Hello All,
I am hoping to gain some words of advice from some Aussie T-Nation members on ‘footy’. I am originally from North Carolina, and I’ve been working an internship as a physio/strength & conditioning assistant for the past two months with a WAFL club. I’ve had some great times here, and to finish off my experience in Australia I am playing a game of footy this weekend with the reserves team.
I’m familiar with the rules and what not, and I have played contact sports before (rugby union) but if you could give one piece of advice for my first (and probably only) game, what would it be? I have less than 2 weeks left in Australia now because I will go back to the US to finish my last year of school.
Cheers
Hey, great that you’re giving the indigenous game a go before you leave. Having being with a WAFL club, you’re probably in a better position to GIVE advice than receive it, but my bit of advice would be this: know what your role in your team is, and then focus on doing it.
Not so much your “position” (which of course you should be given by your coach) but your “role”, which you may NOT be told and might have to ask your coach or other senior players.
For example, if you’re in the forward line, are you there to take the high mark, or crumb the ball from a pack, or draw a defender? As a midfielder, are you an “inside” or “outside” player, or a tagger/run with player? As a defender, are you there to spoil or to rebound? And so on.
It’s often tempting in a game, when you haven’t touched the ball much and things seem so chaotic on the field, to forget your role and “chase the footy” around. This can cost your team big time, especially if some players who are playing their role are expecting you to do yours.
Other than that, hey it’s Aussie Rules - so don’t think about it too much and just have fun!