Although our focus is mainly on international development, WFN likes to take some time to occasionally reflect on the world's elite Aussie Rules competition - the AFL. Traditionally the split round is regarded as a good time to review the season so far, with time to pause after 12 rounds gone with 10 to go before finals action. Two on field stories stand out this year, and they're very much related. One has been the return of attacking footy and the other is the return to strength of many Victorian clubs. There was early season doom and gloom that Victoria's AFL clubs were mostly a long way from winning a premiership and that other teams such as West Coast, Sydney, Adelaide and Fremantle were likely to continue their domination of the top four spots. Everyone had their view on "what was wrong with Victorian footy" and an official investigation was even launched. Here we are just a few months later and the top of the ladder is dominated by Victorian clubs - why the turn around and are they the real deal?

This recent article in the Age features Ireland among several Australian states in a map as one of the breeding grounds for AFL footballers.

While WFN hopes that other countries such as Papua New Guinea and South Africa may join this list in the near future, it does help to bring home the potential for outside of Australia into the mainstream. According to Kevin Sheehan in a recent Herald Sun article at least, South Africa will be next to deliver AFL talent, while AFL footballer Mal Michael is convinced that it will be PNG.

The Elgar Park Dragons, a mainly Vietnamese-Australian footy club who kicked-off in Melbourne this year, got a fairly impressive write-up in The Age newspaper today. The article mentioned some background to the Dragons, including the beginnings in the Multicultural Cup, plans to tour to Japan later this year, the substantial fan base starting to build at matches and the 4-5 winning record the Dragons have achieved so far - not bad for a start-up suburban club.

An extra item of interest (not in the Age's article) for the WFN readership - according to our sources, inaugral Dragons' captain Jiaming Pi (who's actually Chinese, rather than Vietnamese) was previously a key member of the Düsseldorf (now Rheinland) Lions in the AFL Germany.

As we hinted back in January, the Australian Football League seems likely to bring State of Origin football back in 2008 as part of the 150th celebrations for the early foundations of Australian Football. The series was once the pinnacle of Aussie Rules, with exciting, high standard matches surpassing the quality of any state league and with no international opposition it represented the best the sport could offer (though premiership success was still every player's ultimate goal). For various reasons it withered away and was finally ended. However support is on the rise. AFL CEO Andrew Demetriou has publicly stated his enthusiasm for the concept, and a pre-season survey of AFL captains was also very positive, adding to growing media and public calls for a return. Not everyone is in favour of it, but momentum for the series is gathering quickly and unlikely to be stopped. Here we'll look at the various recent opinions on bringing back Origin. Later we'll examine the history of interstate competition, why Origin died and why the push for it again.

A Zimbabwe born umpire, Tinashe Nyatsanga, who was featured in the WFN story "Zimbabwean embraces less fashionable part of the game" was featured on the Seven Network's news in Melbourne last weekend.

The "feel good" story mentioned that his first introduction to footy was responding to an advertisement calling for football officials in a local Geelong league. Thinking that he was applying for a position as a soccer referee, he ended up taking the job. Since finding his feet,Tinashe has developed a love for footy and has become quite a skilled umpire.

A few AFL umpires could take a leaf out of his excellent repoir with the junior players.

The AFL/VFL Italian team of the century was named last Thursday night, with 22 of the best Italian-Australian footballers named in a side captained by the Adelaide Crows' Mark Ricciuto and featuring four brownlow medallists and two hall of famers. Selection was open to a field of 148 footballers with either a parent or grandparent born in Italy, from which a shortlist of 50 was announced recently. While not eligible for an on-field spot for the team (his great-grandparents were his most recent Italian-born ancestors), footballing legend and high profile supporter of international footy Ron Barassi Jnr was named as coach of the side.

In more great news for international Aussie Rules the Australian Football League's General Manager of National & International Development has revealed to WFN that the AFL is looking to stage a World Club Challenge in 2009, with a new stadium in Florida the leading candidate to host the event. What could make the tournament stand out from previous international tournaments is AFL backing and the prospect of major prize money.

Two loosely related kicking articles in the past few days have us thinking about further inroads for our game overseas. The first on AOL Sports site wonders aloud if Aussie rules punters in the NFL could be a great promotional tool for NFL overseas. The obvious answer is that it will raise the profile of NFL but the opposite may also be true, that Aussie Rules will gain greater exposure by pure weight of numbers in the US.

The second article in the Times Online covers the comments of Welsh Rugby’s kicking coach Neil Jenkins bemoaning the head start that Aussie kids have in Rugby’s kicking game “ Our boys kick at that age, but are messing about. The Aussies do it properly because of Aussie Rules.” This may be the perfect argument in Rugby playing countries for parents to encourage their kids to take part in Aussie Rules development programs.

An article by Age reporter Andrew Ryan appeared in Thursday's Age titled AFL should target mainland Europe.

In the interesting opinion article, Ryan, who apparently has umpired last year's AFL Germany grand final between the Munich Kangaroos and the Rhineland Lions and a friendly between Munich and Madrid, is critical of the annual AFL exhibition match at the Brit Oval and the International Rules series and calls for some lateral thinking from the AFL in marketing the game in Europe - particularly in Denmark, Germany, Austria and Hungary, areas where fledgeling competitions exist.

Ed - an insider tip is that there's actually been some talk about this "behind the scenes" as well. Whether the Age writer was acting on a tip-off about an announcement which might come up this year is unknown - but news regarding more AFL attention to Europe might (note - we said might) make the headlines later this year.