World Footy News

Melbourne daily newspaper The Age this weekend reported that the AFL will be holding draft camp-style tryouts in the South African cities of Cape Town and Johannesburg, coinciding with the upcoming tour to South Africa by the AIS-AFL under-17 squad.

Similar to the Western Bulldogs' trials in Fiji earlier this year, the project will be partly focussed on recruiting athletes from other sporting backgrounds for the existing AFL South Africa senior programs, as well as selecting up to four South Africans for the "Mtutuzeli Hlomela Scholarship" to attend the AFL Draft camp in Australia later this year.

The league has placed advertisements in Cape Town newspapers calling for boys between 15 and 19 with strong sports backgrounds, who stand a minimum 175 centimetres and weigh at least 70 kilograms, to attend a testing day at the Sports Science Institute of South Africa at Newlands, with follow-up testing also planned. A session near Johannesburg, featuring about 30 boys already identified, will also be held.

AFL talent manager Kevin Sheehan said that having introduced the junior program FootyWild to South Africa two years ago, the league's next responsibility was to create an ongoing pathway for talented players.

The full article can be viewed here.

For a South African perspective on the trials, the article Hunt for the best Footsie player on, by Sizwe Banzi is worth a read.

The Irish Warriors started their season on a winning note with a hard fought victory on April 4th over their cross channel rivals the Great Britain Bulldogs. In the fine settings of St David’s college Artane, Ireland got off to a slow start but finished well to run out 8.6 (54) - 4.9 (33) winners.

In a much changed side to the one that went to the International Cup in Melbourne last year, Ireland fielded three new caps in Donnacha Reilly, Gary Green and Danny Burke.

This report courtesy of the Australian Rules Football League of Ireland.

There are Australian Rules Football Clubs throughout Asia and the newest of these clubs is the Timor-Leste Crocs. In Darwin on June 13th this year, the Crocs will go up against Asian footy veterans the Bali Geckos for the first time in the inaugural ‘Crikey Cup’, as a curtain-raiser to the AFL Round 12 match between the Western Bulldogs and Port Adelaide at TIO Stadium.

The idea for the Crikey Cup came from Steve Irwin’s connection with East Timor and its sacred symbol, the crocodile or ‘grandfather’. In 2000 Steve Irwin led a team from Australia Zoo, with the Australian Defence Force and the World Society for the Protection of Animals, to rescue two injured crocodiles from a cramped and destroyed cage in Dili, the capital.

For the third year in a row the AIS-AFL Australian Under 17 squad will head off to South Africa (departing tomorrow, Sunday 12th April) for a tour that will include training, sight-seeing, working with the locals and a match against the South Africa Lions.

It's expected that the Lions will be a senior squad similar to that which finished third at last year's International Cup and was ranked fourth in the world behind only Australia, PNG and New Zealand in our 2008 rankings. Jason McCartney is expected to again coach the Africans and a few new talented juniors will be given an opportunity. AFL South Africa Operations Manager Joel Kelly told worldfootynews.com that "Several invitational spots (are) being offered to new ‘yet to be identified talent’ as part of a broader search". The match will be played at Boland Park, Capetown at 3:30pm on Monday 20th April - it has been moved from the better known Newlands due to the sudden transfer to South Africa of Indian's Premier League cricket tournament because of terrorism fears on the sub-continent. Boland Park is described as being in Paarl, "in the beautiful wine district of the Western Cape".

Gold Coast's coach, Guy McKenna, has also been mentioned as making the trip, despite his team underway in the TAC Cup. No doubt his attention will mostly be on Australia's next wave, but given the willingness to sign up two Papua New Guinea players already, surely he will also be very interested in the performance of the younger South African players.

The trip is book-ended by matches against VFL and WAFL sides in Australia. More details follow below.

A quick update for fans following the fortunes of international players in the Australian Football League. They will have been hoping to see Irishman Setanta O'hAilpin get a recall to Carlton this week, and countryman Colm Begley play his first game for his second club, St Kilda. Similarly Canadian Mike Pyke who is close to making his AFL debut for Sydney.

Unfortuntately for all three players they will miss out this week (unless there are late changes), with them all named as emergencies for their clubs (meaning they can be called in if for example there is an injury before the match). Essendon's Michael Quinn has retained his spot in their side after his promising debut last week.

PNG's Stanis Susuve has been named as rover (on the ball) for the Gold Coast in their Round 2 TAC Cup match this weekend against Western Jets down in Victoria - the Coast's first away game. Starting on the ball indicates Susuve has clearly impressed in his short time with the new club.

The New Zealand Under 20 NPC was held at Westminster Park on March 14th and 15th in Christchurch, with the Auckland side undefeated in their four games and deserved winners against the spirited opposition of Canterbury and Wellington.

Talent scouts from four AFL clubs attended the weekend's matches in an event that would have provided thoughtful insights into the game's current development status as well as what potential opportunities may exist in the future - something obviously being discussed at NZAFL level.

The Japan AFL Top League will this year kick off with seven sides, with the Nagoya Redbacks joining the current member clubs from Osaka and Tokyo. The season will feature seven home and away rounds, with teams playing all other sides once.

The first round will see Australian-based club the Tokyo Goannas travel to Nagoya on Saturday April 25th. The Redbacks were undefeated at home in their career in the Nippon AFL, as well as in the recent challenge series against the Osaka Dingoes, and will be keen to keep their perfect record intact.

Back in Tokyo, university clubs Komazawa Magpies and the Tokyo Leopards host the visiting Osaka Dingoes and university graduates Eastern Hawks respectively.

The seventh club in the Top League are the Senshu University Powers, who have the bye in round one.

Also on the schedule for this season is the annual international Narita Cup, a possible Goannas vs Japan All Stars match in July, and a road trip to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia for the Asian Championships in early September.

The season will wrap up in November, with semi-finals to be held on November 8th and the Grand Final on November 22nd.

On the 29th of March, Aussie Rules in France took a step forward with the start of the first-ever national championship. Around 60 footy enthusiasts gathered in Montpellier to enjoy a nice day of footy. Two games were played during the day, which saw the Bordeaux Bombers playing against the Strasbourg Kangaroos, and the Paris Cockerels taking on the Montpellier Fire Sharks.

Not only are Queensland Australian football competitions the launching point for many young Papuans to begin their football scholarships but the local clubs have excelled in supporting the AFL PNG organisation and other parts of Oceania in other ways.

At the annual AFLPNG Junior Championships in 2008 each team that attended had their jumpers supplied by an AFL Queensland affiliated club - Redland, Noosa, Mt Gravatt, Aspley, the Brisbane Lions and Coorparoo. It's one very practical way in which individuals and clubs that are looking to support the international growth of the game have been able to make it happen.

According to a recent article, "Footy Aid", an AFLQ initiative to get football gear into the Oceania region, has seen over 2000kg of second hand (and sometimes new) jumpers, boots, footballs and general football resources filter into countries like PNG, Nauru, Samoa, Tonga and Fiji in just the last 18 months.

Congratulations from WFN to all involved and read on for the full article here Local football helps PNG

For Queenslanders interested in helping, to make donations to assist the "Footy Aid" program, please drop gear into your regional AFLQ office or contact Andrew Cadzow at afloceania@aflq.com.au.

On a humid and wet Gold Coast evening the GC team made its first on field debut for points - and it also saw new recruit Stanis Susuve from PNG play his first game for them. With their AFL debut not set to happen until 2011, this is the building blocks for what will come then. The TAC Cup, the elite under 18 competition made up mostly of Victorian teams as the development pathway and dinner table for AFL scouts and recruiters ever hungry for new talent. Most of what they see from the Gold Coast boys though will be off the table as these youngsters will be outside the draft system already committed to the new enterprise.

Whether that is best for these youngsters in terms of their football future is debatable, but what is not debatable is that it is best for the Gold Coast Football Club’s future. It should guarantee that along with a number of other draft concessions that they can enter the AFL competition with a strong and competitive player group but also with a bunch of home grown talent that has gone through the same talent development finishing school as the match hardened Victorians that dominate the draft each year.

Hailing from County Longford, Michael Quinn is set to make a remarkable debut on Sunday on the other side of the world for the Essendon Football Club. It will be the fastest transition to senior AFL ranks of all the Irish recruits to have come so far. Few would have thought that Marty Clarke would be bettered, yet here we have it in Round 2 of the 2009 season. Quinn has done plenty to impress his adopted club working overtime to develop his skills, fitness and body to give him the first shot at the big time. Quinn showed his determination in a final quarter burst in the NAB cup game against the Bulldogs - but many of those Irishmen who have come before him have been given a taste of things in preseason almost as a reward for making the big transition. But make no mistake any match for premiership points is no token reward and Essendon fans and the folk of County Longford will be watching his debut closely.

Another who might take a glance at Quinn's debut might be agent Ricky Nixon, who reportedly rubbished Essendon's trialing and signing of Quinn who was not identified as part of Nixon's scouting network in Ireland last year (and Essendon did not join Nixon's program either). Quinn's success might provide a rethink on how Nixon and his scouts look at the attributes of potential Irish talent. Quinn has been named in the forward pocket for the match against the Fremantle Dockers kicking off at 1.10pm tomorrow at Docklands Stadium.

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 Number 9 in the Preseason Poll is Chicago United. Chicago finished 2008 ranked 10th with a record of 6-1. They also repeated as MAAFL Premiers. In 2009, Chicago looks odds-on to "three-peat" as MAAFL champions. They have a favorable MAAFL schedule, hosting both No. 10 Nashville Kangaroos and the Milwaukee Bombers. Head Coach Paul Drake agrees. "Have to like that schedule indeed and it certainly bodes well for a stab at the three-peat."

Photo courtesy of Fernanda Schwartz.