Footy in the USA
Aussie-rules football has established a strong and growing presence in the USA. Teams are establishing themselves, leagues are growing, and both player and spectator participation is at an all-time high. The Kangaroos' competitive footy team plays at a growing number of sanctioned events each season.
USAFL Mission Statement
We are an amateur sports organization dedicated to the development of Australian Football. We are a grassroots organization that promotes participation in Australian football through promoting awareness and knowledge of the Australian culture, by promoting a sense of community among USAFL clubs and club members, and by fostering women's and junior programs across the United States.
The USAFL promotes participation by emphasizing awareness and a sense of community within its members, by setting standards by which member clubs agree to abide and by fostering youth programs across the United States. We are the sole representatives of Australian football in the international arena.
USFooty Achievements
From the early days of trying to scratch a football game together (which usually entailed a few cities to make a squad) which was mostly made up of ex-pat Aussie's, to now reducing bench numbers to achieve second and third teams coming from that city…
The first game was played in 1996 and the game has gotten bigger every year, with 340 games played in 2006. Footy in the USA is now over 40 teams in most major cities, the traditional men's footy at 18 a side. There is now Metro footy (9 a side) played by around 80 metro teams in almost a dozen cities, women's footy is now a four-team tournament at nationals, and junior footy is just beginning. Regions have strengthened with the MAAFL having almost a dozen teams, the EAFL with another eight, and the CAFL reorganizing the structure in 2004 and splitting teams to make more games locally to help the growth of numbers of players to the local teams.
Denis Ryan was employed full time in 2003 to run USfootykids which he saw over 20,000 kids from May-October. A huge achievement and self explanatory on how hard Denis is working to try to achieve our goals. With "FOOTY KIDS" backpacks being sold by Denis at courses and through the footy store, kids have now the ability to be taught the basic skills of the game and receive an exciting backpack which has a football, cap, CD ROM, and football related reading material.
The US National Team, known as the Revolution, is a collection of the best and fairest Americans from around the country. It began competing against the Canadian Northwind in 1999, attending the Atlantic Alliance in 2001, and the International Cup in 2002 where it finished at #5 and in 2005 where it finished #3, having just missed a shot at the title match. The next International Cup is in 2008 and they fully expect to win it all. For more information, go to www.usfooty.com
