World Footy News

The Australian Rules Football League of Ireland has reported on some significant historical events throughout its lifespan and today another significant milestone was reached. The first ever ladies match in Ireland was played today at the Boucher road pitches in Belfast between the Kilrea Kookaburras and the Dublin Angels, the Angels running out confident winners 6.5 (41) to the Kilrea Kookaburras 1.2 (8).

From the first bounce it was clear that both sides were giving 110% to the game, Dublin quickly scoring the first two goals and setting a tone with quick feet and hard tackles. Kilrea came back fighting after the first break, as they blocked the momentum Dublin had in the first quarter. but this didn't stop the points hitting the Angels board.

Thanks to Leiha Shrubsall for this report.

The German Black Eagles travelled to Paris last weekend to take on the French Coqs, in the first-ever 18-a-side international for the French national team. The home side battled hard, but struggled against their more experienced opponents, with the Eagles holding the French scoreless in the first quarter.

The second quarter saw the French rally and get their first goal on the board, but by half time the Germans were ahead by 35 points.

From the 3 minute mark of the third term the Eagles were reduced to 17 men on the field, after Daniel Karsch went to hospital with a dislocated shoulder, but in spite of this the Germans again held the French scoreless for the quarter, while they added 6 goals themselves, pulling away to a 74-point lead at the final break.

The last quarter effort from the French allowed them to regain some pride, dominating play and denying the Germans any further score, but inaccuracy in front of goal stopped them from making a bigger impression on the final result, Germany finishing 64-point winners, 13.5 (83) to France's 2.7 (19), in a performance described by Germany's coach Troy Pedder as "a solid effort from the whole squad, with no passengers."

The AFL International Cup is held every 3 years, and this year alongside the men’s competition will be the first ever Women’s Division. The earlier rounds will be held in Sydney, and the later rounds and the finals will be held in Melbourne. Whilst the men start a little earlier on the 12th August, on the 15th there will be no men’s matches and the whole day will be reserved for the start of the women’s competition. The other women’s matches will coincide with men’s games. The Women’s Division competition will finish with the Grand Finals on the 26th August. The men’s finals and the closing ceremony will be held the next day on the 27th. The locations of the finals have not yet been arranged.

The women’s competition will be a “round robin” style tournament. There are six teams which will be randomly allocated a number. After four rounds of matches, the teams will be ranked 1-6 and the top two teams will advance to the finals. Additionally, the 3rd and 4th ranked teams, and the 5th and 6th ranked teams will also play each other as the match experience will help the ongoing development of the teams.

Teams competing in the Women’s Division are Canada, Ireland, Italy, PNG, USA and a combined Indigenous/Multicultural team.
 

Readers will probably have noticed the scrolling football scores across the top of our website over the last year or so. In case you were wondering, they come courtesy of The Footy Record (TFR), a site set up by Ian Hill, a good friend of worldfootynews.com and a former president of the Denmark Australian Football League.

The site focuses mainly on scores from international Aussie Rules, but it's important to note that people behind TFR do not enter most of the results themselves as the job would be too large. If a league wants to see their results up there it is their responsibility to make contact with TFR, arrange for an account and enter their own results. Some exceptions have been made, with TFR posting International Cup results and WFN putting up AFL scores to try to add attention to the feed.

Adding scores from other tournaments requires a new competition to be created and additional information to be added, so it's not something we do routinely, not even for tournaments featuring the World XVIII and South Pacific. So the message is we like scores feed but we nor TFR have the resources to update the data so it's strictly DIY.

The 2011 Women's Nationals have completed, with Victoria too strong as expected in Division One. NSW were pushed harder by ACT but took home Division Two. All the competing teams then converged on AAMI Stadium where they did a lap of honour at half time of the Adelaide versus West Coast AFL match.

Victoria won Division One

Victoria 16.5 (101) defeated Western Australia 3.1 (19)

New South Wales won Division Two

New South Wales 7.10 (52) defeated ACT 6.3 (39)

Congratulations to still undefeated Victoria and to up and coming New South Wales! And here are some pictures of the girls in action from over the whole event...

North Melbourne listed, Sudanese born Majak Daw was the subject of racial abuse as he played for Werribee in the VFL last week at Port Melbourne.  The spectator who yelled the racial abuse at Daw was escorted from the ground and has since been banned from attending matches.  Daw was upset and felt marginalised by the abuse and subsequently won support from not only his team mates but the whole football community.  While this sort of abuse has been around  for a very long time, the current attitude is that it is not acceptable and will be acted on to stamp it out immediately, as happened in this case. 

And while players in the past just had to put up with it now they are encouraged to speak up about it.  Majak's reaction to the event was sought by media outlets across Melbourne this week.  The Youtube video below sees Majak interviewed by 3AW's talkback host Neil Mitchell.

In the rugby league heartlands of Sydney’s western suburbs, a football team called the Auburn Tigers has sprung up. The Auburn Tigers are from a variety of backgrounds, mostly Lebanese, and train to a backdrop of the Gallipoli Mosque towers. Against the odds, they were extremely successful, winning the premiership in their first season. However, the guys are not the only team that trains here- encouraged by the success of the men’s team, a women’s team has also started up.

Like the guys team, the Auburn Tigers women’s team are predominantly Muslim. There are also Fijian, Bosnian, Turkish, Afghan and some white girls there too. Though some girls may be from secular backgrounds, how on earth does a girl from a traditional Lebanese or Afghan Muslim family go out on the oval tackling, kicking and engaging in all the other physical aspects of football? The answer is simple- a specially designed kit, including full length skins, knee length shorts and a headscarf which the girls’ Captain, Amna Karra-Hassan, assures doesn’t slip off during the game. They also have a strategy in case a headscarf incident does occur, to make the girl feel comfortable and able to get it back on quickly.

Because of the cultural requirements of the women’s team, they ask the men to stay away from training on Wednesdays, but the greater problem to overcome is finding a coach. Experienced female coaches are thin on the ground even in the football heartlands of Victoria, and so far the girls have been unable to find a suitable one. To overcome this, their captain has learnt some drills and tactics from the guys team to help her coach the girls, and despite some of them never having seen a game of footy on the TV before, they are enjoying the game and their skills are improving.

Collingwood football club continues its love for the Arizona altitude this week as Dane Swan, Darren Jolly, Nathan Brown and Brent McCaffer headed back to the US on Monday and were shortly after joined by Dale Thomas.  The theory is that the two weeks at altitude will aid the recovery of these players struggling with injury and fatigue problems.

The Youtube video below interviews the players about the trip and has some footage of the clubs preseason trip to Arizona.

Division 1

Victoria 18.5(113) vs Queensland 0.3(3)
Western Australia 11.11(77) vs South Australia 3.8(26)

Division 2

New South Wales 14.8(92) vs Northern Territory 1.1(7)
ACT 15.10(100) vs Tasmania 2.3(15)

Teams progressing into the finals from Division 1 are Victoria and Western Australia. Teams progressing into the finals from Division 2 are New South Wales and ACT. Both finals matches will be played tomorrow, Saturday June, 11 at Gliderol Stadium in Glenelg.

Division One Final 11.40 am Victoria v Western Australia and Division Two Final 9.30 am  New South Wales v ACT.

The Vale Warriors made an impressive comeback in their Welsh Australian Rules Football League Round 2 clash against the experienced Cardiff Double Blues. The Barry-based Warriors were unable to put out a team in last week's Round 1 clash against Swansea Magpies but this week pulled off an impressive victory in the capital.

Despite a strong performance from the Double Blues' Tristan Lewis in midfield, Ethan Dicks & rookie Gareth Booker were standouts for Vale as the Warriors won 18.20.128 - 11.15.81 with Stuart Morgan prolific in front of the uprights.

Elsewhere, South Cardiff Panthers continued their impressive start to the season with a 15.23.113 - 2.11.23 victory at home to the Bridgend Eagles whilst the Bristol Dockers recorded their first win of the season, 16.23.119 - 7.13.55 at home to the Swansea Magpies.

Division 1

WA 8.10 (58) vs QLD 4.4 (28)
Vic 10.10 (70) vs SA 2.2 (14)

Division 2

NT 2.0 (12) vs ACT 17.10 (112)
NSW 16.14 (110) vs Tas 1.0 (6)

More information on the fixtures and the results can be found on the Women's Nationals official website here

AFL club Hawthorn recently played host to International Scholarship holder Rhys Panui-Leth and his parents Luke and Marion, as the youngster undertook testing and skills training with the Hawks. In other recent news Kurt Heatherley, another Hawthorn Scholarship holder, has been starring in Victoria and Shaun Johnson who has previously played AFL in NZ has debuted for the NRL’s Warriors.

Panui-Leth chronicles his training trip with Hawthorn here.

The Hawks' third scholarship player from New Zealand - Shem Tatupu from Auckland - will also be at Waverley Park to train with the Hawks in coming months.

Looking at other junior AFL talent from NZ football we can compare Kurt Heatherley, who was recently named best on ground for the top of the table Caulfield Grammarians in their win against Wesley College, with Shaun Johnson. Johnson has just debuted for the Warriors in the NRL and according to Rugby League legend Andrew Johns ''He's one of those players who don't come around too often. Johnson was a Junior Kiwi last year and a New Zealand representative in Aussie Rules." At the very least it acknowledges that AFL is a contributing factor to players making the top grade in other sports even if they don’t stick with footy.

For more on Shaun Johnson, see this article.