The 2013 season saw some big changes to the Brit Cup, starting with the first year the name has been changed to include a sponsor: ACM Sports.  However as usual the aim of the tournament was to give British players a chance to shine as the Aussie-expats take a weekend off.

In addition, the format was also changed to allow the hosts, Birmingham Bears, to hold games on a rugby pitch, the common ground type for regional 9-a-side Australian football teams in the UK. Instead of 16-a-side, each team fielded a 10-a-side squad, and instead of an oval field, it was rectangular, in-keeping with the rugby pitch markings with a 40m kicking zone at either end. Shots at goal from outside the zone were not counted.

The smaller team size allowed for more teams than usual, with four teams from the AFL Central and Northern England league – CNE Power, CNE Warriors, Midlands Sharks and league team Nottingham Scorpions – being joined by the WARFL Red Dragons and the AFL London Honeybadgers.

The event was held at Old Yardleians RFC in Birmingham, where games were played on two pitches. Each game was two 12 minute halves, with the winner taking 4 points. The competition was in round robin format, with the top two teams playing each other in the final.
 

The following article was written by Tor Ivar Amundsen from the Oslo Crows. It is reproduced here in its entirety with the kind permission of Tor and also the Crows. There is a clear story of development within these words which paints a very bright future for Australian football in Norway. It is just the tonic for the game in Norway as those involved in the game prepare for a range of upcoming international appointments, particularly the Euro Cup.  Over to Tor and AFL Sweden's Swedish Cup in Jönköping...

The Crows came into this tournament with lots of spirit and high hopes to do better than last year. As many remember, last year the Stockholm weather showed us the worst June day since 1904 and they cancelled the tournament after 3 games. That day the Crows lost 2 and won the last.

This year we had perfect conditions, sunny and only a light wind that didn’t have any impact on the play. The Crows line up was a mixed team assembled by Oslo Crows, Ås Battlers and Bergen Bears, and it had never played a game as one team before which made us a little uncertain on what we could expect of ourselves.

We started our first game against Södermalm which everyone had as favourites. We don’t talk much about this game other than the result… 7.4 (46) – 1.0 (6) in the Swedes’ favour, and that Samson and Tor gave a bit of beating in the last couple of minutes which ended in 5 stitches for Samson and a lot of sore players from Södermalm .

This Scottish club, better known to most as the Central Magpies, have been sitting on a secret for a while now. As the football world has turned all around them, a new image, name and purpose has been developing in the Kingdom of Fife. This article, written by Rab (Robert) Dempsey has been reproduced with his, and the club’s, permission to spread the word to the waiting footballing world.

THE MOB GOES WILD
By Rab Dempsey

Kingdom Kangaroos are Scotland’s newest footy team, hoping to emulate the "Shinboner" spirit of their North Melbourne counterparts when they officially join SARFL next season.

The early origins of the club can be traced back to 2012 when former Glasgow Sharks and Scottish Clansmen player Douglas Hunter tried to start a club covering Central Scotland and Fife.

Whilst SARFL had been running for years, the competing teams were only based in Edinburgh, Glasgow and Aberdeen.

The draw for the 2013 AFL Europe Championship has been released, with 6 nations fighting it out in Dublin, Ireland from August 3rd-10th.

Hosts and defending champions Ireland will be joined in Pool A by Sweden and Croatia, with Pool B having Denmark, Great Britain and Germany. The early tipping favours the Irish to have a relatively easy run in the pool stages, with the big question being who out of Denmark and Great Britain will challenge them for the Cup.

The field of six is a drop of two nations from the 2010 European Championship, with Iceland and Finland not attending, and no new nations taking the field.

Full team previews will appear on WFN in the upcoming weeks. For more information, visit the official tournament website at dublin2013.org, or read the full story for a video of the draw.

France is the latest and 21st nation to be Fully Ranked on WFN World Rankings, playing their eighth qualifying International (and 2nd against Germany) in Berlin at the weekend.

The 16.10 to 2.4 win for the Black Eagles (a win greater than 40 points being worth a rating change of +/- 2.14) sees Germany climb from 15th to 12th Place with 37.87 Rating points.

Les Bleus (aka les Coqs) enter the Full Ranks at 16th with 36.09 Rating Points consequentially pushing China (17th), Japan (18th), Finland (19th) and India (20th) down one place each respectively.

Germany's rise has been at the expense of  Canada (13th), Sweden (14th) and Peace Team (15th) each pushed down one place respectively. The upcoming European Championships will give us an indication of how accurate the rankings are, at least for the 6 Euro nations competing.

Read on for the full WFN World Rankings as of July 1st, 2013.

On Saturday, the German Eagles hosted France at the Maifeld (Olympiastadion Berlin) in an International Friendly. With this the first full-field match in 4 years for the home team on German soil, expectations for the Black Eagles were high and the squad did not disappoint, defeating the French by 90 points.

The French squad struggled to find their rhythm, missing key play makers, and losing a player 30 second into the match. Pushing for final selection in Dublin, the Eagles played outstanding football for national coach Troy Pedder.

Final scores: Germany 16.10 (106) d France 2.4 (16)

Full report to follow, as well as how the match has affected the WFN World Ranking in the lead-up to the European Championships in Dublin.

Newcomer to WFN World Ranks - Le Bleus

France will become the newest Fully Fanked Nation on WFN World Rankings when Germany hosts France in an international match in Berlin this weekend. Regardless of the outcome France will be the 21st nation to have been fully ranked on WFN World Rankings (the official, unofficial Australian Football World Rankings)

Currently France is provisionally ranked with 38.23 rating points whilst Germany is fully ranked at 15th with 35.73 rating points. A fully ranked nation will more often than not defeat a provisional nation, so an Eagles Home win of less than 40 points (rating gap of 0.50) will result in a rate change of +/- 1.43 and see Germany climb to 14th (from 15th) with 37.15 Rating Points.

Edited footage from last weekend's clash between the Huddersfield Rams and Wolverhampton Wolverines.

[youtube:M6Le215xBtE]

Despite the local EPL team sharing the moniker, colours and notoriety of AFL’s Collingwood Magpies, many sports fans are unaware of Newcastle United.

However, local Aussie Rules team Tyne Tees Tigers are on a mission to introduce Newcastle to the Australian code of football. And they have the support of Sky News Tyne and Wear who came down to North Shields Rugby Club, where the Tigers train, to film the AFL Central and Northern England League's lightning round there.

“We were in a Newcastle bar… the Shark Bar... at what was supposed to be a sports networking event: free food/free beer. We'd previously discussed the possibility of a club via email over the preceding few months but got nowhere. Hardly anyone else turned up to this networking event so we got stuck in to the free beer! By the end of the night we had agreed to start the club, picked a training venue and date to start training and the Tigers were officially born.”

Such is the story of the birth of the Tyne Tees Tigers Australian Rules football club in the north east of England. The gathering of Ian Baxter, Anthony Nolan and Shaun Bulmer to pursue a means to keep their favourite sport alive in the region has led to the Tigers having served a local “social club” apprenticeship, and they are ready to join the AFLCNE (Australian Football League Central & Northern England) for the 2014 season.

Whilst not technically a “new” team, as they have been in existence in one form or other since 2007, they are quite definitely a new club in a variety of ways.