World Footy News

List changes today announced by AFL Football Operations Manager Adrian Anderson today are set to allow more opportunities for internationals to be added to AFL club lists. The AFL Commission has approved these changes to the AFL Player Rules to widen the ability of clubs to be able to attract and develop talent during the expansion period while Gold Coast and Team GWS join the national competition.

Mr Anderson said the Commission’s meeting in Melbourne today had approved recommendations from the AFL Player Movement Working Party, as part of the annual examination of the competition's draft and trading rules. He said the changes would come into immediate effect for the 2010-11 off-season, covering:
- Rookie List Rules.
- The ability for clubs to attract Athletes from other sports to the AFL competition.
- Eligibility Rules around Rookie List, International, International Scholarship and Three-Year Non-Registered Players.
- The introduction of an Inactive List, allowing players to take a 12-month leave of absence for exceptional and compelling circumstances, without taking up a list spot.

The Australian Government's major overseas aid program is AusAID, which is described on its website as "the Australian Government agency responsible for managing Australia's overseas aid program. The objective of the aid program is to assist developing countries reduce poverty and achieve sustainable development, in line with Australia's national interest".

For many years the program has funded, amongst many other positions, Australian football development roles in selected countries such as South Africa and Australian Youth Ambassadors to Tonga and elsewhere. In recent months this funding has attracted criticism from media in Sydney, notably by writers with strong leanings to other football codes.

So are taxpayers getting value for the money spent? Are recipient countries having valuable aid wasted on football?

Saturday 7th August saw the first leg of the 2010 Bute Series between Wales and Scotland take place in Cardiff, with the newly renamed Scottish Clansmen defeating the Welshmen of the Cymru Red Dragons.

This Bute Series between Wales and Scotland began in 2009, with the Welsh taking out the inaugural championship. This year's two match series is a 12-a-side competition with 4 players on the bench for rotating during the game.

Played under ideal weather conditions, the first quarter was a close affair with both sides finding their feet. Scotland did have the advantage of a slight breeze blowing towards their goal but the Welsh defence repelled their attacks on several occasions. Wales too had a few forays into the attacking zone as well and only 1 goal separated both teams at quarter time.

This report courtesy of Doug Hunter.

St Louis Blues' Dan Sarbacker (seen here around the 2 minute 50 second mark in possibly his most famous US Footy moment) is having a stint in Victoria's GVFL with Mansfield. Mansfield have received good coverage recently centred around their coach Craig Kelly, who is also a player agent and former Collingwood premiership player.

But Sarbacker is generating his own press with coverage today in Melbourne's The Age newspaper. Paul Daffey who writes for The Age and is one of the founders of The Footy Almanac penned this latest piece following Dan's senior debut for Mansfield last week.

Sarbacker also featured in The Age last month in Adam McNicol's article Rural footy lures US player.

The Putney Magpies will take on the Wandsworth Demons for the 2010 AFL London Premiership at Barn Elms this Saturday August 21st, after the Magpies defeated long-time British footy goliaths the West London Wildcats last weekend.

The 95-66 win over the Wildcats will see Putney make their first-ever Grand Final appearance, as well as marking the first year since 2001 that West London have not competed in the season's main event.

After winning the past six London Premierships on the trot, the Wildcats will have to be content with third place in the premiership conference, however their seconds (Shepherds Bush) and thirds (Ealing) will be playing for the cup in their respective divisions.

The day's footy at Barn Elms Reserve commences with Ealing vs South London for the Social Division GF at 11am, Shepherds Bush vs Clapham for the Conference GF at 1pm, and the Premiership Division at 3pm.

The following preview courtesy of Mark Pitura.

The AFL is currently allowing fans to vote on possible rule changes for season 2011. The voting is not binding, meaning the AFL may go against the votes, but a strong response is likely to sway them.

You can take part in the voting at: AFL rules - your say. The poll started last week but only remains open until this Wednesday, so hurry if you have a strong opinion.

Sav Rocca did not leave the bench in his battle with Ken Parrish for the Philadelphia Eagles punting position on the weekend. Parrish took the kickoff and punting duties (Rocca did hold for field goal attempts) for the Eagles practice match, but has been released from their squad, leaving Rocca to hit his booming torpedo's and measured drop punts for the Eagles again this season.

The other former AFL footballer Chris Bryan's battle with Tim Masthay continued to run neck and neck with both punters perfoming well but with similar returns in their practice match. Three more matches are scheduled before the regular season and it may take all those matches before Green Bay make their decision.

Vanuatu is a South Pacific island nation to the east of Australia, sitting between Australia and Fiji in the vicinity of New Caledonia. It has a population of around a quarter of a million, and the capital city is Port Vila, situated on the island of Efate.

Australian Football in Vanuatu was alluded to a couple of years ago with some mention of Auskick in the capital – and as it turns out there is still a small but growing community that represents AFL Vanuatu.

Justin Johnson is the president of AFL Vanuatu and can be contacted via justininvanuatu@gmail.com from anyone wishing to get involved. WFN communicated with Justin recently.

Irish import Jamie O’Reilly will make his senior debut this weekend for the Richmond Tigers in their clash with Carlton. It comes as no surprise as O’Reilly was promoted to the senior panel a few weeks ago and has put in impressive performances all year for Coburg in the VFL.

With the Tigers well short of making the finals, coach Damien Hardwick has made good on his promise to blood as many youngsters as possible. The former Co. Down player will be the 10th Richmond player to make his AFL debut this year when he lines out at half back. O’Reilly has shown remarkable ability to learn a new sport in his first year at Tigerland having joined on a two year rookie deal in December.

Coincidentally round 20 last year was the first live match of AFL that O’Reilly ever saw. At the time he was on trial with the Tigers and round 20 will see him step out on the MCG for his debut. Speaking to the Herald Sun he could scarcely believe how far he has come in such a short time. “I was here in Round 20 last year watching Richmond play Collingwood and was sitting with all the other development players," he said. "A year on I am in the team playing Carlton at the MCG. It's been an incredible journey.”

The past decade has seen the remarkable rise of Australian football, or FootyWILD as it is marketed, in South Africa. For all of that time if there was one name, one person, who embodied the game's journey and was the sport's public face, it was Mtutuzeli Hlomela. He has been many things to many people; a friend, an inspiration, an on field leader, and an off field promoter, developer and ambassador.

Sadly for many of us who have come to know Mtutu along the journey, the 29 year old from Gauteng has departed AFL South Africa to "pursue alternative employment in Johannesburg".

His well documented career began in 1998 when he spent a year in Adelaide with the Sturt Football Club, having arrived thinking he was on a soccer scholarship, but happy to take on a strange new game. We won't recap in detail all the years in between, but over that time Mtutu rose to be South Africa's captain, coach and talent manager. He was twice selected in the World Team after International Cups. His outgoing and friendly personality saw him become a natural ambassador for the game, he met with Archbishop Desmond Tutu in this role (pictured along with Michael O'Loughlin), and he addressed the AFL Commission in 2008 putting forward the case for support for international footy. His departure will come as a shock to many.

Perhaps strangely Mtutu was unavailable for comment, but it has been said he may continue to have a small role with the game in future. An article paying tribute to his contribution to the sport is on the AFL South Africa website: Mtutu moves on

On a personal note this author would like to thank Mtutu for his friendship and contribution to the game. And I will always remember playing a "friendly" against South Africa in which Mtutu expertly appeared to fly for a contested mark but in fact was subtly shielding me from the ball to protect his team mate. As we re-gathered ourselves I commented in rough vernacular that he'd beaten me in a nice move, and he smiled and replied that it was experience. It was at that point that it was clear to me that Mtutu was from the new generation of international footballers who didn't just take up the game recently, but really had a sense and a feel for the intricacies of the sport that you only get by actually playing it over a period of time. Best wishes for your future endeavours Mtutu.

As the 2010 NFL season is about to enter into preseason games we take a look at the former Aussie rules footballers who have been trying to secure a place in the position of punter at various clubs across the US.

Ben Graham - Arizona Cardinals - after a great season in 2009 Graham is guaranteed to be the starting punter for 2010 and will be holding punts for his former Jets team mate Jay Feely.

Sav Rocca - Philadelphia Eagles - the club has brought in Ken Parrish to compete with Rocca for the punting job and it looks like the competitior might beat the incumbent for the place on the team as he can kick off, saving wear and tear on the leg of the team's kick David Akers, who turns 36 in December. If Rocca does lose the job he may get a shot elsewhere in the NFL during the season.

The AFL is planning to host the next International Cup in August 2011 in Melbourne, Sydney and probably the Gold Coast or Brisbane. For the first time in Cup history the competing nations will be split into divisions. The AFL has told potential competitors that "IC11 will be run across multiple divisions - to be determined by the final number of entrants". That suggests that if there are enough teams there could even be three separate divisions.

The 2008 tournament was originally going to have a primary group and a developing nations group, but the final numbers saw the teams merged into one competition, with some demoralising losses. With some new footy nations expected to attend in 2011 and the top squads now very accomplished, a separation is clearly needed if 150+ point blow outs (even allowing for shortened games) are to be avoided.

And in another exciting development the world's national women's sides will be welcomed with their own division. Possibilities at this early stage may include Canada's Northern Lights, the USA Freedom, Papua New Guinea (who have been successful with girls competing in Queensland), South Africa (which has had girls playing as part of FootyWILD) and Ireland, which has recently been trying to begin a women's league. No word yet as to whether Australia would field a side, although that seems unlikely at this stage.

It seems highly likely that 2011 will see a record number of teams competing across men's, women's and in three different cities across Australia's east coast.