World Footy News

Hold the phone! There is a new force in Asian football. Charging out of the dense jungles surrounding Vientiane comes the irrestistible force of the Lao Elephants.

The Lao Elephants, who formed a team last year and won two of their 4 matches at this year’s Asian Champs, have gone on to claim the Indochina Cup. They were undefeated in their matches against the Vietnam Swans, the Cambodian Kangas and the Thailand Tigers, in the tournament played in Phonm Penh on 22nd November.

‘Twas a grand day for the Warriors, but a sad one for the Irish as the Malaysian Warriors extracted some retribution for the Australian AFL failure in the recent International Rules series by comfortably defeating the Malaysia GAA Orang Eire in the first International Rules contest held in Malaysia at the Alice Smith School on November 22nd.

Playing for the Finnegan’s Cup, the trophy donated by the well known Irish hostelry in Kuala Lumpur, a generous sponsor of both teams, the Warriors triumphed 109-61 in what was a highly entertaining game, played in great spirit before an enthusiastic crowd.

It was interesting to note that both sides had little difficulty adapting to the rules, and specifically the Warriors managed to handle the spheroid ball particularly well. This is probably due to the fact that unlike Australian-based AFL players many of the competitors on both sides have played numerous codes, the Australian game, the Gaelic game, soccer and the various rugby codes and hence can easily adapt. The simple fact that the Warriors were able score 6 unders and 19 overs is testimony to their accuracy in dispatching the round ball.

Canada's junior team, the Wolfpack, headed down to Australia in big numbers just prior to the third International Cup. In part 1 of our story on the tour, we talked to young players Chris Harbour and Justen Oertel and began an interview with coach Mike McFarlane. In part 2 we continue to talk to Mike about the impact the tour had on the players and plans for the future.

The Canterbury AFL will host the inaugural Under 20 NZAFL National Provincial Championships in Christchurch on March 14th and 15th early next year.

Such tournaments have been held previously at various age levels, but not to the magnitude of the one being planned. The event will be open to the Canterbury League, Waikato League, Auckland League, Wellington League and, if the tournament criteria can be met, a special invitation will go out to the Otago Region.

As the snow starts to fall along St. Catherine's Street, the Montréal-based Québec Saints Australian Football Club are packing away their jumpers and footy boots after a very promising first year.

With players from Québec City, Montréal and Laval making the long journey to Toronto to play in the OAFL, some driving as much as 9 hours one way to have a kick, a group of expat Australians from Montréal formed the "Québec Saints" in early 2008 in order to have a more accessible way to play Aussie Rules.

As word grew about an Aussie Rules team in Québec numbers increased quickly to the point shortly after its conception the Saints were ready to play their first match.

Thanks to Luke Anderson for this report.

Myk Aussie, that flamboyant Australian reporter on Canadian sport, with a particular eye on Aussie Rules, has done an extensive interview with Mark "Flash" Block. Flash is coach of Canada's national side the Northwind and was a highly successful player and now coach with the Toronto Eagles. The discussion includes the US Nationals (which had a strong Canadian presence in 2008), the International Cup and the impressive juniors coming through from Canada's west coast program.

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Canada's junior team, the Wolfpack, headed down to Australia in big numbers just prior to the third International Cup. In a huge undertaking 52 people made the trip, costing around $100,000 with a big effort on fundraising over many months prior.

The young players got to play four matches against Victorian school sides, attend a few AFL matches, and cheer Canada to victory in the Northwind's opening IC08 match. After that the players and their families scattered on trips across Australia before heading back home to Canada. WFN spoke to their head coach, Mike McFarlane, about the trip and what it achieved, as well as a couple of the star young players.

The New Zealand AFL website is reporting that several footballers from around Oceania have been invited to the AFL and Australian Institute of Sport (AIS) annual week long talent camp held in Canberra for some of the most promising (usually Australian) young footballers.

Not to be confused with the AFL-AIS draft camp that puts on show the best young players that are of draftable age, this camp targets exciting prospects around 16 years of age. As explained in the NZAFL article:

The camp is a very important part of the AFL’s highly successful NAB Rising Star Program which leads directly to the AFL Draft for players over 18yo. 30 players are selected at the Under 16 National Championships to participate in the AIS Camp. From there they are expected to progress through the AFL’s player pathway, the TAC Cup and into the AFL Draft.

A confirmed starter is New Zealand's Liam Ackland, who has already represented his country at the International Cup, despite being just 16 at the time (he's pictured in action against Japan). Ackland is in only his second season of Aussie Rules, playing for Mt Roskill in the Auckland AFL. The forward has kicked bags of 6 and 5 goals in his last two outings.

The report says several Papua New Guinean and Fijian players have also been invited. WFN has confirmed that there is one PNG rep, Tiernan Carby, and possibly two Fijians. We hope to find out more details soon.

The AFL Commission spent Monday and Tuesday of this week meeting in Sydney, with much of the media focus on whether they would allow former West Coast Eagles player Ben Cousins to return from a one year ban due to drug issues. The answer was yes, under strict testing conditions.

Of more significance for the future of the game, the proposed two new AFL club licences were also discussed. The result was that final approval for the GC17 Gold Coast bid was postponed until December and nothing firm given regarding an 18th club. This could be interpreted as the first signs of a re-think due to the global financial crisis, but with a preliminary youth squad already in training for the Gold Coast, it's highly likely that approval will still come shortly, with the squad to play in the mainly Victorian TAC Under 18s in 2009 and the VFL in 2010 as preparation for a 2011 entry into the AFL.

The Commission suggested that the Western Sydney developments are going well, but made no committment on timing. A green light may well be held back for some time. Meanwhile the Tasmanian government has finished its submission for a team in the AFL and will present it to the AFL soon. This would most likely position the state as ready for a club if there are problems with a West Sydney bid or one of the existing 16 AFL clubs.

The Essendon Football Club have signed their first Irish player. 18 year old Michael Quinn has been announced as an international rookie, although ultimately this is believed to fill a normal rookie spot, as opposed to the international scholarship lists, as recently exercised by the Western Bulldogs with two Fijian youngsters. From Killoe in Longford, Quinn will join full training in January and is allowed to remain on the rookie list for two years. He trialled for the Bombers in September, and has now been placed with a recently arrived Irish family to help him settle into Melbourne life.

See Essendon signs first international recruit for more details.

The inaugural USFootyNews.com All-Star Team was voted on during the month of October. Here are the results.

The battle for Australian hearts and minds, in football terms, continues unabated. And it seems the field of battle is spreading to include neighbouring nations.

The Rugby League World Cup is currently being staged in Australia. As would be the case with a true Australian football World Cup, the Aussies are dominating. However the gap to the next rung of sides is not as great as in Aussie Rules, and the defence-oriented game helps keep the scoreboard relatively respectable. Nevertheless it has been interesting to hear quite a lot of criticism of the tournament, with some media lambasting the level of promotion and/or the quality. But Australian football can only look forward to a time when our International Cup reaches the same level as the RL World Cup, which itself sits a poor third to the Rugby Union WC and soccer's WC.

Disturbingly for Aussie Rules fans, there is talk that Rugby League is now rapidly growing in Oceania (Fiji, Tonga, Samoa etc), and moves are afoot to locate an NRL (Australian National Rugby League) club in Port Moresby, PNG. Meanwhile negotiations are under-way for the AFL to vacate its major venues for up to 2 months if Australia is successful in its bid for the 2018 soccer World Cup finals.