World Footy News

The Doha Kangaroos will today face off against the Dubai Dingoes for the ANZAC Cup, in the first Australian football match on Qatari soil. The game begins at 3pm at the Doha Rugby Club and will follow the same format as the Dubai 9s, but will be comprised of four quarters. Entry to the game is by donation, which will help support Frank Kleinitz, a popular member of Doha’s Australian community who was involved in a serious motorbike accident two weeks ago. He is currently recuperating in hospital, with serious back, leg and rib injuries. Frank also faces months of rehabilitation. Organisations can also support Frank. For a donation of QR2000.00 your organisation can place a banner up on game day at the ground, in view of the entire crowd. Crown Relocations and Rydges have confirmed their involvement for the day. For more details contact Gary Johnson on +974 556 2054. This match marks the end of a busy football season for the Dingoes. It began with a game against the Muscat Magpies in Oman in December 2007. In March they hosted the Dubai 9s tournament, which drew eight teams from the Middle East region and earlier this month they played the Falcons in Abu Dhabi.

The world’s smallest island nation, Nauru will field a full team at this year’s International Cup. Australian football is the most popular sport on the South Pacific island, and Nauruans are renowned for their passion for the game. Like many Aboriginal communities in Australia, it is not uncommon for children in Nauru to be named after well-known footballers. According to Mathew Batsiua, the country’s Minister for Sport and one of the people behind the effort to get Nauru to the International Cup, “There’s at least one Jesaulenko bearing that Christian name here and you’ll even find a local Akermanis in our community”. The Chiefs' were one of eleven sides at the inaugural International Cup in 2002, finishing eighth. They were a late withdrawal from the 2005 tournament, and doubt had been cast over their involvement this year.

Batsiua revealed that as of May, players will spend time in Melbourne with VCFL clubs “to help them achieve top match fitness ahead of the August event”. Our Airline, the new trading name from Air Nauru, has agreed to provide air travel for 22 players and three officials, and the AFL has allowed Nauru's team kit to feature Our Airline’s logo. In further positive news for Nauruan football, the AFL is apparently considering conducting coaching and umpiring clinics, and reestablishing a revamped national football competition on the island.

The NZAFL were expecting a Canberra Marists Junior side later this year, but unfortunately they have had to cancel. With the postponement of the Barassi Cup this is a double blow to NZ's efforts to attract and retain junior players.

With Rugby Union, Cricket, Soccer and Rugby League as the more traditional sporting choices it is imperative that juniors who are participating in NZ get an opportunity to make national sides and therefore view a pathway that is exciting, and possibly leads somehere other than the All Blacks, Kiwis, All Whites and Black Caps.

Though many players may only get to represent their country at the junior level, with little likelihood of making an international rookie list, it is a numbers game and it just might be those young fellers who become the future leaders of the sport within the country.

If you are interested in taking a junior or senior team to NZ in the near future all contact details for CEO Rob Vanstam are on the NZAFL website at www.nzafl.co.nz

For more on the Canberra Marist cancellation please view this article.

Pictured below is action from the Canterbury high school league on New Zealand's South Island.

The last three games of the day saw the Baltimore Washington Eagles up against the New York Magpies and the Denver Bulldogs, while hosts Florida were taking on the New York Magpies. Given the Eagles and Magpies were unbeaten, their game and the last game of the day would decide the tournament.

The USAFL traveling squad for the 2008 International Cup has been announced. The selection process for the team known as the ‘Revolution’, began at the start of 2006 with their international match against Canada and has included a number of training camps and matches which culminated this past weekend in Florida. The 35 man squad has thirteen members of the 2005 squad which finished third at the International Cup including the 2005 captain Donnie Lucero and James Brunmeier who were both named in the 2005 Australian Football International Cup All Stars Team.

Clubs best represented are San Diego with five players in the squad, Minnesota Freeze four and Denver, Nashville, Milwaukee and Orange County each with three. Some of the better known clubs not represented this time include Atlanta, Chicago, Arizona, New York, Dallas, Kansas City, Louisville, Cincinnati, Portland and Seattle.

Yes, it's time for WFN to put out another request for assistance. With the steady ebb and flow of work and life commitments of our volunteer reporters we are currently in need of help covering Asia. Our writers are all volunteers who have a passion for seeing Aussie Rules grow internationally. Our main area in need is Asia, covering such growing areas as Japan, China and many more. Language skills relevant to those countries would be a huge plus but by no means a requirement - we have plenty of English speaking contacts.

Perhaps you're an Aussie that used to play for an Asian club and would like to maintain some involvement, or maybe you speak an Asian language and would like the chance to practice. Or perhaps you're just a fan of spreading our great game and would like to help. Your location isn't particularly important - being based in the region is helpful but not a realistic requirement for the job. More important are reasonable writing skills, a love of footy and the willingness to get involved.

The Lao Elephants, Asia's newest club, will host their first-ever home match this weekend with the powerhouse Jakarta Bintangs visiting Vientiane for a showdown.

The Elephants debuted late last year, traveling to Vietnam for a tournament against the Thailand Tigers and Vietnam Swans. While they went down to the more experienced Swans and Tigers, the Elephants performed fairly well on their first hit-out and will be hoping to build a reputation as a footballing outfit worthy of respect in the Asian circuit.

The match, to be held on April 19th, coincides nicely with the Lao New Year, giving visitors another reason to head to Vientiane to play some footy and soak up the celebratory atmosphere.

The Bintangs are one of Asia's oldest and proudest Australian rules clubs, with a number of former Bintangs spread around the world. One such is Rob Spurr, founder of the brand-new Santiago Saints in the capital of Chile. With a bit of luck, we'll have an update from Los Santos in the very near future.

For more information on the Lao Elephants or the match, see their website or email martysharples {at} hotmail.com.

The Baltimore Washington Eagles took out the Inaugural Faststream Florida Invitational at the brand new Broward Country Cricket complex in Lauderhill Florida. The Eagles took the tourney after a solid win against Florida, squeaking by the New York Magpies by 1 point and with what coach Denis Ryan described as a "purple patch" kicking 4 goals to beat the top ranked Denver Bulldogs. New York ruckman, Joel Keating, won the MVP of the Tournament, while New York's Joey Discepola won the fastest man competition and the BW Eagles Jay Leveseque won the longest kick (61 yards).

The Finland Icebreakers played a 14-a-side friendly match against Stockholm's Södermalm Blue Saints on the weekend, with the Icebreakers winning three quarters but ultimately going down 75-37.

According to Finland's Heikillä Kimmo, "Finland's team is young on average and still learning the ecrets of Footy, although the skill level has improved a lot since last season. Test matches against Sweden are valued practice for Finland and are best we can get at the moment since the overall skill level in Sweden is quite high amongst the footy nations in Europe. The more international games Finland can get, the better it is."

The game was played in windy conditions, at a very chilly 3°C. The Finns rated the match as good training, considering their experience has mainly been 9-a-side footy until this game. Next step will be an 18-a-side Test against Sweden in Salo, Finland on the 26th of July, with a return leg in Sweden later this year. The Salo Test will be the first 18-a-side game ever held in Finland.

The Baton Rouge Tigers featured recently on the local Fox 44 news. Rob Montaro, Jesse Tuminski and Jeffrey Phillips describe the game and their local setup between footage of the Tigers in training. The video can be viewed here. The text version of the story, titled "Aussie Footy Action in Red Stick", can be viewed here on the station’s website.

For the record, the Tigers went down to the Atlanta Kookaburras last weekend, the Kookas 15.13 (103) to Baton Rouge’s 3.7 (25).

Former County Kerry star and Sydney Swans premiership player Tadhg Kennelly has been named in the Dream Team in the one-off All-Star match against Victoria at the MCG in Melbourne on May 10 as part of the game's 150th celebrations.

Kennelly was the only non-Australian player to be named, and joins players from the Australian states and territories which make up the Dream Team:

• South Australia (15)
  
• Western Australia (12)
  
• New South Wales (4)
  
• Northern Territory (4)
  
• Queensland (2)
  
• Tasmania (1)
  
• Australian Capital Territory (1)
• Ireland (1)

Apparently China's answer to YouTube is YouKu, and Australian Football development staff in the world's most populous country have made sure footy has a presence on there. Uploaded videos include footage from a local training session with comments from development officer Tom Mattessi, and the ever-popular AFL clip that was shown at the 2005 International Cup dinner, featuring some of the game's incredible highlights including some of those by stars with international roots.

Also uploaded is an excellent ABC Asia-Pacific interview with the AFL's General Manager of National and International Game Development, David Matthews. The video highlights some of the issues the AFL face in terms of balancing domestic pressures with hopes of expanding the game. Of particular note was Matthews' estimate that there are around 35,000 footballers internationally (compared with about 650,000 in Australia) and his prediction that the international number could grow to 150,000 in the next ten years. That's certainly feasible, but nice to hear a key player at the Australian Football League stating it. He also refers to the potential of the game as an export for Australia - as business and governments realise this fact, hopefully they will increasingly support Australia's indigenous sport. Matthews estimated current international investment at around $1 million, compared with domestic investment of $40 million.

The piece also interviews likely China captain Zhao Yonggen and VFL/AFL greats Ron Barassi and Kevin Sheedy.

The full video is here. Not really necessary, but a Google translation is here. Thanks to AFL China's Andrew Sawitsch for the heads-up. The video's are loaded under the name AFL China.