100 Years of Australian Football 1996 documentary
- Wednesday, January 15 2014 @ 03:52 am ACDT
- Contributed by: Troy Thompson
- Views: 3,679
Welcome to World Footy News Monday, November 18 2024 @ 01:43 am ACDT
With the arrival of the 2014 football season, the reality of the next International Cup is just around the corner. World Footy News will be looking at the prospects of teams planning to come out to Australia for the event over the coming months. This story, looking at Finnish football, has been reproduced with the kind permission of Justin Lassey at Bigfooty Media. It is the written article drawn from the recent video clip http://www.worldfootynews.com/article.php/20131113101224554 posted late last year.
In this instalment of the International Footy series we talk to Janne Hokkonen, the President of the Finland AFL.
Janne first got involved in Australian football when he was looking for a hobby in 2009. He says it was an accident, when a family friend introduced him to the game. He started playing kick to kick in the park with a small group of guys, and within the month was playing in his first game. He says that he’s spent most of the time in the backline, but has played all over except ruck due to his short stature.
The following article is an adaption of an original story written for the Guangzhou Scorpions website detailing the finale to the first season of the GDAFL competition in Guangzhou, a competition within the overall SCAFL (South China Australian Football League).
The GDAFL finished it first season on the 4th of January. GZSU (Guangzhou Sports University) Seagulls 10.7 67 beat the GZ Scorpions 3.4 22 making the Seagulls the first GDAFL Champion. Seagulls won all of their games this season. It was amazing achievement for them.
In the first semi-final, GZSU Seagulls defeated the HuiZhou Hawks 19.8 122 to 0.3 3. They were very eager to win the first GDAFL championship and their offensive and defensive game was organized very well. The HuiZhou Hawks didn’t have enough players to join the final game, so they borrowed a few players from Scorpions. But even then the two teams were not level on the same stage, so the Seagulls killed the Hawks.
Thinking of playing footy in Australia ahead of the 2014 International Cup? West Brunswick Amateur Football Club trains and plays on the grounds that were used for most of the International Cup games in Melbourne in 2008 and 2011 (Western Oval, McAlister Oval and Ransford Ovals in Parkville). And they are looking for IC14 players to join them.
This is the exciting story of the “Croatian Knights quest to build the first Aussie Rules field in Eastern Europe.” The Croatian Knights have started an information and sponsorship drive to try to make their dream a reality – a proper Australian Rules football ground of their own.
As stated in their prospectus brochure, “In 2013 an opportunity arose for the Association of Australian Football - Croatia to build the first Australian Rules football oval in Eastern Europe. For years our players dreamed of having locker rooms and being able to train and play on a flat grass field. For years we dreamed of kicking in front of real footy posts.”
Back at training in Melbourne after the Christmas and New Year break the Hawthorn squad looked primed to carry on 2014 the way they left 2013. Most of the squad had a tour of South Africa under their belt and their opponents might have hoped that the Hawks were showing some serious battle scars from their premiership campaign.
New recruits and draftees were out on show. International Rookie Kiwis Heatherley and Tatupu were on deck too - Kurt looking quick and skilled, Shem looking a bit underdone and reportedly not long out of a moon boot.
But Hawks fans out at the Ricoh centre were wondering who the slim red headed kid was?
Being a quiet time of the year for footy across the world, a good old-fashioned feel-good story can often plug the hole. The following story is of an event last year, but on reflection deserved to be told then. Instead, we will tell it now.
Mid-way through last year’s footy season, Elliott Takolu from the Salamanda Port Powers club in Lae, Papua New Guinea, put out a call on Facebook. He was seeking a set of football jumpers if any clubs had a set to spare.
Elliott contacted me direct as my club, Pyramid Power, had already established many links with clubs across the world through their Brother Club Project.
With the commencement of 2014 many (but not all) Australian football clubs will be thinking of a new season and how they can best prepare, not just in terms of improving existing players but in terms of developing their club.
WFN has used this quiet period to formulate a questionaire for the benefit of all clubs and leagues. From the replies we will attempt to identify effective means of developing football club growth.
In effect, we are asking clubs what they have and haven't tried in an attempt to widen support for their club and to rate their experiences.
A number of leagues have been approached and they have expressed interest in the results which will be open to everyone, and hopefully serve as a future reference. We hope all clubs around the world will share their experiences by following the link below.
There's no firm cut off date, but we hope to collate results by the end of January 2014.
World Footy Development Techniques Survey
The Flying Boomerangs were just too good for the NZ Hawks u16’s. This is no surprise as these indigenous Australians realistically will have been playing footy from not long after they could walk. Meanwhile many of the Kiwis will have been identified through talent spotting competitions like the Hawks Cup, with most players unlikely to have played more than twenty games ever. Over time, as the juniors come through in NZ the gap between the two sides is likely to become less, but right now the tour is best seen as a great experience for all involved!
The AFL Flying Boomerangs were formally welcomed to New Zealand with a powhiri (a welcome to country), held at Te Marae within the Te Papa Tongarewa Museum, which served as a fitting introduction to the indigenous Maori culture of New Zealand.
Playing with an exciting blend of skill and speed, the AFL Flying Boomerangs were simply too fast for the Hawks to keep pace. However, the Hawks earned respect through their dogged commitment throughout both games.