What is footy?
(from Wikipedia)
Australian rules football or Australian football is a football variant played between two teams of 18 players outdoors on large oval-shaped grass fields (often also used as a cricket grounds), with a ball in the shape of a prolate spheroid. It is also commonly referred to as football, footy, Aussie rules or AFL (although AFL is actually the name of the elite national league, not the sport). The primary aim of the game is to score goals by kicking the ball between the middle two posts of the opposing goal. The winner is the team who has the higher total score at the end of the fourth quarter. Except for special circumstances,if the score is tied then a draw is declared. Players may use any part of their body to advance the ball. The primary methods are kicking, handballing and running with the ball. There are restrictions on how the ball can be handled, for example players running with the ball must intermittently bounce or touch it on the ground, throwing the ball is not allowed and players must not get caught holding the ball. Unlike most similar sports, there is no offside rule and players can roam the field freely. Possession of the ball is in dispute at all times except when a free kick is paid. A distinctive feature of the game is the mark, where players anywhere on the field who catch a ball from a kick (with specific conditions), are awarded a free kick.[4] Australian rules is a contact sport in which players can tackle using their hands or use their whole body to obstruct opponents. Dangerous physical contact (such as a pushing an opponent in the back), interference when marking and deliberately slowing the play are discouraged with free kicks, distance penalties or suspension, depending on the seriousness of the infringement. Frequent physical contests, aerial marking or "speckies", fast movement of both players and the ball and high scoring are the game's main attributes as a spectator sport. Details of the game's origins in Australia are obscure and still the subject of much debate. Accounts of various forms of "foot-ball" being played in the Victorian goldfields that shared similar attributes to Australian football date back to 1853. Australian football became organised in Melbourne in 1858 with a series of experimental rules in a bid to keep cricketers fit during the winter months and in 1859 the first laws of the game were published by the Melbourne Football Club.[5] Today Australian rules football is the most popular spectator sport in Australia[6][7] and is played extensively with competitions in all Australian states and two territories. While it is a professional sport only in Australia, it is played at amateur level in several countries and in several variations. The most prestigious and only national competition in Australia is the Australian Football League (AFL), which culminates in the annual AFL Grand Final, the highest attended club championship event in the world in 2005, 2006, 2007 and 2008.[8] The league has governed the sport through the AFL Commission and the AFL Rules Committee, since it disbanded the Australian National Football Council in 1993 and International Australian Football Council in 2002. In 2008, the 150th anniversary of the first recorded games of Australian football were celebrated. |
 The playing field, which may be approximately 150m (or more) long goal to goal and approximately 135 m (or more) wide boundary line to boundary line wing to wing. Approximately 3 to 5 metres of boundary line space from the boundary line to the fence is also required. The centre square is 50m x 50m. The curved fifty metre line is 50 m away from the centre of the goal. For professional Australian Football the 50 metre lines should not intersect the front or back edge of the centre square (which is why 150m from goal to goal is considered about regulation size (some grounds are longer)). Adjacent goal and behind posts are 6.4 metres apart. The goal square is 9m long.
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