World Footy News

The AFL today held a press conference at the Telstra Dome to introduce the Melbourne media to the 2008 Australian Football International Cup, its countries and more specifically the captains. While a few of the skippers were literally arriving in the country and negotiating the parking around “The Dome” others mingled with the waiting media. Former Collingwood captain and Australian Football 150 Years Ambassador Nathan Buckley and the AFL Talent and International Manager Kevin Sheehan discussed football’s international operations and the upcoming International Cup and took questions from the assembled media. We have podcasted the full session at our host site or here if you prefer ITunes.

The 17 captains from the 16 competing countries (the Peres team has one Israeli and one Palestinian joint captains, about which Buckley quipped that Grant Thomas must be coaching their team) marched onto the Telstra Dome and assembled for group and individual photographs before also being available to take questions from the media. The captains and team managers then departed for their meeting and briefing in preparation for the cup.

Hopefully we will see a large brace of print and television media in the coming days with shots of the gathering as we did on Channel 9 News tonight in Melbourne. Unfortunately they appeared to be the only television station present, we hope the others are saving up for when the real action begins on Wednesday.

We share with you here some images of the gathering.