Footy Fever: 18 Teams, 150 Years, 1 Brownlow

[Music] hello everybody and welcome I'm your host Adriana and you're listening to English with an Aussie the number one podcast spoken entirely in slow English last week I put out a survey to my podcast community and asked everyone to choose the Australian sport that they were most interested in learning about the options were as follows netball rugby league AFL Cricket lawn balls and surfing with an astounding 90% response rate Australian Rules Football won the survey by a mile a huge thank you to those of you who casted their vote now let's take a moment to hear from some of my listeners and why they chose the AFL over the other sports hi everyone how you doing I'm Gabriel I'm an Italian guy who live in Australia uh I voted for AFL because here this port is part of Australian culture and in my state in particularly in Victoria hips of people follow and practice AFL there are a lot of rules and it is really physical like a sport I can't forget the first time that I went to see aashi Malin can't wait to hear the podcast hi it's Tony here I uh live uh near Melbourne in country Victoria in Australia I selected the AFL which is the Australian football league for the pure reason uh it's an Australian sport so it was created in Australia by Australians other sports are popular in the country um most of which came from England or Great Britain like Cricket uh soccer also known as football rugby as well but yeah the AFL is unique to Australia uh which is played on a cricket field and then it's restructured um to be football so in today's episode I'll be introducing you all to a very special sport a sport that is only played in Australia a sport that is neither soccer nor rugby nor anything else in between the Australian Rules Football or simply put AFL is unique it's a game which began at a high school exactly 166 years ago today you'll learn why Australians go crazy for this sport we'll first dive into the history of the AFL and how the game works I'll then present the 18 AFL teams that are spread over Australia's five Mainland States and finally you'll learn all about a famous AFL event called the Brown low medal ceremony well without further Ado let's jump [Music] in all right guys let's rewind the clock to the year 1858 it was a cold old August day at a grassy Parklands just outside the Melbourne cricket ground where two high school teams gathered to play the first official match of Australian football but not just any game of football a game so unique it is said to have been inspired by gayc football and the indigenous game of M grook which young aboriginals played in The Victorian bush with the arrival of the Europeans into Australia all forms of football started to evolve and some even started being played on the gold Fields rules were added and some rules were adjusted until finally the Melbourne football Club was created the club officially codified the sport meaning that all rules and regulations were approved and set in stone since then this game of football is now called Aussie rules among the locals only Minor Adjustments have been made to the sport to ensure the safety and gain flow but one thing is for certain the AFL displays the qualities of what it means to be a real Australian those of Hope courage and teamwork the AFL season typically runs from March to September each year and finishes with the AFL Grand Final to determine the league champions if you happened to listen to my episode on Australian celebrations you would know that in 2015 Grand final day was made a public holiday for all Australians that's right a whole day off to watch the Grand Final how good is that so you're probably wondering Adriana how does one play AFL well as mentioned the AFL is a one-of aind sport played on a large oval field two teams try to score points by kicking the ball through four tall goalposts the ball is a similar shape to that of a rugby but a bit longer and is made out of leather a red ball is used for the daytime matches and a yellow ball is used for nighttime matches at both ends of the field there is a 50 meter line called The Arc The Arc signifies the scoring Zone and in the middle has the posts that we talked about before now if a team kicks the ball between the two middle posts they are awarded six points if a team kicks the ball between the two outer posts then they are only awarded one point and finally if a team hits the post with the ball they are awarded 1.2 okay let's talk about the positions because they're a little bit strange each team has 18 players which are sorted into eight main positions the forwards Defenders and midfielders like most sports make up the majority of the team however the AFL has some unique positions one of which is called the Rockman ruckmen are generally the tallest and strongest players on the team the designated Ruckman from both teams start the match in a small circle in the middle of the pitch here the ball is bounced up into the air by the Umpire and the two Ruck men must jump and tap the ball to their teammates another interesting position is called The Rock Rover normally this player is small fast and Incredibly fit the rock Rover can be found lurking around the Rockman and anyone else for that matter who is contesting for the ball The Ruck Rover collects the ball when needed and distributes it to the attackers hopefully being able to be the one who said I helped get that goal now the game has four quarters each of them lasting 20 minutes so so that means a game of AFL goes for a minimum of 80 minutes plus we allow for some extra stoppage time at the end of the first and third quarter a 6-minute break is taken and at half time a longer 20 minute break is taken now guys due to the size of the field players are absolutely exhausted by the time halim comes around so they definitely need some rest to play AFL you can either kick the ball punch it with your hand or run with it when running with the ball you must bounce the ball or touch it on the ground every 15 M yes you can tackle each other but you can only tackle between the shoulders and the knees you are not allowed to throw the ball instead to pass the ball to a teammate at a short distance you can perform something called a head pass this is where you place the ball in the palm of one hand and punch it with the other if you decide to kick the ball to a teammate and the ball goes further than 15 M the teammate who caught the ball is allowed to stop and take a free kick without anyone annoying them this concept is called a mark If however the ball is kicked and goes less than 15 M you might be subject to a tackle if you do not get rid of the ball fast enough so in essence the idea of the AFL is to kick and Mark and kick and Mark and kick and mark the ball consistently until you get the ball in the range of the goal posts anyone who breaks the rules gives the other team a free kick poor sportsmanship such as dangerous tackles fighting or answering back to the Umpire will result in either a yellow warning card a red suspension card or a new card that has been added just recently is called the Green Card which sends the player off the field for 15 minutes lastly if the ball goes out of play one of two things can happen one team can take a free kick or something called a throwin can occur this is where the boundary umpire retrieves the ball where it crossed the line turns his or her back to the players and throws the ball in over their shoulder okay now you've got your head around the game or at least I hope you have here is a list of the current 18 AFL teams you will notice that they all have a mascot or a nickname so starting in alphabetical order we have the Adelaide crows the Brisbane Lions my family's beloved team the culton blues the Collingwood Mac pies the enden bombers the free manle Dockers the jalong cats the Gold Coast Suns the greater Western Sydney Giants that one's always a bit of a mouthful the Hawthorne on Hawks the Melbourne demons the North Melbourne kangaroos the Port Adelaide power the Richmond Tigers the saint kill the Saints the Sydney Swans the West Coast Eagles and lastly the Western Bulldogs here's a fun fact for you up until 2007 the AFL was dominated by men however in March 2017 the AFL welcomed a women's league called the aflw initially the competition started with only eight teams but with its growth in popularity the aflw has now expanded to 18 teams since 2022 just like the men's league so if you do happen to tune in to the women's league you will notice some minor modifications to the sport such as a smaller ball being used 16 players on the field instead of 18 and quarters running for 17 minutes instead of 20 all righties let's get down to some of the fun stuff besides the Grand Final the second most important and in my opinion the most looked forward to event in the AFL culture is the brown low metal ceremony or simply put the brown low the brown low is a a huge yearly event in the Australian football league which honors the best and fairest player of the season during the season after each and every game the umpires vote for the three best players the best player gets three votes the second best gets two votes and the third best gets one vote these boats are kept Under Wraps which means a secret until the ceremony the ceremony happens 5 days before the Grand Final and is held at Crown Melbourne anyone affiliated with the AFL such as players parents officials and media dress up in their best clothes and enter Crown via an extravagant red carpet many people actually refer to this event as the Gown low because many of the players Partners walk the red carpet like movie stars with beautiful breathtaking designer gowns another word for a dress at the dinner the judges read out the votes from each game of the season it's really exciting because the leader can change as they read more and more votes players who got in trouble however during the season are disqualified from the running the ceremony usually lasts all night and includes things like interviews speeches and Hobbes to any memorable player of the past at around 11:00 the brown low Medal winner is crowned now if two players have the same number of votes they both win the medal in fact that actually happened in the year 2012 the medal was shared between Trent Coten from the Richmond tigers and Sam Mitchell from the Hawthorne Hawks who both tied in at 26 points each to sum up the ceremony isn't just about the winner or winners but it also gives awards for the best new player and the best goal of the year it's become a big media event and a chance to get glamorous and celebrate the best of the best in the AFL well if you've made it this far thank you so much for sticking around but as always it's time to say our goodbyes just to remind you today's episode was all about the Australian football league we first heard from my friends Gabriel and Tony who explained why they chose to learn more about the AFL I then took you through a brief history of its Origins and how the game works we then looked at the 18 teams of the AFL and finally we discussed the very glamorous Brown low medal ceremony a big thank you thank you again to everyone who helped shape this episode I hope you all learned lots of new things next episode we'll be diving into a part of the English language called idiomatic expressions so stay tuned if you want to start speaking like the natives do if you would like to join my inner circle and receive free content such as the entire transcript of this episode please join my Facebook group I'll leave the link in the description below once again thank you everybody you've been listening to English with a Noy [Music]