World Footy News

In this final instalment of the interviews arranged by the Bordeaux Bombers and the CNFA after the recent tournament in France, the focus is on women’s footy. Vanessa Degrave, a player for the French team – the Inattendues – looks at how she became involved in Australian Rules football – in France.

 In a tremendous coup for Australian Rules football in Europe, and the game in general, Prince Charles has become Patron of AFL Europe. The story below, kindly shared with us by AFL Europe, details this landmark appointment. 

 When he was a student at Timbertop (a campus of Geelong Grammar School) near Mansfield, north-east of Melbourne, in 1966, he is unlikely to have escaped exposure to Australian Rules football. He was a student at the campus from January to August of that year: the same year that St Kilda would go and win their only premiership against Collingwood. He also spent some time in Geelong as part of his curriculum requirements, further adding to his awareness of the game. 

Periodically, Prince Charles has been presented with footballs at various events, even as recently as last year when Tony Woods (AFL International Development Manager) and Chris Dow (AFL Europe Chairman) presented The Prince of Wales with another Sherrin.

A recent conversation with Morten Merhøj from the newly formed Odense Lions in Denmark is a revealing study of how a club has ridden the roller coaster of development and come through to be a new potential force in years to come on the Danish footy landscape. The following article is that story through Morten’s eyes: a story of dreams, setbacks, determination and bringing a vision to life.

“Well the story of how Odense Lions started really goes back to the year 2011. Daniel Petrolo and a few other guys tried to start a team in Odense.” (see previous story linked here )

 

In the second of Bigfooty Media's Jason Lassey's interviews about footy outside Australia he speaks to AFL Germany President Fabian Cordts. You can read more about this interview here.

Jason Lassey from Bigfooty Media has begun a series of interviews with people involved with footy outside Australia.  Below is the first in his series of interviews.  He chats in depth with ARFLI's Cian Quigley about footy in Ireland, Irish players in the AFL, the International Rules series and the upcoming IC14.  You can read more on the Bigfooty Forums here.

Charles Bernigaud bought home a little more than postcards and stuffed koalas from his trip to Australia. Amongst his collection of souvenirs was a new love. “I discovered that sport [Australian Rules football] when I was in Australia for a year, and I was really amazed by intensity [of the game]. From there an opportunity grew for him to “bring a piece of it [the trip and Australia] to France”.

And so, the ALFA Lions were born.

Lyon is the second largest city in France, with a population of around two million people within the greater urban area. It is in the central-eastern part of the country between Paris and Marseille.  Charles explains that “I made a request at the beginning of the year to the CNFA and asked them if there were any [Australian Rules] teams around Lyon I can play for. They answered no and told me that closest teams were in Strasbourg, Marseille and Paris. It was a good opportunity [to grow a club], because Lyon is well situated geographically. It’s the second biggest city of France so we knew that we could create something good.”

 

Reigning Brownlow Medalist Gary Ablett Junior and his brother and Geelong Premiership player Nathan Ablett will be in Port Moresby this week. They will be undertaking various activities for their church group, and it's charity - The Gateway Children's Fund.

As the end of October draws near and Australian based AFL fans wonder whether 2 or 3 weeks is the right length for the trade period or whether the Irish series is worth persisting with or not – we could be forgiving for thinking there’s not much going on in footy. Certainly the same can’t be said for AFL Fiji who have been working feverishly on many fronts.

With the kind assistance and generosity of Jonathan Cooper and the Osaka Dingoes Australian Football club, the following article is an interview with one of the icons of Australian Rules football in Japan. The answers to the interview questions have been produced in both English and Japanese out of respect for the loyal national readership in Japan and so that the current University players can read his message and follow in his footsteps.

With the development of the game of Australian football in Asia high on the agenda of the current AFL administration, we thought we would interview and share with you the thoughts of the Dingoes' Takaaki Seto, a man who has been involved in Japanese football for twelve years now and who was influential in establishing the university football system in Japan.

'Seto' as he is more commonly referred to, is currently a back pocket at the Osaka Dingoes and has represented Japan at the 2002, 2008 and 2011 International Cups. He won the Peter Wilson medal for league best and fairest in 2007, and won the Osaka Dingoes' best and fairest award in 2012.

 

In this second article of the series which looks back at the recent tournament in France, the event organisers chat with Ben MacCormac (AFL Europe General Manager)  about the event from the point of view of AFL Europe. These answers were given by Ben to Alban Schieber and the event organisers, unless otherwise indicated.

 

Whilst the official draw for the 2014 AFL season is still a few days away at the time of writing this article, news has been confirmed that has warmed the hearts of followers throughout the Northern Territory. The first ever AFL match for premiership points will be played in Central Australian town of Alice Springs next season at TIO Traeger Park.

In an enormous coup for Northern Territory football scene, this historic match will feature two of the AFL’s redeveloping clubs clashing for premiership points. The Melbourne Demons will be tackling the Port Adelaide Power in the second of three matches scheduled for the Northern Territory in 2014. Melbourne’s opponent is yet to be confirmed for the pre-season match to be played, also at Traeger Park, but the other match will see the Demons up against the 2013 Grand Finalists, Fremantle Dockers, in Round 16 at TIO Stadium in Darwin.