World Footy News

Geelong star Ben Graham has quit the AFL to pursue a punting career in the NFL with the New York Jets.

The North Fremantle Amateur Football Club are in the final stages of a remarkable World Tour. A large party of players and officials have visited the United Kingdom, Ireland and the United States, in a great initiative that exposes their young men to different cultures, whilst also giving them the rare chance to play teams from other countries. No doubt many more Australian Rules football clubs will follow their lead in years to come, as the game continues to grow outside of Australia, and clubs think about developing their players as both footballers and well rounded individuals. Details of who they played and how they fared follows.

The powerful West London Wildcats club has won the first Dublin International Tournament, which saw England's most dominant club take on the Ireland National side, and the new boys in British Australian Rules footy, the Scottish Puffins.

The AFL Cairns is experiencing great success these days, but the history of footy there goes back to the 1950s, when it got its start in a way that will be very familiar to many new clubs in many different countries.

Last Sunday Ireland thrashed Australia 77 to 41 in the First International Rules Test. With many AFL stars missing injured or essentially too tired to tour, doubts are raised about the future of the hybrid game. However 46,370 spectators saw the First Test last Sunday at Croke Park, and around 60,000 are expected this Sunday for the Second Test, so public interest is strong. The matches are also televised in Ireland and Australia and attract a great deal of media coverage. The blow-out was an anomaly in 20 years of close contests. It has long been said the greatest threat to the IR series is Australian dominance not Irish, and such a shock result is therefore more likely to raise Australian commitment than dampen it. As Australian Rules and Gaelic football both continue to expand around the world, this coming together at the highest level, the International Rules concept, looks set to stay. But what does the future hold - simply maintaining the current series, or expansion to other countries?

As part of their preparation for the 2004 season, the St Kilda football club undertook a two-week training camp in London, an innovative approach which the Saints believe greatly helped them to their explosive start to the year just played.

Such was the success that the Saints are doing it again, but this time heading to Potchefstroom, South Africa, taking advantage of world-class training facilities as well as the chance to expose the players to the challenges faced by the South African people.

World Footy News' Aaron Richard talks with St Kilda coach Grant Thomas.

The Canterbury Australian Football Leagues (CAFL) is based around Christchurch, on New Zealand's South Island. The league features four men's clubs, with hopes to expand to six. Anecdotal evidence suggests that footy is quite popular with girls in New Zealand schools. Recently the CAFL held its first women's game.

Readers may be surprised to know that there is a lot of player interchange and playing of compromise/international rules between the growing number of Gaelic and Australian Rules football clubs in East Asia. The following report is not exhaustive and focuses on Hong Kong, Singapore and Tokyo.

AFL club Carlton are believed to be interested in luring a second Irish player to Australia - the older brother of former hurling star, Setanta "Carlos" Ó hAilpín. The following information is courtesy of the ARFLI website.

In Germany there are a handfull of GAA and Aussie Rules clubs and a consistent report that there were Compromise rules matches played in the early 90s in Dusseldorf, but records of those games seem to have been lost with the comings and goings of early teams. Now the Gaelic and Aussie Rules clubs have more stability and it is in Munich where there has been a version of International Rules played on and off for the past 7 years.

The Pratt Industries 2004 US Nationals have been run and won (see earlier stories), with Denver, Arizona and Cincinnati/Pittsburgh winning their respective divisions. worldfootynews.com have some photos from the tournament.

One of the biggest growth markets in world sport has become fresh alternatives - more people are playing ultimate frisbee, American football, lacrosse, korfball, the Gaelic sports and (of course) Aussie Rules worldwide than ever before. Some predicted globalisation would kill off the smaller sports, but it seems that if anything more people are playing a wider variety.

An opening for a new alternative sport to fill a commercial niche market opened in Chile in 2002, and after some research, Adrian Barraza decided Aussie Rules was a prime candidate. The business never took off, but the code survived the project and grassroots footy in Santiago continues.