Kookaburras Soar at Lilac Festival

Celebrating the start of a terrific 2009 summer season, our club set up a recruiting booth at the annual Lilac Festival on 4th Street in Calgary's Mission neighbourhood. Lilac Fest is the first of the summer street festivals and attracts around 125,000 people each year. Our brand new Auskick target from Australia was a hit with kids and adults alike, and we managed to take down 154 expressions of interest from potential players during the day.

Thank-you to all club volunteers who worked on the booth and in the beer gardens - the day was an unqualified success. And welcome to all the new Kookaburras who signed up for summer footy!

Kookaburras partner with Diamond Creek Football Club and Sydney Women's AFL

The Richmond Hill Wines Calgary Kookaburras have been busy building footy ties across Australia during the first few months of 2009. On separate trips, club representatives have liaised with footy movers and shakers in New South Wales and Victoria. By raising our profile in Australia, we hope to attract Australian clubs to tour Canada and build links that enable us to exchange players and coaches so that our footy development pathways are strengthened.

Sydney Women's Australian Football League Partnership

Kookaburras Vice President, Elise Botero, met with Sydney Women's AFL (SWAFL) delegate Lancelot Yu in March to establish a sister-league arrangement between the Alberta Footy Women's League and the SWAFL. We agreed to share development resources and to facilitate player exchanges for any Aussies and Canadians wishing to do a gap-year overseas whilst continuing with their footy. The agreement is a great opportunity for our players to develop their skills in a more-competitive league, while we'd love to host Sydney-based footy players travelling to Canada for work or play.

The SWAFL have posted information about the exchange program on their website.

Diamond Creek Football Club Partnership

Kookaburras President, Jake Anson, met with Diamond Creek Women's Football Club President Nicole Fisher during his trip to Victoria in April. The two clubs have agreed to a sister-club relationship with similar goals to the arrangement with the SWAFL. 'The Creekers' compete in the premier division of the Victorian Women's Football League (VWFL), which is the highest-level of women's football in Australia. Jake presented Nicole with a Kookaburras' jersey and photo of our 2008 US Nationals winning side, and in return we received a signed Creekers jersey and club photo.

Nicole serves on the board of the VWFL, and spoke enthusiastically of sending a side to play in Canada sometime in the future. We look forward to developing this idea further and, until then, partnering with Diamond Creek to further our development. To date, two VWFL players have played footy in Calgary (Vice-captain Claire Brown in 2007; Jo Constantino in 2008 - both of St. Albans Spurs) and '07-08 Kookaburra Meg Goodfellow trained with the Creekers during early 2009. We hope these are the first of many exchanges to follow.

Kookaburras support Victorian bushfires victims

Kookaburras club President, Jake Anson, travelled Down Under in April to fire-devastated Kinglake in Victoria, to witness the destruction wrought by the Black Saturday bushfires and to offer a bit of assistance to their footy club.


Kinglake felt the full force of the February 7th fires, which claimed 173 lives and destroyed 2,029 homes. The fires took a terrible toll on the town's footy club, which lost many members in the blazes. Bushfire appeals raised a large sum of money to assist in the rebuilding of the towns affected by the fires, and our club held an event on February 20th that raised just under AU$800.

On April 4th, the Kinglake Football Club held a memorial match to honour those lost in the fires and to mark the rebirth of the town. In attendance were the Australian Federal Environment Minister Peter Garrett, and the Victorian Premier John Brumby. Jake presented a cheque to Kinglake club representative Rick Wall and was interviewed by local Channel 10 television news. The money will go towards rebuilding Kinglake's footy club and community facilities.

Thanks to all who helped us raise money for this very worthy cause and we wish those affected by the fires the best with their recovery.

Hull Homes Coaching Clinc

On May 30, 2008, the students of William Roper Hull received a huge treat. Two Australian members of our club volunteered their time to teach Austrailian football at the school, which educates kindergarten to Grade 12 students with behavioural and emotional problems. Calgary Kookaburras coach Jake "Facebook" Anson and Vicki "Lleyton" Hewitt spent half a day teaching these Special Education students about the finer points of the Australian game.

Jake and Lleyton led three workshops with the students; one for each of the divisions of elementary, junior and senior high schooling. They taught the basic prinicpals of footy, including handballing, marking and kicking. Following each skills clinic, each of the groups was given the opportunity to play a mini match. The senior high students were so engaged that they stayed over their break to play some more. The fact that they were so involved showed appreciation and willingness to learn new things. This was a very valid learning experience. We are looking forward to future work with the Kookaburras.

Vanessa "Herbie" Gardner, Teacher - William Roper Hull