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General News

AFL crowds off to a boom start

  • Monday, April 02 2007 @ 12:31 am ACST
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  • Views: 3,411
General News

The 2007 AFL season has opened with the second best minor round attendance in the history of the VFL/AFL. With 364,544 people attending the eight games in round one, the average was 45,568 per match, a great turnout across the nation. The biggest show was the re-match of last year's Grand Final blockbuster between West Coast and Sydney. Such matches are often described as "replays" of the Grand Final, and this one certainly turned out that way with the Eagles again home by just one point - the third successive one point result between the two clubs. With 62,586 fans in to watch the match, it was the highest minor round attendance between two non-Victorian sides. Obviously such a record is made possible by Sydney's Telstra Stadium having a greater capacity than any other footy stadium outside of Melbourne, but it still stands as a great sign for Australian Football's continued growth in New South Wales, the country's most populous state.

Footy Short - Saving footy from the drought in Country Australia

  • Sunday, April 01 2007 @ 10:05 am ACST
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  • Views: 3,301
General News

For our international readers, Australia is currently struggling with a severe drought which while it has had devasting economic consequences for the whole nation, areas outside the major cities have been particularly hard-hit by the loss of both income from agriculture and young people who migrate to the state capitals for work.

Another outcome of the drought is the slow collapse of water supply, both in the major cities and the country, where water restrictions have meant that many sports grounds are turning to dustbowls over summer.

With an ever-increasing number of sports grounds off-limits due to a lack of any grass cover, a new website has recently been launched under the title SaveFooty.com - where money is being raised to install rainwater tanks and encourage the use of recycled water on sports field. While the site is currently based around Aussie Rules clubs, rugby league, rugby union and soccer clubs are also intended to benefit from the charitable actions to save grass-roots footy from the drought.

Indigenous football gets boost

  • Tuesday, March 27 2007 @ 09:53 am ACST
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  • Views: 3,709
General News

Australia’s indigenous population is very important for football. The indigenous community makes up only 3 per cent of Australia’s population and yet a staggering 12 per cent of players in the AFL are regarded as indigenous Australians. Last week the AFL and the Federal Government took a step to strengthen this relationship, establishing a $2.4 million program centred on encouraging indigenous Australians to take up Australian Rules.

Adelaide demonstrate the long road for internationals

  • Tuesday, March 20 2007 @ 02:19 am ACDT
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  • Views: 3,880
General News

The Adelaide Football Club has inadvertently demonstrated just how long the journey may be for any other country to be in a position to be competitive against a true All-Australian senior side.  Back in 2005 top Victorian country club Maffra flattened New Zealand before the Kiwis went on to win the second International Cup.  Again in 2006 the Falcons were on the end of some hidings at the hands of country representative sides at the Australian Country Championships.  Those results demonstrated the gulf between quality country players and the best international footy had to offer, but the Adelaide Crows recently showed just how big the gap is between the top two tiers of Australian Football within Australia itself.

Footy Short - Chinese in Melbourne learning the ropes

  • Monday, March 19 2007 @ 05:08 pm ACDT
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  • Views: 3,959
General News

In an interesting piece of news, a source at the AFL tells us that two Chinese sportsmasters recently visited Melbourne for a week-long workshop centered around Aussie Rules coaching and administration. According to the AFL's Josh Vanderloo, "Essentially, our international plan with countries such as China, India, Argentina and I would think Pakistan, involves identifying key personnel who can be trained over a week in Melbourne and return to their home country and begin teaching AFL to others. We feel this is a cost effective way to introduce the game to new countries and by providing basic resources and working through the language barriers, this form of training should be a good starting point. So to answer your questions, we are keen to follow this method of 'training the trainer' to help the country find their feet at a very basic level".

Also on this topic, Vanderloo tells us the planned visit of two development officials from India has been delayed by visa problems (as also happened when the last visit by an Indian squad was organised through the second version of the IAFC a few years ago), but that they are intending to organise another time for the Indians to visit. (WFN tried to help ensure the visa issue was solved in time but obviously not successfully.)

A program such as this could be the best starting point for a program in countries such as those listed above, particularly as the impetus in India, Pakistan and Argentina is largely reliant on locals rather than ex-pat Australians.

Footy Wrap on Youtube

  • Saturday, March 03 2007 @ 08:49 am ACDT
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  • Views: 5,480
General News

Aussie Rules fans around the world can now get a weekly dose of AFL gossip and news presented in a humourous style on Youtube.  Footy Wrap is the brainchild of director and comedian Jeff Wortman, who teams up with Paul Hogan (not the one of Crocodile Dundee fame).  The duo write and film their show from converted warehouse space in Fitzroy each week.  Several episodes have already appeared on Youtube and WFN thought the light entertainment might be of interest to our audience and the the Footy Wrap guys were happy to hear they might be getting an expanded international following.

Footy internationals 2006 - The List

  • Tuesday, February 13 2007 @ 08:04 am ACDT
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  • Views: 4,915
General News

With the steady growth of Aussie Rules it was difficult, over the course of a year, to keep track of all the international level matches that were played across the world. There were a surprisingly good number played in 2006 given the understandable drop off after 2005, an International Cup year. Here we'll make a list of all the internationals we could find, which should help towards considering how the various nations faired in 2006.

AFL match on the go for Dubai

  • Wednesday, January 31 2007 @ 11:56 pm ACDT
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  • Views: 8,732
General News

United Arab Emirates newspaper the Gulf News reported on January 28th this year that the AFL are currently planning a match between AFL clubs Collingwood and Adelaide in the second week of February 2008 in the UAE city of Dubai, home to Collingwood's major sponsor Emirates Airlines, around 15,000 expatriate Australians and the newly-formed Dubai Dingoes footy club. An AFL match in Dubai has been mooted on a number of occasions, but this appears to be the closest it's come to happening to date.

Footy in 17 languages

  • Friday, January 26 2007 @ 06:58 am ACDT
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  • Views: 39,422
General News

Many of the great names in Australian Football are not Anglo names consistent with Australia's largest migration contributor, England. A great number of the game's stars have been first, second or third generation Aussies whose recent family tree consist of languages other than English. Players from the past like Alex Jesaulenko and current champs like Anthony Koutoufides have made the sport their own. In the last couple of years the AFL has increasingly encouraged Australia's diverse migrant community to embrace Aussie Rules, as has happened in the past to a large extent without official involvement. A useful tool in this process is a simple introduction to the game in 17 different languages.

AFL funding decisions crucial in 2007

  • Saturday, January 13 2007 @ 09:38 pm ACDT
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  • Views: 3,823
General News

Funding for Australian Football is always a contentious subject, with literally thousands of clubs across Australia and the world fighting for a "piece of the pie", either directly or through support for their league. This applies to AFL clubs, state leagues, amateurs, country and other grass-roots programs. This is equally true of international interests, but for supporters of the game's spread, it can be argued that overseas concerns should in some cases surpass that of Aussie regions, primarily base on an argument of potential. That case may not stand up so well according to many Australian clubs, especially with an already heavy focus on Queensland and New South Wales and not so much to other states.

It's in that context that funding is decided. In 2006 the AFL put several new systems in place to deal with the game internationally. A lot of the programs sound encouraging and are based on logical arguments. There have also been significant announcements regarding footy in South Africa. On the other hand there have been quiet grumbles of dissatisfaction and concerns that the African gains could come at the expense of other nations. We look at all these issues and talk to some of the leagues about their funding in 2006 and hopes for 2007.

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