World Footy News

The New Zealand Falcons will return to defend their title. This is a country that has been competitive with the very best from Darwin’s Arafura Festival through to their stand-out performance to date in winning the tournament in 2005. They appear certain to make it through to the semi-final round, and it will take a complete performance to knock them out of Cup contention.

The noble Emu, Australia's "other national symbol", is somewhat underrepresented in the world of footy, particularly when compared with the Kangaroos, but also eclipsed by Wombats, Redbacks and Goannas. A massive grey bird somewhat similar to an ostrich, the Emu adorns Australia's coat of arms along with the Kangaroo - and it is famously said by Australians that neither animal is able to take a backwards step.

However, Germany's newest Aussie rules club is set to remedy this, with the Stuttgart Emus ready to pull on the green and white and join the AFL Germany in 2009.

The Emus are already in training, and have held a few scratch-matches with and against other German and French teams. Their first official match will take place in just over a month, when they take on the 5th-placed AFLG side at the German league's Grand Final carnival on September 6th.

The second annual 'Battle of the Roos' between Munich and Vienna will take-off August 30th in a small Tirolean village called Kössen, the home town of Austrian & Vienna Kangaroos captain Raoul.

According to Vienna Kangaroos president Ben Chick, "it's a great day with a lot of interest from the locals & a good social get together for the Vienna and Munich boys. Munich won in the wet last year but the Vienna Kangaroos have been doing some high-altitude training in preparation for this year's hit out."

The ground in Kössen is actually the landing spot for the paragliders from the mountain up the road. As Chick says, "the playing ground is a pretty smooth paddock - I have played on worse, although never where the goal posts have been cut down from the local forest!!"

"It's a fantastic location and on a good day they have 200+ people sitting back drinking a few beers at the bar after launching themselves - so we should have a decent crowd. Real Austrian country footy."

The Vienna Kangaroos remain Austria's only club, with the plans for a club in Graz still to get off the drawing board. Says Chick, "Unfortunately we havent seen much from the Graz guys this year. The main motivator and organiser was working on a project in Latvia so he hasn't been around and things have just fallen away." Apparently though, the rest of the guys in Graz remain keen and the Kangaroos remain hopeful for the club to finally make its debut in the near future.

For more information on the Battle of the Roos and footy in Austria, visit the Vienna Kangaroos website.

The Papua New Guinea Mosquitoes, with the great support of PNG Telikom in particular, are back at their third International Cup hoping to revisit their great days at the Arafura Festivals in Darwin. There they were undefeated by the other international teams, many including some fine Australian expatriate players, but as yet they remain the bridesmaids of the International Cup going down to Ireland in 2002 and New Zealand in 2005.

They have been one of their nation’s most successful Junior and Senior National teams over many years. Wearing the Black, Red and Gold in matches, both on PNG soil and in Australia, they have always been hard to beat for more than 40 years. In recent times their juniors have dominated the Queensland Country Junior Championships and in 2007 won the QLD Girls Under 16 State Titles in Cairns. With many more players now gaining invaluable experience in Australia via scholarships, it will take a mighty performance to squash these Mozzies.

Just as Carlton's Michael Shields decides to head home to Ireland, two more young hopefuls have arrived in Australia. Carl Dias, 19, is a left footer from Kilmacud Crokes, Dublin, who plays through the midfield as well as having good goal-sense. Brian Donnelly, 20, from County Louth just southeast of the Northern Ireland border, is a tall defender, but reportedly quick over the ground and a good mark. Both are Gaelic footballers who have been invited to Adelaide for three week trials with the Crows. They arrived on 22nd July and have already had their first sessions.

Adelaide recruiting manager Matt Rendell (a former player with West Torrens, Fitzroy and Brisbane) made no secret of the fact that the club is looking further a-field with the looming player squeeze as two new clubs enter the AFL in 2011 and probably 2012. The Crows are impressed with the trialists' ability to read the play, but say it's early days in terms of handling the Australian footy and building body strength.

Timuçin Sindirgilioglu had a dream. Born and raised in Carlton, he played footy for his school, the Princes Hill Football Club, and was asked to try out for Carlton's under 19s team, the old development division of the VFL. His footballing career was however put on hold when his family moved back to Turkey in 1987.

Back in those days it was pretty hard for a teenager to set up a club whilst also getting used to a new culture and environment. Now, thanks to the internet and continuous communication with friends back in Melbourne during the past 10 years, his long-held dream is about to become a reality.

The Karsiyaka Dockers have hit the training track as the first footy club in Turkey, based in the western port city of Izmir. The Dockers hope to be playing matches against regional opposition and possibly other local teams by next year.

This Sunday sees the 2008 SCAFL Grand Final being contested by the Beachside Sharks and the OC Jets. The Sharks will be looking to make it two in a row, while the Jets will be looking to exact revenge for their four point loss in last years Grand Final. The Sharks Club President (and founder) Adam Howarth will play his last game with the club.

On the Beachside Sharks site Howarth reflected on the work involved "Well, it's been a hard two years getting this club started and finding a way to get us in the position to win a second straight Grand Final. It's tough work and I couldn't have done it without the dedication of our coach, John Fragomeni, and the support of the players and their families." Howarth has played in every game for the Sharks and will be looking to go out in style before handing over the running of the club to the new President.

Over the years readers of worldfootynews.com will have been left in doubt that this author is particularly keen to see the game of Australian football seen in its full perspective, not as the dominant sport in one state of one country, but a game that within a handful of years of being codified had spread around a nation. And now, given the chance to go beyond those shores, it is being steadily embraced in many countries by sporting men and women who love the freedom to run, jump, tackle and kick, all in the one game.

Hardcore international footy fans can check out 19 year old PNG star John James in action, playing for Zillmere Eagles against the Brisbane Lions Reserves (the Suncoast Lions). The match was played earlier this year, and appears on AFLQtube (look for the match AFLQ Rnd 11 Lions V Eagles, first time users will need to download a small software patch). James has quite a few possessions and kicks a goal late in the first quarter, sets one up early in the second, and kicks another in the third. Viewers can see that he has electrifying pace and plays the role of a quick tackling, crumbing small forward, much in the style of indigenous AFL players such as the Davey brothers. Like several other PNG players at the 2005 IC, he almost seems to run too fast at times, missing tackles and slipping over. But overall he's an exciting prospect and played a big role in the featured match. It's also interesting to see the quality of Queensland's top league.

The Finland Icebreakers are making their debut this year, as one of the newer sides in the International footy community.

Footy has been played in Helsinki for a few years, with eight players first appearing as the Finnish Lions at the Prague Cup in late 2005. Since then, the Finns have rebranded the national team the Icebreakers. They formed two local teams last year with the creation of the Helsinki Heatseekers and Salo Juggernauts, and this year have kicked off a three-team domestic league.

Finland has had a few successes, with some CEAFL champion trophies heading to Helsinki, and put in a good showing at the EU Cup last year. However, the IC will be the biggest test yet for a team that only recently played its first 18-a-side test match.

Any of us who've had a go at learning Chinese might have come across the very popular ChinesePod, a regular Podcast featuring lessons in spoken Mandarin with subscribers the world over.

ChinesePod featured a lesson this week on Aussie Rules (or more specifically on a conversation between two Chinese watching a Collingwood game on TV, one of whom likes the game more than the other), available here.

Although the lesson doesn't have a whole lot of specific footy-related vocab, it brings up a bit of a translation question regarding how to say "footy" in Chinese, the folks at CPod called it "Australian-style Olive Ball", whereas the Beijing Bombers and Shanghai Tigers use the translation "Australian-style Foot Ball".

That probably looks a bit bizarre to English-speaking readers, but the explanation is that in Chinese, the word "Olive Ball" refers to rugby, or by extension to anything else with an olive-shaped ball, including American football. Chinese tends to name sports this way, with Badminton called "Feather Ball", Tennis called "Net Ball" and Baseball called "Stick Ball" (which makes you wonder what they call the completely different sports "netball" or "stickball").

This question comes up time to time... In at least a couple of other places around the world there were long discussions on what to call the game in the local language that didn't sound like a league of Australians playing Soccer, not to mention the confusion created if you try to translate the word "rules" into the name.

The good folks of the BJ Bombers and Shanghai Tigers have both been on the CPod message board to set the record straight. Bring on IC08, and the Red Demons can decide for themselves what to call it!

As one of the debut nations at the third International Cup, Finland might not be expected to wrack up too many wins (we'll preview them shortly), but they will be sporting a winning jumper, coming in at number one in our recent poll.

Of 295 votes, the Finns received 51 votes (approximately 17%), to record a comfortable win over Canada with their maple leaf on 37 (13%), Ireland's Celtic dragon with 33 (11%) and Great Britain's Union Jack on 30 (10%). Surprisingly coming in last was Samoa on 4 votes (just over 1%). That seems harsh given the impressive Kangaroo design - maybe it just reflects a lack of either Samoan readers or North Melbourne fans.

Open up the story for a much closer look at Finland and Samoa's jumpers. And for those that follow AFL politics - the "big question" - will Samoa have to wear a clash jumper in the unlikely event they take on Finland? (Controversially North Melbourne are forced to change their jumper when they play Collingwood as it is deemed to clash, even if North are the home side).