World Footy News

On Saturday 16th and Sunday 17th May the inaugural Australia.com Canadian National Championships of Australian Rules Football were played over the Victoria Day weekend at Humber college Toronto with great success. Eight teams from southern Ontario participated over the two days of competition and withstood strong wind, heavy rain and low temperatures to provide sponsors and spectators with a great event which is sure to be repeated next year.

The boys and girls from the Malaysian Warrior Auskick program recently won the Gaelic football competition of the South East Asian Gaelic games, despite not having played the game before.

The games were run by the Orang Eire Gaelic team and held in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia on May 9th. The Malaysian Warriors Auskick team beat the Malaysian Gaelic team in their first game, then drew with Singapore to make the final. In the final, the whole squad, aged from 6 to 11 and including boys and girls, played well as a team to win.

Due to relatively low numbers of children for both Auskick and Gaelic, the clubs have worked together to create more opportunities for games and in the process showing the benefit of team sports. The Warriors Auskick program aims to give Australian children the chance to continue Australian rules whilst abroad and encourages locals to play. Gaelic football involves similar skills to Aussie Rules and as shown by the results, the children can play both games, allowing them to enjoy team sports.

The Western Australian Football League has scored its first victory over the South Australian National Football League in around 15 years, winning a thriller by one point at Leederville Oval in Perth. Each year most of the state leagues play one interstate match, with WA, SA and Victoria battling for supremacy on a 3 year cycle, whilst slotting in games against Tasmania and Queensland in the off-years. In recent years the SANFL has held sway, winning 10 out of 11 matches, repeatedly claiming the title as best state league, keeping their noses ahead of the VFL.

WA in the meantime showed themselves to still clearly be third best, but have now stepped up, knocking off the Croweaters in soggy conditions on Saturday afternoon. After SA getting away early, WA bounced back to lead by 2 goals at the main break, SA nudged clear by 7 points at three quarter time then the Sandgropers got away again to lead by 7 points during the last stanza. There was a nail biting finish that saw the sides trade goals, with SA's Brant Chambers booting the final goal 29 minutes in, before the siren blew with SA falling short by a solitary point. To be fair to the South Aussies, it was the narrowest of margins, in foreign territory, and two early injuries were damaging, especially losing their ruckman. WA's leading scorers were Brent Le Cras and Lewis Jetta with 3 goals each, while for SA it was Chambers with 5.

As the first match in a new 3 year cycle, the title of best state league remains winnable by the premier three footy states. With an increased salary cap in 2009, and now an interstate win, it might be that local footy is resurgent in Western Australia. With the AFL National Draft compromised by the new AFL clubs in the coming years, it's likely AFL clubs will look closely at the state leagues for some mature age players - the VFL's best player in last year's loss to the SANFL was Robin Nahas, now one of Richmond's few shining lights in 2009. Jetta might be one who comes under similar consideration, looking a very elusive player in the stereotypical indigenous small forward style.

WAFL  3.0 7.4 7.7 12.10 (82)
SANFL 4.3 5.4 8.8 12.9 (81)

As we move towards the start of the 2009 season, USFootyNews.com will be previewing the Top 10 teams in USFooty as voted in the preseason USFootyNews.com and WorldFootyNews.com poll. At No. 4 is the San Diego Lions. San Diego finished the 2008 season ranked 5 with a 3-2 record in the regular season and a record at the Nationals Tourney of 1-2. San Diego dropped down from their previous heights in 2008 and are looking to turn things around in 2009 by concentrating on developing footy in the San Diego area.

As we move toward the start of the 2009 season, USFootyNews.com is previewing the Top 10 teams in USFooty as voted in the preseason USFootyNews.com and WorldFootyNews.com poll.

At No. 5 is the Golden Gate Roos. Golden Gate finished the 2008 season ranked 4 with a 1-1 record in the regular season and a record at the Nationals Tourney of 2-1. Golden Gate had an excellent Nationals Tourney, beating Boston and the San Diego Lions for the second time in the year. Their only loss was in the first game to eventual Grand Finalists, the Baltimore Washington Eagles.

Beijing is about to get its own three-round 9-a-side football league. The initiative is a direct result of increased player numbers on the Beiing Bombers' roster and enthusiasm for more matches. For the tournament, the Beijing Bombers will split into the Santa Fe Saints, AZ China ChaoYang Cats and DongCheng Demons. These teams aren't a replacement of the Bombers, who will continue to play their own matches throughout the year. The Saints are sponsored by Santa Fe Relocation Services, and the core player recruitment area is the SanLitun & Embassy district of Beijing. The AZ China ChaoYang Cats are sponsored by consultancy firm, AZ China and represent the east side of Beijing, ChaoYang district. Most players living east of the second ring road were automatically zoned to the Cats. DongCheng represent the more central and western Beijing districts. If it proves successful, a follow up tournament will be held later in the year.

A story in the Country Footy section of the Weekly Times highlights a couple of French lads making an impact for Wickliffe-Lake Bolac in the Mininera & District League, country Victoria, coincidentally only about 100 km from Warrnambool, site of the country round of the 2008 International Cup.

Two areas we've particularly focused on for this site are international Australian football and the ongoing development of the sport within Australia, be it plans for AFL clubs on the Gold Coast and West Sydney or the lower tiers such as the addition of the NT Thunder in AFL Queensland's league.

Leading the way for the AFL has been their General Manager of National and International Development, David Matthews. It's pleasing to see the AFL website has conducted a series of interviews with Matthews, covering a wide range of development issues, including all of those that we've previously discussed on this website, but without the large audience that Australia's most popular sporting website can reach.

All of the items discussed regarding international footy we've touched on before with Game Development staff, such as the AFL's hopes to bring Oceania into the elite Under 16 competition, a tender process for IC2011, and South Africa filling the junior void from the cancelling of International Rules with Ireland. But this is the first time the plans have been more widely reported, especially all in one interview, and possibly indicate a firming of some of those plans and a desire to build community support for it. The articles are:

AFL sets sights on Pacific talent pool

AFL says no to reserves league

Heavy hitters: Dave Matthews

It is rare for us to fully reproduce an article from mainstream sites, but as a consolidated summary of how the AFL sees future development it seems worthwhile for the record, so we have done so below.

In the first match of Australian rules football between two Dutch teams, the Utrecht Saints came up against the Rest-of-Holland components of the Flying Dutchmen.

The nine-a-side match at the Olympos Sportcentrum in Utrecht was played on May 9th in sunny conditions, with excited supporters clamouring for a spot in the sun while the two sides clashed.

Right from the first bounce, the Flying Dutchmen, composed of players from the Eindhoven, Amsterdam and Den Haag sides, took control of the match. The Utrecht Saints for their part had four first-timers, who put in impressive performances which demonstrated the progress made in just a few weeks of training.

The second and third quarters saw the Rest of Holland increase their lead, with their own collection of new players acquitting themselves well in their first match.

The final term saw the Saints stage a comeback and keep the game interesting. With four goals, they won the quarter, but with strong defence from the Rest of Holland the game was never in doubt.

The match was the first for the Saints as a stand-alone team, the first of four planned clubs for the DAFA's local league. The other three sides are still on the search for new players, but leagues and clubs across Europe have regularly shown that establishing a local competition has been the best recruiting tool.

Final score: (Rest of the) Flying Dutchmen 14.9 (93) def Utrecht Saints 8.10 (58)

Round One of the AFLG culminated on the weekend of May 9th, with teams in the league's new Second Division taking the field.

The largest Berlin side ever battled the Rheinland B-team through four quarters of intense footy, which saw the Lions manage a 23-point win despite four Lions going to hospital in unrelated accidents.

The Stuttgart Emus in their first official game showed that although they may be new, they’re a team to be reckoned with, beating Munich B’s by 11 points.

In Division One, Rheinland demonstrated they’re still the team to beat, taking out Frankfurt by 9 goals. Up in Hamburg, Munich had to give everything they had to hold on to their 2 point lead late in the last quarter.

Luke McBride from the AFLG spoke with World Footy News about the league's new 2-division structure.

The Irish league's experimental two tier competition is off to a good start, with a record 10 clubs in action. For many years ARFLI has been predicting new clubs but ultimately only been treading water with the new boys either not materialising, not lasting very long, or being offset by a club folding somewhere else. So after a promising start with the first match in Ireland in 2000 and an impressive 7 teams by 2005, by 2008 the total had dropped to 5 clubs taking to the park during the season.

So far the separation into Premiership and Conference divisions seems to have been a successful step towards addressing the problem. Rather than simply have separate regions but then none having very many teams, ARFLI have gone for overlapping concepts. Below we list the teams and describe the interesting new structure.

Punjabi-Australian journalist Manpreet Kaur Singh recently wrote an article for the AFL website, entitled, "Footy in a patka". In it she takes a lighthearted look at how Australian football can help bring people together and break down barriers. She also makes mention of Balraj Singh, a footballer of Punjabi descent, who at his peak was listed on the Adelaide Crows roster.

Manpreet Kaur Singh has previously conducted interviews for SBS radio with Balraj Singh (part of which is in Punjabi) and members of India's coaching and support team at the 2008 International Cup.