Here comes AFL Britain

BARFL to re-structure, AFL Britain likely

Saturday, December 15 2007 @ 09:20 AM EST Contributed by: Aaron

After meetings held recently in London, the British Australian Rules Football League looks set to re-structure and re-badge. Current plans would see a shift towards a national umbrella organisation, probably to be called AFL Britain. To provide a more defined structure, the London leagues will play under an organising body called AFL London, directly responsible for the Premiership, Conference and Social Leagues. It should also consolidate recent improvements to their working relationship with Aussie Rules UK, which has seen collaboration between the GB Bulldogs and England Dragonslayers as well as Aussie Rules UK providing opportunities for London clubs to play their juniors in a new under 16s league. New BARFL President Sam Percy, returning to the role after being BARFL pres from 2002-04, confirmed "AFL London was agreed as the name for the body organising the three divisions here. It is most likely the new name for BARFL will be AFL Britain, though we hope to have discussion with the AFL about that in the near future. As a governing body we are not going to run leagues directly. Leagues in Britain will affiliate with us, somewhat loosely in that they are free to run themselves. We'll provide guidance, geographical protection where possible and admin help with items such as insurance and a national-level website". The plan is much in-line with what Percy had reported in October and what Glen Ocsko suggested prior to that in his UK Footy plan, and also resembles the current United States AFL model. This new arrangement will be similar to the current situation where a league such as the Scottish Australian Rules Football League (SARFL) is affiliated but not directly run by the BARFL. The major change will be removing the need for the AFL Britain to directly run the London leagues, thus allowing a bigger picture national approach.