 | |
| Presence | |
|---|---|
| Country or region | Australia (country of origin) Also played inDenmark,Fiji,Hong Kong,New Zealand,Papua New Guinea,South Africa, theUnited Kingdom, theUnited States andVanuatu |
| Olympic | No |
| Paralympic | No |
Auskick is a program designed to teach the basic skills ofAustralian football to children aged between 5 and 12. Auskick is a non-contactvariant of the sport. It began in Australia and is now a nationwide non-selective program. It has increased participation and diversity in the sport amongst children, and is now being run in many countries across the world.
At its peak in the mid-1990s in Australia there were around 200,000 Auskick participants annually,[1] and this figure has since stabilised around this number. Numerous professional, semi-professional and representative players are graduates.
The program is now run throughout the world, including several locally branded variations such as "Kiwi Kick" (AFL New Zealand), "Niukick" (Papua New Guinea), "Footywild" (South Africa), "Bula Kick" (Fiji), "Viking Kick" (Denmark), "Ausball" (United States) and "Pikinini Kick" (Vanuatu) among others, often sponsored by local organisations.
Auskick has its roots in the Little League which began to be played at half time duringVFL (now AFL) matches in the 1960s,[2] and it was revised in1980 to make it more accessible. Little League was expanded byRay Allsopp into a state development program called "Vickick",[3] begun inVictoria in 1985. Participation increased from 7,000 to 35,000 in four years.[4]
The ACT was one of the first other states or territories to introduce the program in 1991 as "Auskick". Between 1993 and 1995, former AFL player and coachDavid Parkin, who had been coaching the territory'sTeal Cup side, successfully lobbied the AFL for the national adoption of Auskick.[4][5]
In 1998, theAFL Commission, the national governing body for the sport, began to roll it out nationally. At its peak, there were around 200,000 Auskick participants annually.[1] As the world governing body, the Commission later franchised the program to affiliated organisations around the world under various local brands and sponsors.
Auskick is a national football coaching network, with clinics held weekly (usually on Saturday mornings) run by volunteers. The program attracts over 100,000primary school–aged participants annually and, as such, is the largest grassroots sporting association of its kind in Australia.
Each Auskick session consists of a training session and a game, with the emphasis on developing skills rather than the game result. Some of the major rule differences from Australian rules football are a ban on tackling and the restriction of players to their zone of the field, similar tonetball.
The AFL is a major supporter of Auskick and star players occasionally assist in training events. The AFL also invites various branches of the Auskick network to play short games during the half-time breaks of premiership season games at all grounds, with numerous matches played on modified fields simultaneously.
In 2007, the program's slogan was "Where Champions Begin", withJo Silvagni (wife of former AFL playerStephen Silvagni) andRobert DiPierdomenico, the 1986 co-Brownlow Medallist as the main ambassadors.[6] They also used thekick-to-kick tradition as part of their promotional television campaign, which shows kids from around the country kicking the football to each other to the tune of "Gimme Dat Ding".
Parents are involved across the board in activities such as at skills sessions, as coaches and supervisors, administrators, helpers, coordinators and first aid officers. Throughout the year, there are parent orientation courses as well as coaching courses.
The AFL has used the Auskick program the introduce Australian rules football into schools and communities around the country to increase the AFL's profile in areas that traditionally support otherfootball codes such asNew South Wales andQueensland.[7] There have been accusations of exaggerated participation figures[8] in an attempts to gain access to Sydney playing fields. Vast increases in AFL participation figures in Sydney were questioned by David Lawson, a Melbourne University academic, in a study commissioned by the AFL. Lawson's study found that AFL club participation rates in Sydney had stalled, and that the AFL was masking low figures by using short-term, non-club affiliated Auskick participants and comparing them to competitive junior club participation numbers in other sports.[9]
Early on in the national program, national ambassadors were nominated. All of these ambassadors played for Victorian clubs and as the AFL and the program continued to expand nationally, these players were not always well-recognised figures by children in all regions.In 2010s, each state nominating its own ambassador, usually a homegrown talent, without a national ambassador.
Outside Australia, Auskick programs exist in the following countries:
Auskick exists under a different name in the following countries:
Denmark (Viking Kick)
Fiji (Bulakick)[a][14]
New Zealand (Kiwi Kick)[15]
Papua New Guinea (Niukick)[b][16][17]
Solomon Islands (Solkick)[c][18]
South Africa (Footy Wild)[19]
United States (Ausball)[20]
Vanuatu (Pikinini Kick)[d][21]| National governing bodies | |||||||||
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