Team Africa

The concept of a team in the 2008 Australian Football International Cup to represent Africa came after the early success of the AFL Multicultural Program in engaging these communities.

Community leaders with ties to the African community wanted to participate in this exciting AFL event and Team Africa was born. With the assistance of the North Melbourne and Essendon football clubs, the team commenced training in early Hune. Many of the squad members come from the Kensington and Dandenong areas in Melbourne, with others coming from Geelong and three from South Australia.

Having people of African heritage who are living permanently in Australia playing Australian Football is a great indicator of community harmony and cohesion.

Squad members are representing places such as Sudan, Nigeria, Kenya, Somalia, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Egypt, Djibouti, Oromia, Zimbabwe and South Africa.

African community leaders have thrown their support behind the team, with Francis Acquah, Lanre Bolarinwal, Ahmed Ahmed, Ahmed Dini, Yusef Mohammad, Claudia Abakah, Dr Berhan Ahmed and many others contributing.

Also assisting the team are AFL Multicultural Program development officers Sash Herceg, Michael Nguyen, Jieh-Yung, Harmit Singh as well as coaches Graeme Pratt and Kim Kershaw. The team will be playing both in Melbourne and Warrnambool and is looking forward to its first game against South Africa on Saturday, August 23 at Windy Hill.

Special thanks go out to the Victorian Government through the Victorian Multicultural Commission on its generous support of this team, along with the Centre for Multicultural Youth.

Peter Kierley from Australian Photography Magazine has been photographing the players from the outset in readiness for a photographic documentary to be exhibited later this year, while Collingwood player Harry O'Brien - who has African ties - has become a team patron.

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