One in, four out for IC11

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Monday, May 02 2011 @ 09:28 pm ACST
Contributed by: Brett Northey
Views: 3,547

The seemingly inevitable has occurred, with several more teams confirmed as pulling out of the 2011 International Cup. Every 3 years the list of hopefuls shrinks as the event draws near, and we watch on hoping that the final number is at least higher than the previous tournaments. That still looks reasonably safe at this stage, especially as Timor-Leste are apparently back in contention, a surprise given their position in February. Note that this list is "in contention", not a list of 100% confirmed contestants.

WFN spoke to AFL Multicultural and International Coordinator Peter Romaniw and he confirmed that Croatia have pulled out due to the large financial challenge. Also missing from the last list we saw are Iceland, Finland and Indonesia. As a very young footy nation and a developing country the absence of Indonesia is no surprise.

The current list now stands at 21, including an Australian-based multicultural team. 2008 saw 16 nations in the main draw. Question marks remain over some candidates, such as the Swiss still needing some funding proposals to succeed.

The men's nominations (previous attendance in brackets) that we believe are still in the running are:

	Nation	Previous ICs attended
1.	PNG	2002, 05, 08
2.	New Zealand	2002, 05, 08
3.	South Africa	2002, 05, 08
4.	Ireland	2002, 05, 08
5.	Nauru	2002, 08
6.	Canada	2002, 05, 08
7.	USA	2002, 05, 08
8.	Japan	2002, 05, 08
9.	Great Britain	2002, 05, 08
10.	Samoa	2002, 05, 08
11.	Denmark	2002, 08
12.	Tonga	2008 (not in main draw)
13.	Sweden	2008
14.	China	2008
15.	India	2008
16.	Peace Team	2008
17.	Switzerland	(New)
18.	Fiji	(New)
19.	France	(New)
20.	East Timor	(New)
21.	Multicultural	2008 (not in main draw)

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One in, four out for IC11

Authored by: Brett Northey
on Monday, May 02 2011 @ 09:55 pm ACST

Without having asked them, my main concerns would be about Switzerland, Tonga, Samoa, Fiji, Timor-Leste and India.

How about a lightning carnival between all teams to decide a Div 1 top 8 and however many teams remain make up Div 2. Or maybe 10 for Div 1 and the rest Div 2.

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Brett Northey - Co-founder and Chief Editor of WFN

One in, four out for IC11

Authored by: Aaron Richard
on Monday, May 02 2011 @ 10:22 pm ACST

Looking at that list, how about 12 in Division 1 and 8 in Division 2? Maybe:

Div 1 - PNG, NZ, USA, SAf, Nauru, Ireland, GB, Denmark, Sweden, Canada, Japan, Samoa

Div 2 - Fiji, China, India, Switzerland, France, Timor-Leste, Tonga, Peace Team

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Brett Northey - Co-founder and Chief Editor of WFN

One in, four out for IC11

Authored by: Cam Homes
on Monday, May 02 2011 @ 10:57 pm ACST

I'd have to go along with Aaron's suggestion, his Div one 12 teams have all been in at least two IC's, and they are all in that top 15 rankings. The rest are either newcomers or were (not intending to be rude here) the "easybeats" last IC. China, I believe has already indicated they don't want to be in the top division.

Of those left at this stage Tonga and Fiji could prove the strongest, with Peace Team and Sweden in the mix to surprise(especially Sweden). If Timor-Leste do turn up they could throw a spanner in the works too(all learning the game from Aussie Peace-keeping Forces over the last few years).

China just might win more than they lose too, as their 2nd time around(but I believe could be a lot of new players in their squad)

20 teams is still an increase on last IC at least.

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Brett Northey - Co-founder and Chief Editor of WFN

One in, four out for IC11

Authored by: Cam Homes
on Monday, May 02 2011 @ 11:19 pm ACST

Woops! I've put Sweden in 2nd division. No, they should be in 1st Div although only 2nd time around for them.

2 pools of 6, play four of the other teams(# 1 rank does not play #6 rank) in Div 1. As in the Womens comp.

2 pools of four and played as in last years European Champs, for Div 2.

Keeps it all simple and straight forward and minimises risk of any real thrashings.

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Brett Northey - Co-founder and Chief Editor of WFN

One in, four out for IC11

Authored by: Cam Homes
on Monday, May 02 2011 @ 11:23 pm ACST

Woops! I've put Sweden in 2nd division. No, they should be in 1st Div although only 2nd time around for them.

2 pools of 6, play four of the other teams(# 1 rank does not play #6 rank) in Div 1. As in the Womens comp.

2 pools of four and played as in last years European Champs, for Div 2.

Keeps it all simple and straight forward and minimises risk of any real thrashings.

---
Brett Northey - Co-founder and Chief Editor of WFN

One in, four out for IC11

Authored by: Jens Djernes
on Tuesday, May 03 2011 @ 01:17 am ACST

Why do you keep on talking about divisions? I would never pay 5000AUS$ to play in a tournament, with no chance of taking The Cup with me home.

For what reason should we split the bad and the pour teams up into divisions. If you only want to have the "best" teams competing for the Cup, fine with me. Do it like in Soccer, make qualification-rounds. You could say top-3 from each continent or a'like.... Then tell the nations about it... AFL can't expect nations to spend that much money, to go to a tournament, without having a chance to take home the cup.

Did australias mens handball-team do well in the world cup??? danish television compared them to danish amateur-teams... Same in soccer European Championships, no-one expected Denmark to win any games. they took away the Cup...

Don't underestimate lower-ranked teams, they might do well. And if not, they deffinately learn from the experience. Having played several games losing by 100points, i kinow what it's like, and i know how much you learn from it. Don't take that away from nations like China, india, etc....

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Brett Northey - Co-founder and Chief Editor of WFN

One in, four out for IC11

Authored by: Brett Northey
on Tuesday, May 03 2011 @ 10:34 am ACST

Hi Jens,

I understand your sentiment, but in answer to your question the reason we keep talking about divisions is because:

- the AFL has said it is likely
- it is very difficult in a short space of time to have more than 10 or so teams in a division get a fair chance to compete for the top prize
- although you may not like the idea of playing in division 2 some nations actually want that, e.g. see Chinese perspective on IC08

You might think some nations might be expected to be lowly but surprise and win. I think this is clearly wrong. Leading into the last 2 Cups we did predictions about results and were overwhelmingly accurate. The chances of a bottom 6 ranked side making the grand final are so small that it is reasonable to not consider it.

Do you really learn more from a 200 point loss than a 70 point loss? Because that is what the newest sides are facing if they play a full scale match against the top couple of teams. The gap is so large that fortunately the top few teams already actually tend to rest some of their stars in those matches.

My bottom line is that we talk about it because it is likely (unless the number of nations shrinks further) so we're just tryng to work out what we think the best mix is, and I think many nations want it that way.

I would think it a good thing to go with the aim of winning a "Developing Nations Cup" rather than going knowing deep down that you are simply trying to minimise the damage.

And if the AFL use an initial day of lightning tournament matches to seed nations, then everyone would be in with a chance anyway.

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Brett Northey - Co-founder and Chief Editor of WFN

One in, four out for IC11

Authored by: Cam Homes
on Tuesday, May 03 2011 @ 04:19 pm ACST

G'Day Jens.

I have to agree with Brett when we discuss the IC being split into divisions. You say players learn from being thrashed by a superior opposition but I'd have to say they actually learn precious little. If you are a "spectator" on the field(cause you are one those players who didn't even get a touch of the ball let alone a kick)in one of those 200 to zilch matches you learn no more than a spectator standing in the grandstand. Experience tells me that, sure I enjoyed playing against better players and learning from them but they were the guys that were maybe only 4 or 5 goals better than us.

I recall that I learnt that the goal posts were somewhere to hide behind to shelter from the wind and rain when I was resting in our forward lines and my team was getting a 28-30 goal to 0 flogging :-) And having regular floggings like that certainly didn't encourage me to continue to play Aussie Rules.

I think India and China probably felt like that after IC08 and the same sentiment has been expressed by some of the Finland players after the European Champs last year when they were winless. By the way, there were a number of 100+ point wins in that competition and all but Iceland and Croatia were in the top 15 ranks

Although the spread of points(from top to bottom) in our world rankings is not large the difference in standard and ability of the teams from top to bottom is enormous.(and thats not counting Aussie).

The divisions will prevent the newcomers from playing matches that benefit nobody, (players, teams, spectators, the IC, nor footy) eg 100 or even 200 to 0 losses.

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Brett Northey - Co-founder and Chief Editor of WFN

One in, four out for IC11

Authored by: peterc
on Tuesday, May 03 2011 @ 05:40 pm ACST

I find my self sypathetic to Jens comments, but I note that in my League Nimbin have more often than not been thrashed by 100 pts or more yet still turn up every year. So maybe we should look at a 2 division, but with a cup for both! it would give the up and comming an insentive to play against simmilar standard teams and perhaps may be later a mirical may happen that the AFL puts more time and lot more effort into these countries. May be some of these men would like to come and play in our league and we can learn from each other, Nimbin had Americans play for them, we have had Danish, Canadian, Irish Coolie have PNG players. Its worth a thought.

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Brett Northey - Co-founder and Chief Editor of WFN

One in, four out for IC11

Authored by: Aaron Richard
on Tuesday, May 03 2011 @ 05:47 pm ACST

Which Summerland club do you play for, Peter?

Coolie will have some French guys joining them very soon for some pre-IC Australian experience. Presumably will be in the senior 3rds, playing in the Summerland league.

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Brett Northey - Co-founder and Chief Editor of WFN

One in, four out for IC11

Authored by: Cam Homes
on Wednesday, May 04 2011 @ 10:30 am ACST

Howdy Peterc.

I suspect Nimbin might be similar to a small country town in South Australia called Callington whose football team quite regularly makes the Statewide press because they are on the tail end of the biggest thrashings in football in the state, often 30goal and even 40goal to nil type loses, and they keep turning up for more of the same the next year. Why? Probably many reasons including, nothing else to do other than spend the afternoon drinking in the pub, catch up with their mates and have something to talk about other than work, save the footy club from dying, but the one reason really relevant to this discussion, they've played footy all their lives and so they keep turning up for all those other reasons, its part of their culture.

The teams that are competing in the IC (especially the newcomers) are largely people who have only recently taken up the game and obviously enjoyed the experience and have become proficient enough to be able to represent the nation(fledging tho it may be at the sport) at the IC. The IC's are however to some degree showcasing footy on the International "Stage" and although the players all wish to play their best and also against some of the best players around 200 to nil games do none of the stakeholders(players, teams, the IC nor footy itself) any favours.

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Brett Northey - Co-founder and Chief Editor of WFN

One in, four out for IC11

Authored by: peterc
on Wednesday, May 04 2011 @ 08:28 pm ACST

Hi Aron I no longer play, and after several years helping out now occationaly watch Byron Maggies. I hope to later on in the year see Coolie v Maggies and will watch with interest the French players.

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Brett Northey - Co-founder and Chief Editor of WFN

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