World Footy News

We are reproducing Matt Zurbo’s training manual for those that are challenged by small numbers out on the footy track. This series first appeared in The Footy Almanac.

The following article from Ben Guthrie at the www.afl.com.au website looks at the hopes of another Irish talent and their quest to reach the highest levels of AFL football in Australia as the drive to find the finest women’s talent gathers speed.

 

SINEAD O'Mahony hopes she can follow in the footsteps of fellow Irish products Tadgh Kennelly and Jim Stynes and become a trailblazer for the national women's AFL competition.

 

The 26-year-old primary school teacher, a 2015 Gaelic Athletic Association Dublin County team member, recently moved to Australia and turned her attention to tackling a new sport.

 

 

O'Mahony will join around 140 other players trying out in the inaugural female football national talent search at the Whitten Oval in Melbourne's west. 

The tour of South Africa by the School Sport Australia Under 15's squad has come to an end with a domination across three games against the South African Lions. But the scores are secondary to the developmental value of the tour as the players shred their skills with their South African counterparts as well as giving assistance and advice to young kids at clinics across the country.

The team won their first match of the series, played in Johannesburg, downing the South African Lions 20 11 131 to 5 4 34. The report of that part of the itinerary can be found here: Sawubona! – South Africa Welcomes School Sport Australia

The second game of the series was played at Rustenburg, to the west of Pretoria. Once again the schoolboys team was too strong, though the South Africans certainly learned from the opening game, closing the gap and going down by just 55 points. The final score in Game 2: School Sport Australia 16 18 114 d South African Lions 9 5 59.

The AFL and Australia Post today announced its Multicultural Program will expand to 18 player ambassadors in 2016 and for the first time will include two female players.

Female footballers Sabrina Frederick-Traub and Darcy Vescio will be joined in promoting some of the many diverse backgrounds in Australia’s Game by Brisbane Lions Vice Captain Dayne Zorko, Geelong’s Tom Hawkins, Fremantle’s Tendai Mzundu, Gold Coast SUNS players Adam Saad and Tom Nicholls, Sydney Swan Aliir Aliir and Western Bulldogs player Jason Johannisen.

The new additions in 2016 join existing Australia Post AFL Multicultural Player Ambassadors David Zaharakis (Essendon), Stephen Coniglio (GWS GIANTS), Paul Puopolo (Hawthorn), Shem Tatupu (Hawthorn), Alipate Carlile (Port Adelaide), Jimmy Toumpas (Port Adelaide), Bachar Houli (Richmond), Nic Naitanui (West Coast) and Lin Jong (Western Bulldogs).

A number of hopefuls from Fiji, PNG, Tonga, Nauru, South Africa, NZ and even Denmark have been part of the AFL's International Scholarship scheme over the past eight years without the ultimate success of playing in the AFL.  Now there are just two Kiwi's at St Kilda holding that torch of what seems to be a fading light for international development.

The signing of an International Scholarship player is usually heralded with a feature article on the AFL club's website, perhaps an article on the AFL website and even sometimes some local press in the home town or country. But when their time is up they seem to quietly disappear. 

The latest to 'disappear' from AFL clubs are Siope Ngata who was a scholarship holder at Hawthorn and Giovanni Mountain-Silbery who was a scholarship holder at St Kilda.

Last year Wanderers pulled off the fairy-tale finish that clubs dream of. From sitting outside the top five to premiers in just a matter of weeks was a remarkable footy story. But lightning rarely strikes the same place twice, and as the NTFL season went to the recent summer break, Wanderers again sat outside the top five and had to rely on another barnstorming finish to see finals action.

Last week they took out the second placed St Mary’s, squeaking home by just three points. This weekend they took yet another step towards the unlikely when they brought down the relentless Nightcliff Tigers by just two points. The pair of post-break wins has Wanderers right back in the action, but more importantly they are back in form. They are also back into the top five, leapfrogging both the Tiwi Bombers and Darwin Buffaloes.

Final Score: Wanderers Eagles 15 7 97 d Nightcliff Tigers 14 11 95

If enthusiasm is one of the criteria on which success is based then the new Croatian footy team, the Ploče Eagles, is in great hands. A chat with the fledgling club’s president, Johnny Roncevic, tells the story so far, but also tells a story of a larrikin who may have exactly what it takes to bring together another successful Croatian footy team.

The town of Ploče is not large – approximately ten thousand people – but it important as port on the Adriatic, or Dalmatian Coast, and is used heavily as a port for the neighbouring nation of Bosnia and Herzegovina. The reference to a port adds to the irony of a president of a new club who is from Fremantle in Australia.

Recently, World Footy News published an interview with Croatian journeyman, Josip Habljack, who has become a beacon, if you will, for other European players seeking a dream to follow in A Pilgrimage From Zagreb To Adelaide. Following is an excerpt from a new interview with Josip for the Savez Australskog Nogometa Hrvatske (SANH – Australian Union Of Croatian Football) looking at his journey since his arrival.

 

The 24-year-old from Velika Gorica, Josip Habljak was a Zagreb Hawks player, but now he is in Australia. He is the first Croatian footy player who became a pro and signed one-year contract in Adelaide for Sturt FC. Read this interesting interview and find out more about his life in Australia.

 

 How did you manage to sign one-year contract for Sturt FC and to play footy in Australia.  What is the key of your successω

The 2016 School Sport Australia tour of South Africa is underway with highly talented Australian school footballers taking their wares to towns and villages across South Africa as well as experiencing cultural, social and scenic delights as they mingle footy and travel.

Amid the excitement, the touring team will play in three matches against the South African Lions and possibly another team. The players will also be heavily involved in clinics with school kids across the Johannesburg-Pretoria-Potchefstroom triumvirate as well as later in the journey across Cape Town and Khayelitsha.

The itinerary is exciting, and for many of the players may forever be a highlight of their personal lives as well as footy career. But the opportunity for these players to work with AFL South Africa to grow the game across the nation might be the most valuable legacy of the journey.

The following article from The 42 website by Finlan O’Toole looks at the movement of potential Irish Gaelic footballers and Hurling stars headed to the AFL Training Camp to be held in Florida.

Players from Galway, Kilkenny and Westmeath are amongst the 33 players heading to Florida today for the start of the NAB AFL Academy’s training camp in America.

Galway’s Cillian McDaid, Kilkenny’s Darragh Joyce and Westmeath’s Ray Connellan are all partaking in the camp where leading Australian clubs will run the rule over the players present.

 

The players fly to Orlando before travelling to Sarasota in Florida for eight days on a high-intensity camp at the IMG Academy.

Whilst it is clear that events today will have a devastating impact on the Essendon Football Club in the wake of the CAS/WADA decision to ban players for the 2016 season after a guilty verdict was reached on the use of illegal supplements at the club in 2012, the Bombers will not be the only club hit hard. Port Adelaide, St Kilda, Melbourne and the Western Bulldogs each have former Essendon players that they have recruited post-2012 who will also be banned. Additionally, clubs around metropolitan, country and interstate leagues will be impacted.

One of these is the Palmerston Magpies club in Darwin playing in the NTFL. Former Bombers, Alwyn Davey and Leroy Jetta have been instrumental in helping the Magpies rise to become a potential finalist in 2016. Both are part of the original "Essendon 34" and face lengthy sanctions that will see them miss the remainder of the 2015 /16 season as well as most of the 2016/17 season.

To make matters worse for Palmerston, Alwyn Davey is their playing coach, meaning that the club loses more than just his playing skills, but his direction on and off field as well.