The Australian football, Australian rules football or Footy, is a team sport that is played outdoors on an oval field. The objective is to kick the ball, also oval, between the four posts at the ends of the field.
As its name suggests, it is a sport that originated in Australia. Each year, the final of the professional championship takes place in front of more than 100,000 spectators in Melbourne.
This sport combines some of the rules of several sports:
- the position of the players on the football field, the roles of defenders, midfielders and attackers;
- basketball in-betweens;
- running with an oval rugby ball;
- the multiplication of sprints and the endurance of athletics;
- the multiplication of handball passes;
- the possibility of boxing the volleyball ball.
Footy is practiced by both sexes. There are men's teams and women's teams.
A quick overview of the rules is available at the bottom of this page.
The video below offers an illustration of the sport based on a match extract from the Australian professional league (video credits AFL Europe, AFL France, voice: Marc Chavet).
The speed of execution and the precision of the kicks make the sport particularly spectacular.
If it is indeed a contact sport, these are very supervised. There is no scrum, no tackle on the ground or tackle in the feet. It is forbidden to push his opponent in the back, to grab him by the neck, the head, to trip but also forbidden to kick when the opponent has his hands close to the ball. All this allows you to play without requiring specific and expensive protective equipment.
If this sport is popular in Australia, Footy is also developing very strongly in France and Europe. At the last edition of the European Cup 24 women's and men's teams were present, representing Germany, England, Austria, Croatia, Scotland, France, Ireland, Israel, the of Wales, the Netherlands, Poland, Sweden and Switzerland.
(see below a souvenir video of the Champions League 2022, organized in Amsterdam, video credit AFL Europe)
The French Australian Football Championship exists since 2009.
In France, and more generally in Europe, the matches are played in 9-a-side-footy, that is to say with nine players from each team on the ground (instead of eighteen as in Australia). The size of the field is also adapted, the matches are played on a rugby field on which the corners are rounded.
The 2021-2022 championship included eight men's teams divided into two geographical conferences (North and South): Antony, Bayonne, Bordeaux, Cergy, Lyon, Paris 1, Paris 2 and Toulouse.
In addition to these teams, there are two women's teams.
It is possible to practice Australian Rules Football in France for girls and boys from the age of 16 (with parental authorization for minor players).
Responsible for the national championship, AFL FRANCE benefits from the support and technical support of AFL EUROPE, the representative body of the Australian national professional league in Europe. To this end, AFL EUROPE provides training for coaches, referees and club development.
FOOTY RULES
Objective: score by kicking between the two central posts
- Playing time: 4 times 20 minutes.
- Point system: 6 points between the two central posts; 1 point if the ball is touched or if it passes between the side posts.
- Kick: tapping the ball with the foot (no ground rebound necessary).
- Mark: capture a ball in the air following a kick.
- Handball/handpass: hand pass by hitting the ball with the fist.
- Running: it is possible to run with the ball. It will then be necessary to bounce the ball every 15 meters.
- Putting the ball into play: it is an in-between, the referee throws the ball in the air, you have to jump to deflect the ball thrown vertically by the referee. We are talking about ruck.
- Tackle: The tackle is allowed between the shoulders and the knees. It is forbidden to push in the back. The objective is to prevent the player from releasing the ball with a kick or a handball.
- Contacts: Apart from the tackle, shoulder contacts are allowed.
- Prohibited movements: no tackle head-in, no grabbing the neck or head, no percussion in the back, no tackle following a mark, no tackle on a player without the ball, no kick if the opponent has his hands on the ball.