World Footy News

The International Cup teams attended the Telstra Dome last night to parade at half time, and to watch a great football spectacle, if not a great game. The great expectation of seeing Hawthorn star Lance Franklin and Carlton star Brendan Fevola achieve their 100th goal for the season drew a full house of over 49,000. Franklin achieved his in the first quarter and we have no official confirmation that any of the International Cup representatives were among the approximately 5000 people who rushed onto the ground to congratulate him (though there were reports that the Samoans were amongst them).

Fevola failed, just, to reach the mark himself at the end of the match, but the chance of the double kept the crowd on the edge of their seats. The Parade of Nations at half time saw all nations march out in alphabetical order (and included multicultural division teams - even Tonga whose attendance has been the source some mystery). There were some mixed responses to nations including some (hopefully good natured and based on sporting competitiveness) boos for NZ, Great Britain and the USA. The nations all assembled in the centre of the ground to be introduced before marching off again.

The Friday match at the Western Oval between International Cup debutante Finland, most of whom have been playing the game for around a year, and the experienced Irish team was seen as a mismatch. The scoreboard might confirm that.

However, in play, the Finns, with a bumping tradition from ice hockey, harried the Irish all day, a team with its own national bumping tradition drawn from Gaelic Football.

The Finns lacked both on-field tactical nous in taking the ball forward and the players who could execute in the forward line, but they kept the pressure on the Irish all day, leading to sloppy ball handling and missed passes from the boys in green. After the match coach "Izzy" Barker explained that after their big loss in round 1 the team had sat down and focussed on what each individual was going to do to stop such a blow out again. That meant harassing the Irish, forcing them wide and employing a fair bit of flooding.

As was expected 2005 International Cup champions New Zealand comprehensively defeated India in their Pool A match on Friday.

The Falcons dominated the match from start to finish, with the Indians struggling to get the ball past the centre. Whilst New Zealand missed their first few shots of the game, they were extremely accurate in front of goals from thereon in (almost 80% of shots at goal, were goals).

There's a growing awareness in Australia of the need to actively encourage immigrant populations to take up the great Australian game of football. In the past it was somewhat taken for granted that people new to the country would slowly embrace Aussie Rules, but these days with so many sports on offer and soccer much more established, that assumption can't be made. For this reason and with more lofty aims of helping new arrivals integrate into society, multicultural footy development is a growing area, especially in Melbourne (but is also likely to be a core focus for the proposed new western Sydney AFL club).

This pursuit has seen four games scheduled during the International Cup as Multicultural Challenge matches, as an adjunct to the main tournament - the teams are not part of the main draw. Yesterday on McAlister Oval at Royal Park in Melbourne Team Africa took on Team Asia, with players drawn from local ethnic communities.

The two Yukis from Adelaide, South Australia, could be the secret weapon that the All Japan Samurais team needs to advance to the big finals of the 2008 Australian Football International Cup, which is now heading to Warrnambool in country Victoria.

It was the Scott Fleming show yesterday at Ransford Oval. But don’t be fooled into thinking he was a lone hand. Both on Wednesday and again yesterday we repeatedly saw the brilliant passing of Aaron Falcioni (and other team mates) giving Fleming the best possible chance to mark out front on the lead where defenders were unable to have a say in whether he marked or not.

He is not a one trick pony though - we have seen Fleming pounce on the loose ball at pace and snap goals on the run. It was Fleming who started the ball rolling early on with a mark out front on the edge of the arc. However, he had to wait some five minutes to take the kick as Sweden’s full back Mattias Fagersson, who was knocked out falling heavily in a previous marking contest, had to be treated by medical staff and was later taken to hospital. Fleming restarted the game with a solid boot for maximum points.

South Africa take on Denmark at Kardinia Park West (St Marys FC) in Geelong to complete round 2 of the 2008 International Cup today, 12pm AEST. Quarter by quarter live scores will be updated here.

The Singapore Wombats proved to be too fit and too powerful for the Malaysian Warriors in a tough encounter played in wet conditions at Alice Smith ground in Kuala Lumpur on 23rd August.

After an even first quarter, the Wombats' resilience, superior teamwork and ability to run enabled them to eke out a comfortable 8.7.55 to 2.8.20 victory, thereby regaining the Changi Cup, a trophy they lost for the first time last year, and extending their dominance over traditional rivals Malaysia to 20 wins against just four losses since the year 2000.

A good crowd gathered to watch and support the PNG and Peace teams in the 1.00 pm Round 2 match, almost as big as the crowd across the road watching the contest between Japan and Samoa. Some of the visionaries of football, and now international football luminaries, of the Victorian kind, including Ron Barassi and Brian Dixon, were amongst them.

It was inevitable that the novices of the Peace Team, drawn from Israelis and Palestinians, including some African residents, even with the coaching of the Big Dipper, Robert Dipierdomenico, would struggle against the athleticism and football skills of the PNG team. It was a hard fought but friendly match, with no quarter given.

In the first major surprise of the AFL International Cup, the Samurai from Japan defeated the might of Samoa. Truthfully it was always a possibility that Japan could upset the AFL's seeding in this match, but to do so relatively comfortably, by 4 goals, was somewhat unexpected. It must rank as their best international win, and they certainly celebrated like it was.

Unfortunately for Samoa the loss is likely to condemn them to positions 9 to 12 come the end of the competition, unless they can pull off the biggest upset in International Cup history and roll the Kiwis in their next match, in Warrnambool. Japan will be looking to mix it with some of the top sides, assuming they get the business done against India, a match which should be far less physical than today's.

While the US team may have had many of its squad from game one on the sidelines for this match, its goalkicking star of game one, Kidney Lakomy started off where he left off the last, with a goal. There was a light northerly breeze and although this was only Round 2, Melbourne’s great finals weather had arrived at least a week early. China had the breeze in their favour but it was Rob Lutostanski for the US who soon added a second goal after marking. The Chinese put to bed any thoughts of an easy hitout for the Americans with a series of heavy tackles particularly from Li Cheng and making the Revolution earn their possessions. Ruckman Gao Rundong was winning taps in the center but the US still managed to clear. With an extended period of the ball bouncing from one half back line to the other, the US could only score points. It looked like the US would finally goal when Lutostanski received a free kick for high contact after a series of Chinese tackles. His kick however went wide. The Chinese team may have made more progress but many of their kicks contained more height than length. The US led by 14 points at quarter time and coach Rob Oliver wanted the forward line opened up as their forward 50 was continually full of players from both sides.