World Footy News

Google Australia today got into the April Fool's Day theme with the unveilling of the "gBall". While the use of GPS technology has clearly come into play in the coverage and analysis of AFL matches, its introduction into the actual gameball is yet to become a reality.

The Gball product is described as follows "This weekend around the country, the gBall(BETA) will change Australian rules football as we know it. Building on our core strength in search, Google was approached by a number of Australian rules football leagues to apply our technology in their search for new talent. In response, Google, in partnership with the official supplier of matchballs to the AFL, Sherrin, has developed the gBall. Incorporating specially developed Google technology, it will be used in all school and amateur competitions - and will go on sale to the public - this weekend."

The rest of the mock article can be read here.

The Gold Coast Football Club has been awarded the 17th licence to compete in the AFL competition. AFL Chairman Mike Fitzpatrick, in a message to the GC17 board said:

"This is an historic decision of the AFL Commission and it is only the sixth time since the AFL Commission was established that a licence has been awarded to a new club.

"It is not a decision that the Commission has made lightly and it has been made after a long period of investment in Queensland and a rigorous process over the past two years in which the Gold Coast football, business and wider communities have made clear their support for and ability to sustain an AFL team.

"It is also a decision that we have made after a rigorous process to validate the business model for a Gold Coast Football Club. We are confident that we grant the licence knowing that you have put in place the foundations to build a strong and sustainable club which will serve well the Gold Coast community".

However, the licence remains subject to finalisation of the agreement between the Queensland State Government and the Gold Coast City Council on the terms by which the land for the stadium will be transferred, and a decision by the Federal Government on further funding for the stadium. Both of these issues are expected to be resolved soon.

The Queensland club debut in the primarily Victorian TAC Cup Under 18s this weekend, and are on track to enter the VFL in 2010 and the AFL in 2011. If a west Sydney side is to be formed for a 2012 AFL debut then major developments are likely to be announced by the end of this year.

Andrew Werner, older brother Joe Werner and Joe's wife Katy Werner have decided to follow their sporting dreams to Australia. Joe Werner was a standout basketballer for UW Lacrosse and was also picked up as a tight end for the Green Bay Packers. In 2008 he was offered the opportunity to play for the Kilsyth Cobras in the South Eastern Australian Basketball League. This year, Joe's wife, Katy Werner, a former UW Lacrosse basketballer herself, was offered the opportunity to play for the Lady Cobras.

This week, Joe's younger brother Andrew, pictured at left with Geelong coach Mark "Bomber" Thompson, joins them both in Australia. While Joe and Katy play basketball in the eastern suburbs of Melbourne, Andrew will be heading to the other side of the continent and the country Western Australian town of Mt Barker to play Aussie Rules.

Hot favourites the Dubai Heat have defeated the Muscat Magpies by nine points to claim the inaugural AFL Middle East VB Premiership, completing the season undefeated. Simon O'Keefe of the Muscat Magpies was awarded Best on Ground in the Grand Final.

Read on for a report of the day, courtesy of AFL Middle East Commercial Manager, Stephen Nugent.

While outsiders generally associate the word "Catalonia" with the autonomous region in Spain centered around Barcelona, the Països Catalans, or "Catalan Countries" also extend north into the region of Rousillon in southern France and the tiny nation of Andorra in the Pyrenees, known for being the only nation where Catalan is the sole official language.

This year, the Lliga de Futbol Australià de Catalunya will span all three nations of the Catalan-speaking region, with the Cornellà Bocs and Belfry Valls from the autonomous region of Catalonia in Spain, one team from the Aussie Rules community in Andorra, and the newly formed Perpignan Tigers from the French side of the border.

After Valls kicked off the year by winning a pre-season tournament in Barcelona last weekend, the first round of the LFAC will be held on the weekend of the 18th and 19th of April. The league will play 6 home-and-away rounds, with the grand final to be held on June 21st.

The LFAC thus joins a growing crowd of multi-national leagues in Europe - the DAFL having included both Swedish and Danish teams for a number of years and the Croatian-Austrian-Czech Championship also being able to lay claim to being a league across three nations.

After many years of struggle, France is finally ready to host its first national championship. The national league will take the form of a series of tournament rounds played in the different cities which are home to clubs, Montpellier having the honour to host the historic first round this weekend.

The four established clubs of Paris, Strasbourg, Bordeaux and Montpellier will compete in the first season, with the new clubs in Perpignan, Aix en Provence and Toulouse hoping to appear at the Coupe de France tournament to be held in Bordeaux in July.

Read on for a preview of the four teams involved in the inaugural national competition.

New Zealander Moss Doran, regularly mentioned in WFN articles such as this one, has this year stepped up in the footballing world and moved from country Victoria to the AFL Queensland, impressing in his first outing with his new club.

Doran, who represented the NZ Falcons at the last International Cup, has played the last few seasons for South Warrnambool in the strong Hampden League of country Victoria. This season he has done what many Kiwis have done before, and moved to Queensland!

However, it is not a life of lazing on the beaches that has drawn him there, but rather the chance to further develop his Australian football skills playing for Mt Gravatt Vultures in the very strong AFL Queensland competition.

To read about his latest exploits, see New Zealander Impresses.

Nauru, the tiny Pacific nation that made a fortune from bird guano and then ran out of the stuff sending the country near broke, has relaunched its domestic competition under a exciting new system. This is a country that came 5th in the 2008 International Cup, with most of the country AFL mad and looking for a long term solution to getting domestic footy happening again.

Unfortunately the Nauruans played the game on a village/tribal basis which created quite a violent contest at times, especially when you consider that the ovals lacked any great covering of grass. As a result it has been some years since the domestic competition has been played in a formal manner and given the nation’s excellent results at IC08 the place was cherry ripe for the game to reinvent itself.

Mike Pyke’s rapid journey to AFL footballer has seen the Sydney Swans elevate the big Canadian to the senior list last night. Evidently there is a dearth in Australia of big men with the ability to cover the ground quickly in the mould of Dean Cox. This has created the opening for Pyke and there has been much speculation as to whether he could possibly do the unthinkable and debut in this weekend’s Round 1.

It currently looks like that will not happen and he will be named as emergency for the Swans clash with St Kilda at Docklands Stadium on Saturday night. That still leaves the door ajar for him to complete his transition from playing rugby union in France last year to being at the elite level of the Australian game.

In the first article in this series, we mainly discussed with Malte Schudlich what AFL Germany would like to see from an AFL Europe body. Today we get opinions from the Danish Australian Football League's Ian Hill, the French Commission National de Football Australien's Marc Jund, and Aussie Rules Europe's Philip Porublev.

Aussie Rules Europe has announced that the 2009 EU Cup will be held on Saturday, October 3rd in the town of Samobor, just outside the Croatian capital Zagreb.

This will be the second edition of Europe's biggest 9-a-side representative tournament to be held in eastern Europe, after the 2008 cup was held in Prague.

The Croats were impressive on debut at the 2008 EU Cup and will be eager to take out the main prize in front of their home crowd this year. For their part, England's Dragonslayers will also be eager to defend their title.

Some new teams may be on the cards, with the Welsh and Andorran leagues hoping to make their debut after having a few seasons of domestic competition under their belts. Further east, players from Poland, Lithuania and Hungary helped fill out sides in last year's cup and organisers are hopeful of seeing one or more of those having a stand-alone side come October.

The AFL Queensland 2009 Under 18 State Championships have recently concluded, with two PNG players being selected in the state All-Star team.

Stanis Susuve from the Country Kookaburras and Peter Labi from the Suncoast Power have been included in a 21 man All-Star team chosen from the Championships. They will now join members of the Gold Coast squad in a special pre-season trial at Carrara at 11am on Saturday 28 March.

The match will be an opportunity for the championship standouts, who have not yet been involved in the Gold Coast training squad, to further their cause ahead of the upcoming season.