World Footy News

As we hinted back in January, the Australian Football League seems likely to bring State of Origin football back in 2008 as part of the 150th celebrations for the early foundations of Australian Football. The series was once the pinnacle of Aussie Rules, with exciting, high standard matches surpassing the quality of any state league and with no international opposition it represented the best the sport could offer (though premiership success was still every player's ultimate goal). For various reasons it withered away and was finally ended. However support is on the rise. AFL CEO Andrew Demetriou has publicly stated his enthusiasm for the concept, and a pre-season survey of AFL captains was also very positive, adding to growing media and public calls for a return. Not everyone is in favour of it, but momentum for the series is gathering quickly and unlikely to be stopped. Here we'll look at the various recent opinions on bringing back Origin. Later we'll examine the history of interstate competition, why Origin died and why the push for it again.

A Zimbabwe born umpire, Tinashe Nyatsanga, who was featured in the WFN story "Zimbabwean embraces less fashionable part of the game" was featured on the Seven Network's news in Melbourne last weekend.

The "feel good" story mentioned that his first introduction to footy was responding to an advertisement calling for football officials in a local Geelong league. Thinking that he was applying for a position as a soccer referee, he ended up taking the job. Since finding his feet,Tinashe has developed a love for footy and has become quite a skilled umpire.

A few AFL umpires could take a leaf out of his excellent repoir with the junior players.

The Baltimore Washington Eagles (8th in our US poll) 109 points handily defeated the North Carolina Tigers (10th) 25 points. The game was played at the Capitol Polo fields in Poolesville, MD. Poolesville lies in the hart of Maryland's horse country past the grand mansions of Potomac and DC's northeastern suburbs. While it was definitely hot, there was none of the humidity that DC is famous for.

Ireland's O'hAilpin brothers have continued their rocky rise to AFL ranks in 2007, with mixed results for both of them. Setanta has played both fullback and ruck at Carlton with promising signs but hasn't yet managed to hold down either position. He did hit the headlines again with a brief and relatively mild "punch-up" with fellow Blues ruckman Cain Ackland at training last week, though both players and coaching staff laughed it off as one of those things that can happen in competitive workouts. Younger brother Aisake has moved up from the Northern Bullants' reserves to league side and would be hoping to make the Blues' senior squad in 2008. In the following story we have a look at the form of both players, and have a very recent update with talk that Aisake might be moved to Carlton's senior list well ahead of schedule - maybe even this week.

The Kelowna Cup was a very successful day for footy in Canada held last weekend Sat June 2. The Alberta Canadians won for the second year in a row defeating the BC Canadians. The BC Footy Aussie guys defeated the Calgary Aussies convincingly. Mark Block Canada's national team head coach was there and he was impressed, we may see some fresh talent heading to the Northwind squad for their upcoming clash with the US Revolution team later this year.

Japan's Samurai squad swept through the 2007 Arafura Games undefeated recently, taking out the tournament for the first time. The team has returned to the event every two years and has steadily improved each time. This year they took on the Northern Territory Crocs and the Northern Territory Buffalos. WFN spoke with both the Samurai's captain and team manager about their Down Under.

As the 2007 season starts to build up some momentum in the US, we take a look at what is going on with some of the clubs in the western half of the Nation - with the Denver Bulldogs playing exhibition games, the Arizona Hawks kicking off their inter-regional season as well as getting women's footy going, and movements in US Military footy in the Middle East and California.

The Hanoi Swans are Vietnam's oldest continuous footy club, regularly playing around the Asian region, with an on-again-off-again presence in the southern city of Saigon. While primarily an Australian-expat based club, the Hanoi Swans are forging links with the Elgar Park Dragons, Melbourne's first Vietnamese community-based footy side, and starting AusKick at the United Nations International School in Hanoi.

In addition to developments in Vietnam, a new club is under formation in neighbouring Laos, to be nicknamed "the Elephants".

Followers of the local Australian Football clubs in the United Kingdom will be well aware of recent turmoil in the game with a second organisation, Aussie Rules UK, starting up senior nine-a-side competitions in 2007. The main controversy has been ARUK not working within the BARFL system (whether it should have is a debate within itself) and deciding to run matches in areas with active BARFL clubs. The result has been small but significant ARUK affiliated leagues starting in Wales, Northern England and Southern England and the loss of several BARFL clubs and effectively the demise of their Regional League. None of this is black and white such as in the case of Sussex which has continued in the BARFL as The Swans but also expanded to support ARUK's southern zone, so there is some cross-over. It's fair to say that if everything was running perfectly in England then ARUK would not have managed to get a foot in the door. Of course it's easy to be critical of the BARFL without truly understanding the hard work done to keep a league running week in week out as a volunteer. In many respects the BARFL has a proven track record of being one of the most stable and successful Australian Rules leagues around the world, but with a few simmering problems within and pressure from outside through ARUK and the carrot of junior development it seems change could be in the wind. After the tumultuous off season and plenty of frustration by those involved it seems that there might be a mood for a major paradigm shift in the way footy is organised in the United Kingdom.

Australian football’s involvement in the global scene (at least seriously), has only occurred in the past two decades. We are gradually seeing more exhibition matches played on foreign soil and higher participation levels outside of Australia – the figure of around two thousand players for the United Sates is not huge, but when you consider this was only a few dozen ten years ago, it is impressive growth. Other nations like South Africa have similar levels to the US, but they are expected to skyrocket into the tens of thousands in a few years time.

We're familiar with expat-Aussies trying to convert the locals, but with all these new markets comes an interesting possibility – players learning our great game outside of Australia and outside of their own homeland. WFN sought out all the clubs in the USAFL (and managed to get responses from most of them) about whether on not they had any non-Australians and non-Americans on their list, who they were, and how they had stumbled across our great game.

The popular reality television show "The Lost Tribes" on Australia's Nine Network features a group of Australian families from Sydney and Melbourne thrown across the world to remote places to experience a culture shock in tribal settings. This weekend the screened episode showed the families sharing some of their customs with their host tribes for the first time, with the Melbourne family introducing their hosts, a Zulu tribe in South Africa to Australian Football.

The AFL/VFL Italian team of the century was named last Thursday night, with 22 of the best Italian-Australian footballers named in a side captained by the Adelaide Crows' Mark Ricciuto and featuring four brownlow medallists and two hall of famers. Selection was open to a field of 148 footballers with either a parent or grandparent born in Italy, from which a shortlist of 50 was announced recently. While not eligible for an on-field spot for the team (his great-grandparents were his most recent Italian-born ancestors), footballing legend and high profile supporter of international footy Ron Barassi Jnr was named as coach of the side.