Chairman's Report

The key objective of ASAFA is to encourage and promote the sport of Australian Rules Football amongst the members of the Australian Defence Force. The principle ASAFA activities for 2008 are as follows.

The ASAFA National Carnival is traditionally preceded by the Kapooka 12s Competition conducted by the Army Recruit Training Centre at Kapooka (Wagga Wagga) on Saturday 15 March 2008. The Kapooka 12s provides an important opportunity for Service associations to draw prospective players and officials from around the country. The Service associations have identified other development and selection activities to ensure that all ADF bases and locations have opportunities for their personnel to participate in the Great Australian Game. Questions on these development and selection activities should be directed to your service football representatives detailed in this letter.

The major ASAFA activity for 2008 will be the National Carnival that will be conducted in Canberra at Ainslie Oval during the period 18-21-23 April 2008. Army will be defending their title in the men's competition and Navy in the women's. I anticipate that Navy, Army and Air Force will have training camps in the week preceding the National Carnival. It is intended that each Service will field a men's and women's team in the National Carnival and that at the end of the Carnival the men's 'ADF All Stars' and women's ADF National representative teams will be selected.

The men's 'ADF All Stars' team will play a game against the National Emergancy Services Team. Details of this game will be confirmed once the AFL 2008 program has been finalised. This will be the sixth occasion in which the 'ADF All Stars' have participated in this important activity. We are currently in negotiation with the AFL for the women's 'ADF All Stars' team to play a curtain raiser prior to an AFL fixture in Melbourne in May 2008.

Umpires are a critical part of any Aussie Rules competition. The ADF Umpires Panel participates in the National Carnival, the AFL curtain raiser game and has provided the majority of umpires for the AFL National Women's Carnival. ASAFA sponsors ADF umpires to undertake approved umpiring accreditation courses.

The ASAFA Executive Committee meets on a regular basis to plan and coordinate the conduct of Defence Aussie Rules activities and development of the Great Australian Game in the ADF. While we are unable to coordinate the development of the game at every level we seek opportunities to promote Aussie Rules in Defence.

The ASAFA Intranet website is at http://intranet.defence.gov.au/armyweb/sites/ASAFA/ . We are always on the look out for people who want to become active participants with Defence Aussie Rules as players, administrative staff, coaching staff, umpires committee members or just want to be involved. Listed below are the current key ASAFA Executives and their contact details.

a. Executive Officer: MAJ James Weaver - 02 93392626
b. Operations Officer: SQNLDR Paul Webb - 02 62655387
c. Umpires Representative: WO2 Clay Baker - 02 657 03465
d. Navy Football: CDRE Clint Thomas - 0439 649 683
e. Army Football: BRIG Simon Gould - 02 61224052 or 0437 715642
e. Air Force Football: FLTLT Justin Taylor - 07 363 70758
f. Sponsorship Officer: BRIG David Saul - 02 9349 0273

I will be overseas on deployment during the period Nov 2007- May 2008. Brigadier David Saul has agreed to stand in as the Acting Chairman of Defence Aussie Rules for the period I am away.

The key objective of ASAFA is to encourage and promote the sport of Australian Rules Football amongst the members of the Australian Defence Force. My intent is to ensure that you, as a key stakeholder of the development of Aussie Rules in Defence, are aware of the principal ASAFA activities for 2008. I would welcome your input into how we can improve the coordination and development of Defence Australian Rules Football over the coming year.


Brian Dawson
Brigadier
Chairman Australian Services Australian Football Association
ADAFA
Northcott Drive
CANBERRA ACT 2612

24 Oct 07