World Footy News

Narrowed down from a squad of 33 a little over a month ago the Australian team of 21 players for the International Rules series in Ireland has been named. The AFL chose to make up this year's team from players of Indigenous Australian heritage. They depart for Ireland on Saturday.

AFL New Zealand have hosted in conjunction with the 2013 AFL Grand Final, an annual Community Awards function.

The event was an opportunity to recognise and thank the many people and partner organisations that have contributed to the success of AFL New Zealand over the past year.

The many different aspects of AFL New Zealand’s strategies and programmes were put on display throughout the Community Awards. Encompassing and recognising the contributions of primary and secondary schools, regional sporting trusts, media organisations or AFL New Zealand High Performance participants and parents, the awards covered the breadth of the AFL community.

Last week we posted a story about the grand finals across the five major Australian Football leagues in the tropics (above the Tropic of Capricorn) of Queensland (see: ). This follow up story looks at the grand final stories of the big games across the Northern Territory. As a point of interest, many of these leagues played their finals much earlier in the year, but by including all that we can a bigger picture of the scope of Australian Rules football across the NT can be seen.

 

The VAFA U 18's are currently in NZ and have played the first game, in a 3 match series against the NZ Hawks.

For the first time the NZ team opposed to the Victorians is of the same age range, with previous tours being against a NZ team with older boys. As the talent pool in NZ has increased, the need for this advantage has decreased.

Once again the Victorians were too good but players who stood out in the NZ Hawks/ South Pacific Academy game on Anzac Day as the curtain raiser to the Sydney Swans/St Kilda game were once again prominent. Hawthorn scholarship holders Ben Miller and Siope Ngata were standouts as were Kade Riddell and James McKenzie who kicked 5 goals.

With the final scorse 103- 51 the Kiwis were by no means disgraced.

St Kilda has agreed to a new five-year deal to secure the Anzac Day fixture in Wellington, New Zealand until at least 2018.

The Saints hosted the first ever game for premiership points held outside Australia when it played the Sydney Swans at Westpac Stadium, Wellington on Anzac Day this year.

The club had initially agreed to play games in New Zealand for at least three years with the option of playing additional games from 2014.

The AFL's Talent Manager, Kevin Sheehan, discussed the 2013 AFL Draft Combine with WFN's Troy Thompson.  They chatted about how the international athletes fared at Etihad stadium in Melbourne.  With two players listed as international rookies with AFL clubs before the camp finished, one already listed last year and American Patrick Mitchell listed by the Swans earlier in the year after the US Combine - the AFL will be pleased with the fruits of their labour at the international combines in Europe and the US this year.  We've uploaded the audio and photos of some of the players to our youtube channel.

[youtube:-X_wxrq6DFo]

(Better viewed by following the link)

After 40 years it's time to farewell "Footy Park", home of the SANFL, Adelaide Crows and home ground for Port Adelaide Power.

Building the stadium at West Lakes in Adelaide's western suburbs was considered a bold move or by some, foolhardy.  It was built on recovered marshland when tensions became too great between Aussie Rules (run in SA by the SANFL) and cricket (run by the SACA, headed by Sir Donald Bradman).  Football wanted a home of its own and in 1974 controversially moved away from the ground on which it had been played since the 1870s or earlier.

The move proved to be a great success and the financial risk was rewarded, and little did the SANFL know in those pre-AFL days that it would provide a cornerstone on which to build two AFL clubs, the Adelaide Crows and Port Adelaide Power.

But over the last decade AFL fans have seen numerous significant upgrades to stadia around Australia (though Football Park, or AAMI Stadium as it is currently branded, has also had improvements).  Perhaps most damaging of all to the Footy Park brand was Docklands (Etihad) Stadium in Melbourne - many footy fans have ventured across the border to experience what a modern roofed stadium in the CBD is like.  Despite a Labor government plan to spend $100million upgrading the stadium and a possible expansion back up towards 60,000 (after various upgrades had reduced the capacity) there were growing calls to start afresh.

So with crowds falling, the Liberal Party opposition proposing a roofed stadium in the city, the state Labor government looking to neutralise the issue, and the SACA (cricket) in major debt over its new stand at Adelaide Oval, the perfect storm emerged that saw a return to an upgraded Adelaide Oval.  Port Adelaide and Adelaide have now both farewelled Football Park (in terms of their final AFL matches there) and this weekend the 2013 SANFL Grand Final concludes official matches at the ground (although there have been suggestions it may still be used such as for NAB Cup).

Ireland International Rules manager Paul Earley today confirmed Michael Murphy as team captain for the upcoming Test series against Australia.

Murphy is the 2012 Donegal All-Ireland winning captain will lead Ireland’s campaign in both Cavan and at Croke Park as Ireland look to retain the Cormac McAnallen Cup won in Australia two years ago.

Murphy said: “It is a massive honour to be involved with the Irish team, never mind accepting the accolade to lead my country as team captain. “I have enjoyed immensely the experience of pulling on the Irish jersey in the past and I am especially looking forward to playing with the best footballers from our game against the visiting Australian team over the course of the two upcoming tests.”

Richmond will be the first club in AFL /VFL history to have a female president after Peggy O’Neal was voted into the role at a board meeting this morning.

O’Neal has spent the past eight years on the Richmond board. She takes over from Gary March, who officially stood down as president at the Jack Dyer Medal last Monday night.

O’Neal, who was born in Virginia in the United States, has spent the past 24 years in Australia. She currently chairs the Club’s risk and compliance committee, is a member of the governance committee, and also chairs the Tigers in Community Foundation.

LEFT: Flynn with Port coach Ken Hinkley.

19-year-old Irishman Daniel Flynn has been signed on for two years as an international rookie by AFL club Port Adelaide, after meeting with club management at Alberton Oval on Monday ahead of this week's AFL draft screening.

Flynn was identified by his former countryman Tadhg Kennelly, during the AFL talent screening session of 24 prospects in Ireland in March this year. He is seen as a potential running half-back or midfielder, after he impressed with his speed and agility, achieving 2.83 seconds in the 20 m sprint.

A native of Johnstownbridge in County Kildare, Flynn has been a promising junior Gaelic footballer for the Lilywhites, as Kildare's GAA side are known.

His signing follows hot on the heels of Jason Holmes from the USA, who was signed by St Kilda as an international rookie this week.

Port Adelaide's official press release follows.

What price the smile on the face of a kid with a new footy? Priceless. What price also a kid’s ability to run and chase with purpose with their own brand new ball in their possession? Again, priceless.

But if there is anything as good as that, it is the ability to be there first hand, giving the kid their ball, watching their timid belief that it is now theirs and sitting back knowing that you had just had a hand in something special. That’s not why you get involved, that’s just the by-product – the natural result – of what you just did.

Michael Gallus and his team at Footys4all are very aware of this osmosis: they do this all the time. Our little crew from the Pyramid Power club in Cairns learned it ourselves over the weekend when we undertook a trip to the indigenous communities of Yarrabah, Hope Vale and Wujul Wujul, distributing footballs to kids who may not otherwise receive them.

American Jason Holmes is described at the AFL Draft combine in Melbourne this week as 203cm, 104kg , born 28/10/89 - Potential key position player/ruckman from Moorehead State in Kentucky ( the Ohio Valley Conference of the NCAA Division I-AA) with a multiple sports background in basketball, soccer, NFL, baseball and golf. Was introduced to AFL at the USA Combine in April 2013. Left-footer who looked natural with the ball by hand and foot.