World Footy News

Collingwood defender Mark Keane and the club have mutually agreed to part ways leaving the club with no Irish men's players this season.

The 21-year-old will remain in Ireland after leaving the AFL program early and returning home in August last year. Keane returned briefly for pre-season training in November but did not return for training on January 10.

After two days of frenetic wheeling, dealing and clubs selecting for their futures, the 2021 AFL draft has seen the most significant selection of players to have strong African connections. In fact, when Greater Western Sydney Giants (GWS) selected Leek Aliir with their pick 15, he became the third player of African origins within the first round of the draft.

The first player of the trio selected, Mac Andrew, was nabbed by the Gold Coast Suns with pick 5. He is the highest ever draft selection for a player with an African background. Andrew's parents are from South Sudan but Mac was born in Egypt.

According to Sarah Cumming at the ABC, Andrew's journey has already captivated young kids of similar backgrounds. Andrew told the ABC "I've already got messages from young Sudanese kids who are telling me that they're following my journey and looking up to me."

NEWS FROM JAPAN AFL. Post Covid!

2021 A League Final Series.

AFL Japan has announced that the Season 2021 A League Finals will be played as a "Top Five" series similar to the SANFL in Adelaide, South Australia. This means all five teams in the competition will take part. This is a change from what has been the case in the past, brought about because of the Covid interrupted/shortened 2021 season.

The series will begin next Sunday 28th November with an 'elimination/quarter' final between 4th GAA Wolfhounds and 5th placed Eastern Hawks at the Ikego Forest Natural Park Athletic Field.

The league implores all whom intend to attend the match, players, staff and fans, to cooperate with basic pandemic infection prevention measures.

Mirais Get Actual Match Time.

A number of lady players travelled to Osaka as part of the R246 Lions team and played in a mixed-gender Go League practice match against the Osaka Dingoes on the 30th October. Published results on AFL Japan website Lions 29-7, 121. Dingoes 9-13, 67.

I understand that the Osaka match followed another mixed-gender practice match played the week before on 22nd October between R246 Lions & Senshu Powers teams in Tokyo? Both matches were played with much enthusiasm by all (first post-covid games) but even more especially by the lady player's and I quote (with apologies google translation)  "the experience was beyond the imagination, the feeling being like two years of training condensed into just 10 minutes". WOW! Does that sound like heart and soul being put into Footy?

Juniors (Unoki Kids) Play 5-A-Side Game.

Post-covid practice for the kids began late October/early November with enough kids getting on the park by 17th November that a proper match was able to be played (although at 5-a-side) so that the kids could get to experience team work as well is skills practice.

Great to see that Footy is getting back on the park in and across Japan following covid lockdowns and restrictions.

Footnote: (Fingers-crossed), with more State borders in Australia "opening" tomorrow Tuesday 23rd November, I might just be able to get to have a kick with my daughter and grandson in Sydney over Xmas/New Year break, Yahoo! Yippee!

Source: AFL Japan website.

Geelong has signed young Irish star Oisin Mullin from Mayo as category B rookie. The 21-year-old has already established himself as one of the premier defenders in Gaelic football.

Mullin has played in the All Ireland final in each of the past two years, and earned GAA All Star selection following his breakout 2020 season. He was also named the GAA Young Footballer of the Year in 2020, and has again been named a finalist for the award this year.

Yesterday, on a small school oval in far North Queensland, a team of girls played against a team of boys in our school’s first ever match which pitted one gender against another. Our boys and girls had been wanting this match all year, as had previous teams in years gone by, but with the help of local women’s footy gurus we went ahead.

Gordonvale State School has enjoyed success with girl’s teams since 2013, reaching regional and state finals regularly. The boys have not been as successful at that same level, but many play for local clubs so there is a high skill level and understanding of the game. It was always going to be interesting to see whether the boys dominated or the girls surprised.

Back in 2009 I arranged a similar game for girls v boys at another school. The girl’s team featured current North Melbourne AFLW player Elisha King. Whilst she terrorised the boys that day and booted around four goals, the boys were too good – by a significant margin.

Despite almost two years of footy lost the USAFL showed Aussie rules is alive and well in the USA.  Even without their Canadian neighbours to the north this year due to border restrictions Day 1 showed that despite shutdown the momentum of the game rolls on. 

The Austin Crows remain in the box seat after Day 1 of the 2021 USAFL Nationals and didnt miss a beat defeating New York in the morning and Los Angeles at the end of the day to top their Pool at 2-0.  In Pool B the Golden Gate Roos took out San Diego and scraped past Denver to be the other undefeated team.   

This sets up the semi-final clashes tomorrow where Austin will play Denver and New York will play Golden Gate and the winners heading on to the crescendo Grand Final match. 

 

The USAFL National Championships tournament is back this weekend in Austin, Texas (October 15-17) at the Onion Creek Soccer Fields.after the 2020 nationals in California had to be cancelled due to Covid.

Almost all footy in 2020 and a good deal of 2021 could not take place across the US. But in recent months footy has resumed in most cities. But the shadow of Covid still hangs over the Nationals. Not all the usual teams have been an able to field a side this year in Austin. Medical facilities in Texas are still being overwhelmed by Covid cases and this has lead to the concern that the possibility of not being able to get medical treatment should players be seriously injured. All attendees must be vaccinated against COVID-19 or a negative PCR test.

Add to this the stance of the Texas state  bringing in deploarable new laws surrounding abortions and those involved with the abortions has seen a number of womens teams and others individuals in solidarity boycotting this year's event.

In total there will be 28 mens (4 divisions) and five women's teams competing, but this includes a number of teams combined from cities without the numbers to make a full squad on their own.

Due to a lot of targeted work over a number of years AFL Canada Australian Football is now an official Canadian sport.

After a lengthy application and verification process, AFL Canada has been approved as a Registered Canadian Amateur Athletics Association (RCAAA). This is a milestone in Australian Football in Canada and brings with it many benefits not just prestige.

In the second series of interviews with people and personalities involved in Australian Football across the United States, Rick Shaibani from the Los Angeles Dragons shares his unique journey. Rick is already widely known to World Footy News readers as one of our writing team, but his journey to discover and then tell of our game adds another dimension, different again to those we have already interviewed.

The first question was to find his earliest connections to our game.

“I first discovered the wonderful world of Aussie rules when I lived in Phoenix, Arizona shortly after graduating from university in 2015. I didn't really enjoy my time in Phoenix, but I did meet some cool people, mostly through a local rugby union club that I joined. I had briefly played some union in college thanks to the influence of my dad, who played quite a bit himself growing up. Unfortunately, I never had a ton of time to dedicate to it, plus the side that I joined in Phoenix was already pretty experienced and didn't have a ton of room for newcomers to crack the starting line-up.”

It is one of the AFL/VFL’s most stirring theme songs – Melbourne’s song being belted out by the faithful at Optus Stadium in Perth after claiming the club’s thirteenth premiership after a 57-year drought.

Last night people across the world were able to join in song with the Demons as emotions ran a faction higher than normal as droughts were broken, curses lifted, debts paid, potential realised and dreams came true.

I knew the words, having been to every Port Melbourne flag from 1974 to 1982 – six flags in nine years, all at the grand old Junction Oval. Port had the same theme song and I belted it out with gusto, and my family, as we took out Oakleigh, Dandenong, Sandringham, Coburg and Preston – all comers. None could down The Boroughs, and the song resonated across Melbourne for years – and in our car on the way home. But it wasn’t often applied to the Melbourne Demons over that era.

A furore has broken out in Queensland with the state U18 Netball Championships won by an all-boys team in an otherwise girl’s competition. There are rabid arguments flying through media, families and the sport itself and at the same time raising questions about the fairness of such competitions.

For the record, the Queensland Suns U17 Boys team won the final against the Bond University Bull Sharks 46-12. These boys went through the entire competition undefeated, and winning all matches by an average of 30 points. They were far superior on the scoreboard, raising the ire of parents, spectators and in turn media (social and otherwise).

For the record, it must be said that the boys have done absolutely nothing wrong. Their team was entered into the championships by express permission of the state netball governing body, Netball QLD. The argument cannot be directed at those who played, but instead at the decision makers who allowed this.

Life has a habit of presenting second chances to people. Not all are taken, but there are many cases of people believing their chance to do something has passed only to be given a second chance and gleefully take it. I know it has happened to me – more than once – and my life has been changed and bettered by the experience.

The appearance of Ben Cousins at Sunday night’s Brownlow Medal count in Perth rated as one of the subtle highlights of the night. He didn’t say much to the salivating press, but what he said was, it seems, genuine, grateful and optimistic. Admitting that it had been a while since he had been to such an event (since his retirement from the AFL level in 2010), he was happy to state that it was “great to be here” and that he was “looking forward” to the night.

He even offered a concession, stating that “we all find ourselves in different situations along the way and it’s just great to be here tonight”. It amounted to a candid acknowledgement of his journey in life to date.