Recently we reported on the first game played by the Karlstad Dragons against Gothenburg. Further north and east, two more clubs are starting up in Sweden - one based around Australian students in Uppsala and a mainly Swedish team dubbed the Diggers in the city of Falun. Both sides recently played practise matches against opposition from Stockholm, Uppsala going down 55-22 to SAFF metro club Bromma on April 21st and Falun losing 190-67 to the Stockholm Dynamite last weekend.

The Lliga de Futbol Australia de Catalunya kicked off its 2007 season on April 22nd with a match between the Barcelona Stars and Belfry Valls, Valls running out fairly comfortable winners. This was then followed on May 5th by a much closer encounter, with Valls hanging on for an 8-point win. The league has dropped to two teams for this year's season as Lleida and Tarragona have gone into recess until 2008, but on a positive note is looking forward to some international competition this year, including taking part in the EU Cup in Hamburg in September. The LFAC also recently relaunched its new website at lfac.cat.

The Karlstad Dragons made their first appearance on the weekend, taking on the Gothenburg Beserkers in a friendly in Gothenburg. Although the Dragons went down 134-61, the Beserkers are reportedly a much stronger side than previous seasons, making the game a fairly promising start for Karlstad. The South Sweden Saints and Port Malmo Maulers have both kicked off their DAFL Premier League seasons, although they are both still seeking their first win. In the Swedish capital, the three-team city league coordinated by the Stockholm Dynamite has also begun its season.

The Finnish AFL may soon have its second club take the field, with the formation of the Tampere Kestrels. Around 170km from Helsinki, Tampere is Finland's third-largest city overall and the largest outside the Helsinki metropolitan area.

With a controversial summer behind it, the British footy season is about to begin in earnest with the new Aussie Rules UK seniors competition opening up with the Southern and Wales leagues on April 28th and the Northern league on May 5th, with the BARFL's first 2007 match also on April 28th (not confirmed) but the rest starting on May 5th. After a frenzy of meetings, emails and phone calls, the two separate leagues appear to have settled into their final configurations for 2007. We untangle the complicated web of which clubs ended up where and how the year is scheduled to unfold, and reveal that there is a glimmer of hope of the two sides working together in future.

The Sussex Swans were founded by Julian "Rooster" Clark in 1990 as the first BARFL club outside London. From the start the Swans have been a particularly British club, with the majority of players British born and providing many players to the national squad. As a result it would be fair to say the club has struggled for success against the dominant London clubs which have had a greater share of expatriate Aussie players. However this situation has forced the Swans to become more innovative. With a controversial northern winter coming to a close in which regional teams had to decide between staying with the BARFL or joining the new ARUK league, the Swans chartered a different course – expanding their numbers to play in both competitions, as well as greatly expanding their club's junior operations as one of the first British teams with a junior development officer.

The Vienna Kangaroos have announced they will host the 4th Central European AFL Championships on Saturday 9th June, 2007. The CEAFL tournament has run every year since 2003, pausing only for the EU Cup in 2005, and has traditionally been a chance for countries with only one club or European leagues not yet at the stage of fielding an International Cup side to get a game against regional competitors. This year the format will be 9-a-side with one representative team allowed from each country. At least four countries in Austria, Croatia, the Czech Republic and Finland are committed so far.

Further north, the year's second all-Europe 9-a-side championship, the EU Cup, is scheduled for September, hosted by the Hamburg Dockers. The tournament will be the second EU Cup, the first being held in London late 2005 and last year's tournament in France being cancelled.

After months of planning, the French footy scene has finally officially affiliated with the Léo Lagrange National Sports Union, creating the Commission National de Football Australien. Léo Lagrange is an organisation representing over 100 different sports in France, with over 400 member clubs, 50,000 individual members and an emphasis on youth involvement.

Details for Scotland's VB Haggis Cup have been finalised with six teams fronting up for the Glasgow tournament. The 2007 event will feature sides from Scotland, England, the Republic of Ireland and a combined Brussels/Strasbourg team.

Like the Lund Bulldogs who briefly appeared in the mid-90s, the Lund Magpies have struggled with both playing numbers and off-field issues in their history, difficulties with finding a field meaning they never even got to play a home match inside the city of Lund.  The Magpies recently announced they would fold for this season, but nearby Landskrona will see a strengthened Bulldozers side playing as a self-sufficient entity in the Scania league this year. Further north, the Karlstad Dragons are Sweden's newest team, and the first in the region of Värmland. One of the Dragons' founders, Jörg Pareigis, talks to WFN about the club's development so far.