World Footy News

In the first article in this series, we mainly discussed with Malte Schudlich what AFL Germany would like to see from an AFL Europe body. Today we get opinions from the Danish Australian Football League's Ian Hill, the French Commission National de Football Australien's Marc Jund, and Aussie Rules Europe's Philip Porublev.

Of course it would be reasonable to say that the Australian Rules Football League Ireland are strong supporters of a move to an AFL Europe body, as the main proposal put forward was done so by ARFLI President Ciarán O' Hara. But what of some other possible candidate countries?

One of the first to also give the idea their support was the DAFL. The President of the Danish league, Ian Hill, said in a statement that:

"DAFL is 100% supportive of the ideas suggested by ARFLI President Ciaran O'Hara in the email he sent around late last year proposing the formation of a European Body. In particular, we like his ideas for the governance of such a body and the fact that it must be affiliated with the AFL and branded as AFL Europe. Some sort of independence would be a nice idea but simply not practical for a sport so closely and uniquely associated with one country.

"Football in Europe has over the years developed along two lines - the older established leagues that were in place by about 2002, and those where footy had started since then and tend to be more Australian-player dominated and have struggled to establish domestic leagues. More common ground has been found in the last few years but nevertheless it's about time a body was established to give the two styles of footy league in Europe a better opportunity to understand each other and move forward cohesively".

WFN also spoke with Philip Porublev of Aussie Rules Europe, who was less enthusiastic. They have previously sought to play a role in organising Australian football in Europe, generally gaining greater acceptance from the smaller, newer countries, and having increasing success with the EU Cup in recent years. Any establishment of an AFL Europe structure would be likely to impact their operations. Porublev explained that until such time that the issue was discussed at an ARE conference there would be no official position, and it wasn't clear whether a formal proposition would be on the agenda. However he did express his own opinion.

"Personally, I feel AFL Europe will achieve very little in addition to what ARE does today unless it metamorphoses into a viable self-sustaining independant commercial operation. Anything less is certain to under-achieve. I realise this has stunning implications on financing, affiliation, indepedance, democracy and representation and will most likely go against what some others may envision. I'm not aiming to be controversial; just present what I believe to be a statement of fact".

AFL Britain President Glen Ocskó did undertake to provide feedback but did not make the publishing deadline.

We also contacted the CNFA's (France's) Marc Jund who apparently had accidentally fallen out of contact with the AFL in an email address mix-up. Jund's initial thoughts were that "the idea of AFL Europe is a good idea but it needs the real support of AFL. We have to build a European body like UEFA. If this can be helped by AFL it would be great".

When asked whether the AFL should be closely involved with setting up AFL Europe, Jund replied:

"I think Ciaran (ARFLI) and Malte (AFLG) have both good ideas. The problem of international Aussie Rules is that there's no official body like FIFA or FIBA but only one league which exist in terms of "business". AFL has to help the involvement of international footy. If it is not the case, we have to be together to create an independent body which should be helped by major sponsors and own funds. It is difficult at the moment to take a clear position for the French footy. Working for the national footy plus the European footy is a lot of work and we don't have enough people to be able to do both for the moment".

Other countries thought to have had discussions with the AFL are Sweden, Finland, Netherlands, Spain/Catalonia, and several of the new footballing countries further east under the banner of Central Europe.

To summarise both on and off the record comments, there appears to be widespread support for the formation of an AFL Europe body. The exact form and how closely the AFL should be involved differs, with opinions ranging from wanting close involvement to wanting complete separation - but the latter is not the majority view, and for some of those in that situation it is not something they deem crucial. So at this stage the trend looks to be towards the formation of AFL Europe, with AFL assistance, most likely amongst AFL affiliated nations as well as some not currently in that position, but with a few countries staying out in the first instance.

The AFL recently appointed an associate to work with interested nations on the AFL Europe concept. We hope to bring you more details in the coming weeks.