World Footy News

Alberta is a province in Western Canada that is in the encouraging position of having two cities hosting Australian Football clubs. The following article is from Jason Arnold and Chantal Spindler of the men’s and women’s teams who report on the interesting formation, proud achievements and exciting developments of the Edmonton Australian Football Club.

It’s been an active off season for the Edmonton Australian Football Club.  The club’s teams, the Edmonton Emus (women’s) and the Edmonton Wombats (men’s) haven’t let the long winter slow them down.  They’ve been conducting weekly training sessions, since mid-October.  Significant recruitment efforts have seen the EAFC double their numbers and record a constant 40+ at training.

The club was established as the ‘Edmonton Emus’ in 2008 by Tristan Waldock, who coached the women’s team for two years.  The Wombats (men’s) officially joined the following year in 2009, initially led by Hamish Martin, then led by Brad Havin upon Hamish’s return to Australia.  The Edmonton Australian Football Club was then formed.

After much hard work in the off season 2012 was a breakthrough year with the Wombats enjoying successes at the Kelowna Cup (Western Canada’s first tournament of the season, hosting teams from Vancouver, Calgary, and Edmonton) and being super competitive in the Stampede Cup against Calgary later in the season.  Off the back of great performances by their National reps, the Emus had their first win over the Calgary Kookaburras at the inaugural Capital Cup.
 

The 2012 season saw an unprecedented eight players, five women and three men, play for the Canadian Nationals at the 49th Parallel Cup, and the club is aiming to have more representation on the National teams in 2013.

The 2013 season will see two new coaches at the helm. Will Geisler will take on the Wombats Head Coach’s role and Jason Arnold, will be the Head Coach of the Emus, in addition to taking on Head Coach of the Women’s National team, the Northern Lights. Collectively the club has been working hard on the recruiting front with the aim of fielding two men’s and two women’s teams locally.  As a result of the success of the recruitment strategy over the winter, each playing list will soon be spilt into 2 ‘club teams’ and six official ‘club games’ are on the schedule for 2013 - a first for the EAFC.

Another first will be the introduction of an EAFC Junior program under newly appointed Development Officer Joel O’Brien. Joel has extensive experience with ‘AusKick’ (Australian program aimed at introducing the game to juniors) and the club is excited about this major step in its development. Joel will also be piloting a program which will see the EAFC conduct clinics as part of the Phys Ed program at local elementary and junior high schools.

EAFC is proud to be hosting the 49th Parallel Cup in August and see that in itself as a reward for the hard work of the club’s Executive Committee. The Committee is actively planning the event and is excited at the exposure such an event will do for Aussie Rules not only in Edmonton but Alberta wide.

To celebrate both the Men’s and women’s team being united under one club emblem, the EAFC will be unveiling its new ‘strip’ at this year’s Kelowna Cup tournament in June. This is seen to be symbolic of the club moving from being a ‘new kid on the block’ to becoming a competitive force on the Canadian Australian Rules front and at the same time a respected contributor in developing our great game nationally.

An exciting year ahead for EAFC and for Australian Rules in general here in Edmonton.