World Footy News

A number of (non-Aussie) former members of the Danish Australian Football League are currently making headlines in spreading Aussie Rules across Europe. In the Norwegian city of Tromsø, Helsingborg Saints old boy Johan Julin is part of a group founding the world's most northerly club. In Andorra, British expat Doug Pate is running a club. Páll Finnsson, the Icelandic captain of the Denmark Vikings at IC08, this weekend pulled on the boots at the French Championships.

Back in Iceland, Páll's brother Jón Hrói Finnsson has also been trying to get the sport started since returning from his stint playing footy in Denmark. It seems his efforts are paying off, with school clinics underway and a senior side in formation in the town of Ólafsfjörður.

Around 400km away in the Icelandic capital Reykjavík, a group of around a dozen senior players have been kicking the footy on a weekly basis since May, under the leadership of Friðgeir Torfi Ásgeirsson, another Icelander who learnt to play in the DAFL.

worldfootynews.com has a new section called Country Snapshots available from the pulldown menu Countries. Over the coming months we will be adding a brief summary of the status of Australian football in each country that has had some form of involvement in the game.

To be a truly complete record would require pages of information per country and need to be constantly updated, so these snapshots are not intended to replace a Google search or a search of our news articles and links - there's nothing like tapping a query into the search facility at the top left of our website. Rather, they are intended as a quick look for basic information, especially for people new to the world of international Aussie Rules.

The first region completed is Africa. As always, let us know if there are any significant errors or omissions.

Los Santos de Santiago, Chile's first Australian rules football club, will head to Rio de Janeiro in Brazil on Saturday June 20th for a match against a team called the "Carnaval", drawn from expat Aussies and locals in Rio and São Paolo.

The Carnaval will be the first-ever Brazilian team to take the pitch. Rob Spurr from Los Santos tells us the game was conceived at a business dinner last November in Sao Paulo, where he met with Australian Trade Commissioner for Brazil, Greg Wallis. Wallis has since taken the steps required to pull a team together from across Brazil, as well as securing a ground and sponsors.

Spurr also mentions the Santiago club is going from strength to strength, with the Saints setting themselves the goal of having a Chilean team at the IC11 in Melbourne. "We had 29 to our first training for 2009 in April, including 19 Chileans. Last week we held our first intra club test match - Chile v Anzacs whereby the Chilean side played as a national team for the first team in front of about 100 spectators."

"Whilst the Anzacs were victorious on the day, the Chilean side were competitive and have the basis of a decent side to work with."

"Our committee hopes to kick off a minor league format by later this year and we are still shooting to have the Chilean national team at the 2011 International Cup in Melbourne."

Spurr also confirmed Los Santos are planning to return to Argentina for another tour match this year, and are hopeful that the Rio match should see a side from Brazil also make the trip down to Buenos Aires.

Anyone interested in footy in Chile can contact the Santiago Saints via their Facebook group.

There is no doubt that AFL South Africa has been a stunning success so far. They are spending a year consolidating their amazing growth of up around 17,000 players across a number of communities, seeking to expand within those fixed programs rather than roll out further areas. It has been speculated before that if the program is successful then the AFL may look to other African nations. The big questions are what defines success and might they spend a decade proving the long term viability before any further moves?

For those that feared an undue level of conservatism it is pleasing to report that the AFL has already begun to look at other opportunities. Or more accurately, other African countries are looking to the AFL. We were aware of discussions with media from several other African countries in terms of showcasing the game, but the AFL Talent Manager Kevin Sheehan has revealed to worldfootynews.com that Botswana and Kenya are the front runners for FootyWILD programs, with Ghana also in the mix.

As we move toward 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. 1 is the Baltimore Washington Eagles. Baltimore finished the 2008 season ranked 1 with a 8-0 record in the regular season and a record at the Nationals Tourney of 2-2. The BW Eagles only losses came at Nationals to the No. 8 Boston Demons and eventual champs the Vancouver Cougars. USFootyNews.com caught up with Head Coach Aaron Tyndall at the Eagles Open Day in Arlington VA.

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The Queensland Under 16 Championships have recently concluded with the PNG team winning one and losing two of their matches. The PNG side easily accounted for the Suncoast Power but were overwhelmed by the Northern Raiders and the Country Kookaburras. In pleasing recognition of the football talent located in PNG Naime Gordon and Collins Brand-Slim were selected in the State team. Collins Brian-Slim was also selected by the PNG coaching staff as their player of the tournament.

Former Collingwood, Adelaide and North Melbourne player Jason McCartney is well known to international footy for various roles performed on behalf of the AFL, especially as coach of South Africa at the 2008 Australian Football International Cup. McCartney has now been appointed as High Performance Coach for Australian football at the Australian Institute of Sport, which oversees the country's elite youth. Full details follow.

Media Release

The AFL today announced Jason McCartney had been appointed as AIS-AFL High Performance Coach, to replace Alan McConnell who recently accepted the role as Western Sydney High Performance Manager.

McCartney, 35, played a total of 182 games across a 13-season career with Collingwood, Adelaide and North Melbourne, and had been the AFL’s Youth and High Performance Co-Ordinator. McCartney commenced with the AFL in 2004, heading up AFL Youth Leadership Seminars that have reached more than 70,000 students across Australia.

A common complaint by people trying to promote Australian football around the world is that it's often difficult to show people the game regularly as it isn't on television very much. Happily Africa is getting some coverage in 2009, with 1 game per week and possibly a one hour package. Unfortunately it is almost certainly subscription based, however talk of producing local content relating to AFL South Africa is encouraging. The regions that should have access are:

Sub-Saharan Africa, that is, the continent of Africa – including Cape Verde, the Comoros, Madagascar, Mauritius, Reunion, St. Helena, São Tomé & Príncipe, and the Seychelles – other than Algeria, Egypt, Libya, Morocco, Tunisia and Western Sahara. And Israel.

The Salamander Company, looking after commercial activities for AFL South Africa, recently announced that:

The Salamander Company is pleased to announce that global sports broadcaster ESPN will broadcast one AFL match per week into Africa through the DSTV network.

The Salamander company will work with ESPN to look at ways to enhance the broadcast of AFL matches in the region including the production of local television content focusing on the growth and development of footyWILD in South Africa.

A while back, we caught up with Gavin Mahoney - AFL London's first fulltime employee, focused at growing footy in and around the capital in England. This month, we speak to Rick Shrowder, employed by Aussie Rules UK to support the leagues outside the city in regional England.

With established leagues in the South and North-East of England, along with new clubs forming to grow a Northern league, Rick's territory is a lot more spread-out and without the large population of Australians present in the capital who can help bring that initial level of experienced enthusiasm. The regional game is based around 9-a-side teams, utilising existing facilities such as rugby posts and pitches to make the beautiful game accessible to a wider audience.

As we move toward 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. 2 is the Denver Bulldogs. Denver finished the 2008 season ranked 2 with a 3-3 record in the regular season and a record at the Nationals Tourney of 2-1. The Bulldogs regular season losses were all at the Florida FastStream Invitational Tournament early in the season and their only loss at Nationals was to the eventual champs, Vancouver, by 7 points.

According to Head Coach, Tom Ellis, "2008 was a big year for us. We had over forty-five men compete at Nationals and over twenty women. For us that makes the year a big success. Every year the Bulldogs have the goal of winning Nationals. 2008 was no different so it was dissappointing to not win but we still think the year was a big success. 2008 was our tenth Anniversary as a club and it was great to look back at six National Titles, over one hundred players on our list over the years and to also have six players that have now played over 100 games for the club. We now have a womens team and two players going to Australia this August to compete with the Freedom. The other teams around the league are getting better and better every year so that is something I really think is good to see."

While the Essendon Bombers came from behind for a famous victory over the Collingwood Magpies at the MCG, Australian rules football resumed in Japan with the commencement of the JAFL 2009 season. The Nagoya Redbacks hosted the reigning premiers, the Tokyo Goannas, on Australia’s most revered occasion on the national calendar, ANZAC Day 25th April. The Goannas showed their class in wet and difficult conditions with a dominant 10 goals to 2 first half before running out 13.9 (87) to 5.6 (36) victors. The Redbacks, playing their first game as part of the JAFL, valiantly fought out the game, matching the Goannas for goals in the second half. They were brave in defeat, facing a more experienced and hardened outfit that also had a significant number advantage on the bench. Two games were played on Sunday 26th April. The 2008 runners-up, the Eastern Hawks, had winners all over the ground as they thumped the Tokyo Leopards 25.18 (168) to 3.7 (26). The first quarter was marred only by inaccuracy in front of goals for the Hawks, although this improved over the course of the game. The Hawks showed a ruthless edge in kicking 9 goals in the final quarter to ensure a healthy percentage. The young Leopards battled hard throughout but lacked the skills and experience to match their opponents.

The final match of the round saw the Osaka Dingoes travel to Tokyo to play the Komazawa Magpies. After an even first half that saw the straight kicking of the Magpies take a 9 point lead into the long break, the more experienced Dingoes lifted their work rate, scoring 10 goals to 1 in the second half to run out 49 point winners, 14.15 (99) to 7.8 (50). First-gamer Sato was superb up forward for the Magpies with 3 first half goals, while the load was evenly spread by the Dingoes with 5 players kicking two goals apiece.

The Senshu University Powers had the bye this round.

Ed: WFN welcomes Roy Obal to our team of correspondents. An Aussie living in Japan as an English teacher, Roy will be reporting on the goings-on in the Japan AFL.

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. 3 is the New York Magpies. New York finished the 2008 season ranked 3 with a 6-3 record against tough opposition in the regular season and a record at the Nationals Tourney of 1-2. New York's regular season losses were to the Baltimore Washington Eagles (twice) and the Boston Demons at home. At Nationals they lost to Denver and eventual champs, the Vancouver Cougars. In 2009, the Magpies will be looking to compete with the Baltimore Washington Eagles for the EAFL Premiership and with Denver for the National Title.