International Rules dying a slow death

If we played them a proper game of football, we would destroy them, there would be no contest. I don't know what the problem is. If one doesn't like IR, then one simply doesn't have to watch it. There are enough people who watch it to justify it being held.

I enjoyed watching it, but, no one takes it seriously and we cant get the crowds, to AFL standards, scrap it. Just broadcast Live AFL matches around the world and around australia, to strengthen the game near and there. Play games in rural Australia, where the NAB Challenge can't get to and places around the world like, Dubai, China, Japan, New Zealand, Great Britain, Ireland, France, etc etc.

Ian, I've been saying it every year, including those series Australia has won. I actually think the oringial idea of the Galahs going over and challenging the Irish to proper Gaelic Football is a better idea. But I digress. This game...It's a hybrid set of rules for a game played twice a year only, and only ever by the same 2 countries. How can that grow? The public don't care for it, the players don't care for it (though the interest from Australian players and staff seems to rise when it's been hosted in Ireland...junket anyone?), and commercial sponsors are hardly rushing in to get involved. Also, it's not the best Australian players. This year's group of "stars" were close to being anonymous. It's a desperate attempt by the AFL and GAA to contrive some kind of international relevance for their respective codes. It just hasn't worked and as I said above, it's quickly regressing, particularly in terms of public interest. Get rid of it.

Gaelic was not coded until the 1880s. What is clear is that rules such as Eton, Cambridge, Harrow and Rugby were considered and that Wills in particular had clear knowledge and experience of the rules of Rugby. What is clear too is that those rules, 37 based on the 1845 school rules - were NOT deemed appropriate for Melbourne. For a variety of reasons. Harder/drier grounds. That the early games were adult recreation, and included youths playing in these matches - the immediate response to the wrist injury to a youth named Blanchard after being tripped by T.W.Wills shortly after the May 17, 1859 draft of the rules saw a July 2nd, 1859 revision where tripping was outlawed. The main Melb paper of the day, the Argus, has references to the (most likely a variation of) Rugby rules that were trialled in 1858 (and clearly a failure to gain widespread support). So, the first set of 10 rules were drawn up, with zero reference of off-side (Rugby school 1845 had 7), on side (vs 2), 'Try at goal', 'running in', let alone that throwing was strictly illegal from the outset, rule 10, compared to 3 Rugby 1845 rules that refered to throwing. Sean Fagan back in the Tom Brock lecture in 2007 suggested that the Melbourne Rules were an adoption of the Rugby rules but with 2 amendments - one being the ommission of 'off side'. That clearly is a massive stretch of the truth by Fagan, but, he's prone to taking liberties on this topic. The Melb rules of 1859 immediately used terms like 'out of bounds' compared to other codes using 'touch'. This distinction remains to this day. The July 2nd rule revision of 1859 saw rule XI added which provided for captains ruling on infringements other than where umpires were appointed. Umpires were not referred to in other codes, and back to Fagan's 2007 lecture, he asserted that codes of football in the 1860s were devoid of umpires. Ironic really, given he also points out that T.W.Wills was one of the 2 umpires of 'that game' from the paddock beside the MCG in August 1858. The main thing is - the Melbourne rules were OWNED locally, there were a unique collection, and immediately 'evolved' locally. And, whilst the May 1859 rules were distributed amongst about 70 members of the MFC, the 1860 rules were NOT the result of the MFC Committee - but, rather, at the urging of St Kilda and involved delegates from close to 10 clubs. These rules were resolved to be made into 300 copies, called 'Victorian Rules' and distributed around the metropolis. J.B.THompson's annual 'Victorian Cricketers Guide' which included a 'football' section, in 1859 included the rules of Eton, and Melbourne, but in 1860 included the Victorian rules of football. Well and truly codified and localised by this time. And no evidence anywhere that anyone had any knowledge at all of the 100% internal Sheffield Rules at that time.

The International Rules Series "will" continue in 2013 - Who said that - AFL Boss Andrew Demitriou. Andy was just about solely responsible for keeping it going after the famouus brawl a few years ago.He will not let it go. According to the article it seems that a full strength top rated Australian team will leave for Ireland in 2013 if the tea leaves are read correctly. Link -- http://www.theage.com.au/afl/afl-news/afl-we-erred-on-irish-timing-20111106-1n1xy.html

Russ Very rational and relevant post. Thankyou.

The mistake generally made is to start from the view that Australian Rules is a hybrid of other sets of "rules". There were practically no formal football codes available by this time, barring the Cambridge rules, the Sheffield, Rugby, Gaelic etc. codification all came later. To the extent that people came to Melbourne with an understanding of a specific set of rules they were fluid and partially evolved. A good analogy is the codification of language and spelling in the 16-17th century. Before that there are subtle, but fluid differences between English as spoken in the various regions of England, and the various regions of Scotland. After the adoption and promulgation of the printed word and with increasing urbanisation they coalesced into two: English and Scots. Each variant of football, when codified, selected a specific subset of possible rules from a myriad of different rules available in the local region and elsewhere. The codifiers of Australian Rules also adopted a set of rules based on a variety of ideas about how football was played, not from specific codes (which as yet didn't exist). Given the diverse number of immigrants in Melbourne at the time, they'd have known football from various regions, which explains the diverse apparent origins. But these exact origins are pretty irrelevant given how little it conforms to modern football. What mattered is that it continued to evolve separately to (though no doubt occasionally borrowing from) other forms.

You're only saying that because the Irish (a) took it more seriously, and (b) won.

Demonstrably wrong. You should read more widely before you post, to save others the trouble of repeating ad infinitum what has been written on this forum and others many times before. In short, the founders of Australian Football declared "we shall have a game of our own", and they made one.

As the 4 gentleman are no longer with us, debates about the true genesis of the sport will always be subject to semantics. For the purpose of this forum, I can only say: "Please end this farce now!" This annual 'contest' has become embarrassing and is actually regressing rather than developing - says it all really.

Ben The reason is 'compromise'. Both cultures feel that the other is advantaged and therefore hard done by. The Australans are extremely frustrated presently, since the hybrid is even more weighted than ever before towards our Irish brethren. It's really quite simple, the Irish can play us at our Indig code and we can reciprocate by playing them at theirs, since both codes share a st such a strong heritage but ;ests be done with the iR fiasco once and for all.. Lets j

Yes, I am well aware of Blaineys subjectively motivated take on our codes history. Evidence - well what exactly constitutes this. It seems many of our esteemed historians only take into account what is written when much of history has been passed down through verbal accounts. All that is is written was first spoken in fact.

I suppose I've just given up on the blame game. No matter which teams are involved, there seems to be a potential for a big bash (of the non-cricketing kind!) every single time. WHY? It does nothing to get the ball through (or indeed under) the sticks, as Australia proved last week....

Ben but I'm not sure the Australians were to blame for the fisticuffs in New York!

Geoffrey Blainey is pretty much opposed to an Irish link, stating that there is no evidence of one, however, in his own book he actually does provide evidence of an Irish link! I think the very best portrayal of the conditions that existed in Melbourne in 1858 that led to the formation of our game is where Blainey conveys a first hand account of a bunch of gentlemen turning up at a pub that had offered the use of a football for a scratch match of football. I can't remember the exact description, but there was one group who understood the rugby rules, and then there were a bunch of Scots that understood another form of football, and then he describes a group of Irish men who were involved in kicking the ball straight up in the air and catching it. Anyway, it serves to underscore again that when four gentlemen sat down to codify the first set of rules, they drew inspiration from far and wide, including knowledge of what had transpired in the previous year, and it's clear to me that that included knowledge of various forms of "folk" football, and more than likely, that included Irish forms as well.

hi Cattery - just had a glance through it. And what a surprise. The NYC game finished with a second half fight-fest, and Australia lost. Hmmm... As I've said previously, I think the IRF concept is actually quite brilliant. It's just such a shame that it's seemingly buried every year beneath such idiotic and pointless violence.

That link to the article on the Galahs of 1967 is a fantastic read, I highly recommend it. What a fantastic achievement it was for them.

Axelv So what pray tell did sheffield Rules evolve from. The Gaelic games were played in Oz long before the Indigenous game was codified and that fact is that the huge Irish diaspora especially, influenced our code in those formative years, far moreso than has been credited until recent years. The Sheffield link as with the Rugby one is the myth if ever there was one and very much overstated for too long due to the politically Albion status quo of the day. There is plenty of reference to the Gaelic influnece which is backed by very reputable historians and sporting journos in this country. It is smewhat ironic that now, the English and Rugby persuasions have a great desire to appropriate our game after deriding it all these years.

In the case of Australian Football, you cannot be that definitive. Sheffield Rules are one of 3 or 4 games that were highly influential in the early codification of the rules of Australian Football. The important point is that the four gentlemen who sat down in a Richmond pub near the MCG to codify the first set of rules, did not have the rule of one game that they were working off, they brought to the table knowledge of at least four forms of football, not to mention they're experience from the previous year in having kick arounds.

"It’s popular fallacy that Australian football evolved from Gaelic football. " They both evolved from Sheffield Rules in England.