in his nature to play: "There's two things about you everybody seems to have agreed on—you'd drink with anyone and you'd play with anyone." He quotes Lawton Wills Cooke, a descendant of Horace Wills (Tom's brother), who said a family story had been passed down about Tom playing Marngrook as a boy. Family historian T. S. Wills Cooke disputed that such a story existed, calling the Marngrook link "a bridge too far" and an example of historical revisionism motivated by political correctness. Despite lacking in hard evidence, the theory is often presented as factual. In Moyston, the self-proclaimed birthplace of Australian football, stands an AFL-endorsed monument, unveiled by historian Col Hutchinson, commemorating Wills' childhood in the area playing Marngrook.
Tom Wills