Australian Rules Football
Australian Rules Football, also known as Aussie Rules, is a full-contact team sport, played between two teams with 18 players in each team. The origin of the sport is not very clear and there are several theories about when and how the sport originated.
Aussie Rules is the most popular and the most attended sport in Australia. Australian Football League (AFL) is the highest level professional league for the sport in Australia, with 18 teams, and a season that runs from April through to October.
The sport is played in an oval shaped field, using an oval shaped ball. Each end has two pairs of posts. The inner pair is called the goalposts, and the outer pair is called the behind posts. The objective of the sport is to score as many points as possible, in four 20 minute quarters of play.
WAFL players going up in the ruck at Leederville Oval
Points can be scored in two ways:
- Goal : A goal, which is awarded 6 points, is scored by kicking the ball through the goalposts.
- Behind : A behind, which is awarded 1 point, is scored when the ball goes through the space between the goal post and the behind post.
At the end of the match, the team with the most points is declared as the winner. If both teams have the same number of points, the match ends in a draw.
Similar Sports
- AFLX — a new version of Australian Football played on a rectangular field with seven players created to showcase some of the most thrilling elements of the sport to attract new fans.
- Nine-a-side Footy — a mini version of Australian Rules Football, with 3 players each designated as forwards, centers and backs.
- Rec Footy — an accessible non-contact version of Australian Football, played with 8 players per team.
- Metro Footy — a modified version of Australian football played on a rectangular field, predominantly played in the USA.
- International Rules Football — a hybrid game invented so that Aussie Rules Football players can play games against Irish Gaelic Football players.
- AFL Wheelchair — a wheelchair version of the football code from Australia, played between two teams of five players.
- Lightning Football — shortened version of Australian Rules Football, usually played in the half time break. Lightning football is not significantly different from standard Australian rules football other than the length of its games.
- Beach Footy — a version of AFL played on the beach. It is 7-a-side and non-contact.
Related Pages
- About football (general)
- Football Decoder — what is called football around the world?
- Basic Rules of Australian Football
- Complete list of sports
- The Encyclopedia of Sports
- About sport in Australia
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