World Footy News

As many may be aware, the Australian Football League has decided to speed up the great game, after analysis has shown stoppage time has increased in recent years. But it isn’t only the sport's major league that it affects. It affects the whole Australian Footballing world, with most leagues in Australia and around the world following the AFL's lead.

World Footy News was recently contacted to review a new publication called Australian Football - Steps to Success. The book is a joint effort between star Adelaide Crows player Andrew McLeod and long time club Training Services Manager Trevor Jaques. It details training methods and how to learn the skills of the game. This may be of particular interest to our many readers outside of Australia who are often new players to the sport and don't always have expert coaching readily available.

Eddie McAvinchey of the SARFL reports that the Scottish league are looking to raise their profile with another preseason cup, hoping to have up to 8 teams attend.

This is just a quick note to advise that the WFN staff are doing some end of year tidying up, which includes checking all our Links. A few old websites for defunct clubs are being deleted and some new addresses added where clubs have changed URL etc. Where there have been changes, the link appears in the What's New section to the right.

The first footy match on record between two 100% French teams was played in Strasbourg on 3 December 2005, with the hometown Kangaroos defeating the Razorbacks 91-17. Senlis are the latest new club in France, with a team also hoping to form in Perpignan in the country's south.

One of the more recent countries on the international footy stage is the Kingdom of Tonga, a Pacific nation whose nearest neighbours include Samoa and Fiji. Australian Mark Korsten was based there in 2004 and started the game going, and although he has moved on, Mark has continued to ensure a sound structure is built. His focus has been on junior development, with the assistance of an AusAID position (currently filled by Ed Cowan), and includes a scholarship at an Australian school. In a year when start-up plans in Fiji were shelved and the promising Solomons Island program appears to have gone a similar way, it's encouraging to know that Mark has a long term strategy to ensure the game in Tonga.

As fans would know, the much anticipated telecast of USAFL matches into US markets appears unlikely to take place in 2005, despite USFooty's deal with ASTN. Nevertheless, Australian Football's governing body in the United States still holds out hope that ASTN and its parent company can resolve financing issues and deliver in 2006.

Another good story on the international players attending the AFL-AIS Camp appeared on The Age's Realfooty on December 7th. It profiles the players and speaks with AFL national talent manager Kevin Sheehan.

With games now having been played in over 25 cities across Ireland, Australia, England, Sweden, Denmark, Germany, China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Singapore, Japan, Canada and the USA - it seems International Rules has come late to the place which tries everything - California.

As reported yesterday in major Melbourne newspaper The Age, AFL club Hawthorn have cancelled a series of clinics due to be held in Christchurch, New Zealand, after the Hawks' request for the AFL to help fund their pre-season training session was turned down.

The Tokyo Goannas failed by 6 goals in their quest to win the Japan AFL premiership for the 3rd year in a row yesterday going down to the Samurais in the Japan AFL's season decider at the Radisson Ground, Narita. Final score 170 - 133.

Following on from our story several days ago International players invited to AFL Camp, we now present the complete list of players attending the AFL camp. The camp is run in conjunction with the Australian Institute of Sport which gives scholarships for talented juniors. The AIS targets the best players coming out of the AFL Under-16 National Schoolboys' Championship each year. As such the Australian players will generally be younger than the internationals invited this year, although countries such as PNG will be sending boys of similar age. It appears although invitations for 15 players were sent, only 7 are attending the camp.