The USFooty season is fast approaching so Chris Adams has got the ball rolling with his 2007 predictions, looking at his top-ten USFooty clubs and how their preparations are going.

Ontario has proven fertile ground for expansion sides this winter and encouragingly enough, they’re all well outside the Toronto area, the hotbed of Canadian footy. There’s the Ottawa Swans in the Nation’s capital, the Cambridge Warriors in the Kitchener/Waterloo area (watch for an article on them in a few weeks) and a third side in the city of London, nicknamed the London Stallions. Home to the University of Western Ontario, the city of 335 thousand is located about 2 hour’s drive southwest of Toronto. If London sounds familiar footy-wise, that’s because a previous side, the London Magpies, went under after the 2005 season. The Pies struggled on and off the field having trouble fielding a side for their final few matches before missing the playoffs and folding.

The USAFL and the Louisville Kings Football Club today confirmed that Louisville, Kentucky will indeed be the host city for the 2007 USAFL National Championships on the weekend of October 13th and 14th, 2007. As reported earlier the rumours had been strong that this would be the case, and the claim had earlier been posted on the Louisville website before being withdrawn.

It appears that the Louisville Kings website has jumped the gun (as have I) in announcing they are hosting the 2007 US Nationals.  The club has contacted us to say that there is no definite decision on the location and that US Footy will make the announcement when the final decision is made.  They have said they are removing the announcement from their site as it was added by a team member getting “ahead of himself”. 

Rich Mann the National Championship Director also posted on the US Footy Forum today saying that nothing is yet confirmed but they were “VERY close to signing final contract with venue, fields etc” and “we should be officially announcing by end of week, but again, be aware I'm waiting on contract from city, so out of our hands to a certain extent.”

The Louisville Kings Footy Club website appears to be breaking the news (although rumours have strongly suggested it would be the case) that the 2007 Nationals will be held in Louisville, Kentucky (note that their website has since gone down).  This will be the 11th staging of the event, in the 10th year of the USAFL.  It will no doubt be promoted as a celebration of that milestone with a return to the original location of the first game of footy played in the US between Louisville and Cincinnati back in 1996.

2007 marks the 10th anniversary of USFooty. Originally construed as the United States Australian Football Association it was later renamed the United States Australian Football League and given the appellation USFooty. This article looks at some of the people who have made footy in the US what it is today.

Matt McBriar started out in Melbourne playing Aussie Rules footy. His long kicking ability was spotted in a long kicking competition in Melbourne and through contacts including former Melbourne and West Coast AFL footballer Darren Bennett he made his way from Old Brighton in the VAFA to college gridiron football in Hawaii. He's now reached the very top - punting in the Pro Bowl.

The first match of the newly overhauled AZAFL for 2007 was played on Saturday Feb 3rd between the Devils and Dingos. The league will consist of three teams vying for the title this year, with two teams competing and the third team handling field setup and officiating each round. This report supplied to us by John ‘Pops’ Meier

Late in the fourth quarter of Super Bowl XLI, the Indianapolis Colts' American punter Hunter Smith kicked a 32 yard drop punt to hold the Chicago Bears deep in their own end of the field. Commentator Phil Simms described Smith as holding the ball perfectly straight up and down and kicking so that it looked like a "kick off" (that is, the ball span end over end). "Aussie Rules" also got a mention when commentator Jim Nanz described the Bears' quarterback Rex Grossman's difficulty taking the snap in the wet conditions as being like an Aussie Rules game. With three Australians punting in the NFL including All-Pro Matt McBriar and possibly Sav Rocca following soon, NFL games are likely to see more drop punts. One has to wonder if the "banana" will make an appearance.

Football in the US is now over ten years old. The game is still currently evolving and trying to settle on workable formats. Clubs seem to ebb and flow in terms of their player and financial strengths and their ultimate strategies can change as they gain more experience of football life. Over the last two years the MAAFL looked like it was settling down with a pretty solid group of clubs competing for their Championship, but after rumours of changes over the offseason, more details of a new structure have been revealed, including greater flexibility and a possible new club.

We've also got further information from Atlanta's Wayne Kraska about the reasons for the change to the structure (an update since article first published).