World Footy News

Editor: USFooty's Revolution headed to Atlanta for their second training camp of the year last weekend. The following report courtesy of Chris Adams at our partner news site, usfootynews.com. Chris will continue to provide stories for the international readership on worldfootynews.com, as well as working on the dedicated United States website.

The Revos have three training camps planned before they head to Melbourne for the Australian Football International Cup, one camp in each region of the US. The Western training camp was in Los Angeles a few weeks ago. The Central training camp is this weekend in Atlanta. The Eastern traning camp will be April 12 as part of the Fort Lauderdale Spring Tournament at the new Broward County Cricket Stadium. The Fort Lauderdale camp will be the last opportunity for hopefuls to impress the coaches and USFooty plans to name their squad for Melbourne soon after the last training camp.

Pearce Hanley is the Brisbane Lions' latest Irish recruit and already is being favourably compared to Colm Begley who played 19 games last year for the Lions.

Hanley is interviewed by the Queensland Courier Mail talking of his homesickness for County Mayo in Ireland's west and the challenges he has had adapting to the oval ball.

He makes the point that the only real challenges are adapting to the oval ball and tackling, but that otherwise Gaelic football and Aussie Rules "are nearly the same".

Hanley was the Barassi medallist as best player in the 2006 Under-17 International Rules series. The loss of such top young talent from Gaelic Football has been cited as one reason for abandoning the under age series by the GAA, and losing Hanley would have been a particularly painful blow.

On that score, GAA fans can console themselves with some of Hanley's comments - that returning to Ireland a better footballer and playing for his club and county in the GAA remain his long term ambition. However it is early days and whether he will still think that way once he tastes AFL finals action and other attractions of the land down under remains to be seen.

The Australian Indigenous under 16 side, the Flying Boomerangs, have completed their African tour undefeated, knocking over the locals 164 to 38 in Khayelitsha, Cape Town. The match was preceded by an under 13s game between the home town and another local area, Nyanga. In another good sign for development of the sport, both matches received some local media coverage, an important step in exposing locals to footy and opening people's mind to the game.

The following report, by Mzwanele Mkalipi, can also be read online here: Blimey, bra, it's Aussie rules footy

AFANA is still looking for a couple more writers to add to their team covering the AFL for the North American audience. In particular they need Adelaide and Sydney-based staff. They can organise AFL accreditation and the position offers an excellent chance for a budding young journalist to get some experience.

See Volunteers Needed for 2008 for more information.

Former Richmond and Essendon great Kevin Sheedy is keeping up his fervent calls for the AFL and Australians to embrace international footy. When the AFL appointed him as an ambassador for the 150-year celebrations, they said Sheedy would challenge them, and he's certainly doing that. Amongst his latest challenges are for an AFL match in India, an academy in California, more overseas development officers, and a $1 levy on AFL tickets to fund development. Most of these are ideas that have been floated many times before, by people in overseas leagues, those involved in developing the game, sites such as worldfootynews.com and fans on chat forums. But never before has someone so prominent made such a sustained call to arms for international footy.

The full article, on the Herald Sun website, is: Time is right for AFL to go global.

There's been a couple of good reports on Game 2 of the South African development team versus the Australian Indigenous side. The two sides met in kwaMashu (near Durban) and with plenty of local promotion a crowd variously stated as "over 1000" and "2500" turned up to cheer on the home nation (and boo the Aussies - at least they're passionate!)

Pleasingly the match got some local press, something that Australian Football hasn't had a lot of in South Africa thus far, at least not showing up in on-line searches (which admittedly may not be the best resource in a country such as this).

Read Yusuf Moolla's report, Local ground transformed into Australian football field, online in South Africa's The Mercury. The image to the right of the article suggests it was accompanied by an action photo from the game. AFL Commissioner Colin Carter was on hand to witness the game's early growth in the KwaZulu-Natal province.

The Aboriginal side pulled away in the first three quarters of the 16-a-side match, but obviously the locals were competitive. In what was presumably a sporting gesture to test their own players and allow the South Africans a chance to fight back in front of their supporters, the Boomerangs played with 14 on the field towards the end. The Buffaloes duly fought back with five unanswered goals, much to the delight of locals. But the Australians hung on to win 11.10 (76) to 8.9 (57).

Also see Ben Broad's Indigenous team pushed, but prevail.

A preview of Game 3 is this article, ’Litsha to host an historical game , on the Western Cape CityVision website.

The Dubai Dingoes' Joel Preston was extensively interviewed on Adelaide's top sports radio show, hosted by South Australian footy stalwarts Graham Cornes and K.G. Cunningham. Cornes was a star player with Glenelg in the SANFL and Cunningham a state cricketer and long serving football umpire. The duo are in Dubai for the NAB Cup opener between Adelaide and Collingwood, and have spent a lot of the time discussing Dubai and the conditions for football.

Reports suggest the field is in good condition, with interviewed Crows players saying it was firm but okay underfoot, despite a recent sandstorm. Temporary seating and amenities have been installed and a crowd of anywhere between 4000 and 10,000 has been predicted, though the lower end of that range is likely.

There's also been plenty of media for the event, some of which is listed here, but there's also apparently been some off-field talk that might not be healthy, though a recent update from Joel is that the situation should not be an issue on the day.

The comedic duo of Jeff and Paul that brought you the Footy Wrap on Youtube in 2007 are in training for the new season. In what seems to have become an annual event, AFL club the Western Bulldogs invited the media to a training day in which they got to experience a typical day in the life of an AFL footballer. Jeff had no pretensions but Paul was ready to make his bid to become the AFL's most unlikely rookie....

Jeff and Paul meet the Western Bulldogs

Jeff's full report can be read below.

After their 100 point loss to the Australian Boomerangs side, South Africa's developmental team headed down to Kwa Zulu Natal province to pick up some more talented locals ready for Game 2 in Kwa Mashu, near Durban, on Wednesday 6th February. We'll have a report on that match as soon as possible.

Next up is the third and final match, again to feature a large contribution of locals, this time in Khayelitsha, Cape Town, in the Western province. Local development officers have been talking up the event to get the community involved, advertising the match as the first ever international Australian Football game to be held in Cape Town. Details are:

Khayelitsha Cricket Oval (Town 2, behind Law Courts), Saturday 9th February

Performances by the Kwaito Group "All Blacks" and traditional dance group "Imduyekezo Mat", music by DJ D Lo, competitions, prizes and giveaways.

12pm Curtain raiser - Nyanga vs Khayelitsha under 13s
2pm Main game - South Africa vs Australia (Indigenous Youth Team)
4pm Speeches and medal presentation
6pm Post-match function at Mzoli’s, Guguletu

Just a quick reminder that last Saturday's AFL pre-season match between Carlton and Fremantle in Pretoria will be telecast in Australia on Foxtel. Fox Sports 3 will show the match on Wednesday 6th February at 10 PM AEST (immediately after the soccer) and Thursday 7th February at 10 AM AEST.

Former Richmond and Essendon great Kevin Sheedy has called for future AFL seasons to commence with Round 1 played outside of Australia. He made the comment at the AFL Coaching Conference on the Gold Coast, Queensland. As strong an advocate for international footy as worldfootynews.com is, even we might hesitate to seriously suggest such a dramatic change due to the risk of alienating supporters in Australia.

There's little doubt that such a move would be highly unpopular if it were to occur in the next few years. However staging a lot more NAB Cup games in other countries would provide a good balance, plus consideration given to occasional home-and-away matches outside of Australia, such as during the mid-season split round. Sheedy has always been controversial and this new call fits the same mold. But the international development of Aussie Rules is a journey that will be so much faster if the AFL clubs and fans are willing partners, and it seems like the AFL's official ambassador for the 150 years of Australian Football will not get his way on this one any time soon.

In another small but promising step for the promotion of this year's International Cup, Andrew Sawitsch (working for the Melbourne Demons and Melbourne City Council) has released a Chinese language flyer for the tournament, based on one produced by the AFL. So where does Sawitsch see it being used? "We'll use it for our players, supporters and government groups over here (in China) to give them a bit of background on the tournament. Melbourne Football Club and (the) AFL Multicultural Department can hopefully circulate it around as well from now until August". One would hope to at least see them around Chinatown in Melbourne.

Hopefully a poster campaign around Melbourne will be included in the event promotion, as they seem to be quite effective at raising interest. If the AFL doesn't put out such posters, maybe international footy fans in Victoria will take up the task themselves?

Chinese language poster

Sawitsch has recently returned to Australia to attend the AFL coaching conference on the Gold Coast, where he told media about two Chinese players that will join the Melbourne Demons for their Community Camp in Canberra.

"The two guys I’m bringing out to Melbourne – one is a child prodigy in martial arts but there really isn’t a career in that, and the other is soccer goalkeeper, where there aren’t that many opportunities in China unless you are really good," Sawitsch said.

Full article is: Football's bid to break into China