Australian Rules stadium. http://www.mybadpants.com/2011/05/14/things-i-like-australian-rules-football/ |
(taken from www.nzherald.co.nz)
Aussi rules football. http://fearofaroundball.com/call-it-what-you-like-but-to-many-of-us-its-just-not-footy/ |
The true origins of Aussi Rules are widely debated. The earliest football in Australia was believed to be English and Irish folk football, which dated back to the 1820's.
Tom Willis (founder of the sport) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tom_Wills |
The Australian Rules football game was founded in 1857 by Tom Willis, a great sportsman that had just returned to Australia from captaining a rugby school in England. He was also a brilliant cricketer. He created the game with the intention to keep cricket players fit during their off season in winter. On 8th August the Melbourne Football club was founded the first Australian rules football team. In 1896 the Victorian Football League was founded originally containing 9 teams. Today the Australian Football League contains 17 teams. In 2006 615,549 people were recorded to be participating in the sport in Australia and in 2010 35,000 people were recorded to be playing the sports in structured competitions in 32 countries.
In the 1970's historians began studying the origins of the sport. Many myths were preconceived claiming that the sport descended from Gaelic football and that indigenous games such as Marngrook also had their part to play in the creating of the sport. There is little evidence to support these theories.
Australian football league logo. http://www.bigfooty.com/forum/threads/high-resolution-sports-logos.890953/page-7 |
Due to the similarities between Gaelic football and Aussi rules many games between the two sports have been arranged using compromised rules from the two sports. The games consist of the top players from the two associations from the year prior.