Another African trailblazer

MAJAK Daw is yet to make his AFL debut but his highlights reel is already one of the most exciting in the game. The North Melbourne-listed player has thrilled VFL crowds with his athletic play for Werribee this year.

Although relatively short for a ruckman at 195cm, Daw's exceptional spring allows him to regularly beat taller opponents at ruck contests and soar for 'speccies'.

He's incredibly agile at ground level, too, memorably leaving a trail of VFL Collingwood players in his wake recently as he burst from half-back to bomb a 60m goal.

But the most exciting thing is that Daw is the first player from strife-torn African country Sudan to be listed by an AFL club.

The hope is he will become a trailblazer for other African immigrants, who, like him, can enrich our game with their rare talents.

Those hopes seem well-founded judging on a story in The West Australian.

There, reporter Steve Butler introduced us to Ugandan refugee Emmanuel Irra.

Like Daw, Irra immigrated to Australia with his parents as a child. But Irra is more advanced in his development than Daw at the same age.

While Daw only played a handful of TAC Cup games for the Western Jets in his final junior year, Irra starred in last year's second division NAB AFL Under-16 Championships for the World team.
 
This year, he has played four senior SANFL games for South Adelaide and is expected to play for South Australia in next month's NAB AFL Under-18 Championships.

AFL national talent manager Kevin Sheehan told Butler Irra's "first-class" skills, contested play and decision-making made him "a legitimate draft prospect".

Irra told Butler he had taken some time to warm to Australian football but now dreamed of playing in the AFL like his heroes Ben Cousins, Chris Judd and Cyril Rioli.

Irra also said it would be a privilege to be the first Ugandan-born player to make it into the AFL.

"I think a lot of kids (from Africa) like myself would not really like (football) at first, but then they would get into it," Irra said.

"The talent is enormous and we've got the build, I think."

It's an exciting prospect. As AFL chief executive Andrew Demetriou told the National Press Club on Wednesday, while football can enrich the lives of youngsters like Daw and Irra, the game needs them more than they need it.
        
Bulldogs tighter than ever


It must have been the week from hell for Western Bulldogs players.
 
The photo of Bulldogs skipper Matthew Boyd on the back page of Tuesday's Herald Sun seemed to capture the club's mood in the wake of its 123-point loss to West Coast on Sunday.

Boyd looked defensive, like he wanted to dodge the cameraman and the outside world.

But Bulldogs Bob Murphy and Daniel Giansiracusa gave us an insight in what life inside the Western Oval kennel had really been like this week.

Regular Age columnist Murphy was interviewing Giansiracusa ahead of his 200th game, against Hawthorn this Sunday.

Both players acknowledged team reviews after a big loss can be - in Murphy's words - "fairly brutal" as what went wrong is identified and dissected.

But Giansiracusa said the Bulldogs' review of last Sunday's game had been "cleansing".

Murphy suggested such "soul-searching" reviews brought teams under attack from the outside world closer together.

Giansiracusa agreed.

"To actually talk about things and find out how guys are feeling … even though you're whacking into each other, it does bring you closer together," Giansiracusa said.

"I think you do tend to bond and gel a bit more because everyone's coming at you, you've got to stick fat."
  
Giansiracusa was also comforted by the fact the Bulldogs were now a stable club, saying a similar thrashing in the past may have "fractured" the club.

It remains to be seen whether the Bulldogs' united front will be enough to help them rebound against the Hawks this Sunday. Or whether it will carry them into the top eight, even the top four, by the end of the season.

If Murphy and Giansiracusa need any more positive reinforcement, a look through AFL history books will tell it can be done.

For instance, North Melbourne won the week after two massive qualifying final losses, rebounding after both its 125-point thrashing by Essendon in 2000 and its 106-point mauling by Geelong in 2007.

Swans' goals dive


It's not often you hear football and Viagra in the same sentence.

But the Daily Telegraph found a way to link our game and male virility on Thursday, suggesting the Sydney Swans' attack needed a dose of "footy Viagra".

The paper said the Swans' chief problem in attack was their struggle to convert inside 50m entries into goals, with Champion Data statistics ranking them and the Gold Coast Suns equal last in this category, at a 21.9 per cent conversion rate.

By comparison, the top-ranked side, Richmond, kicks a goal 29.6 per cent of the time it enters its forward 50.

The Swans' inefficiency in attack is also highlighted by the fact they are ranked a respectable eighth in the competition for inside 50s, averaging 53 a game, and seventh for the time they keep the ball inside their forward 50 - averaging 10 minutes more a game than the Suns.

Which has meant the Swans have averaged 11.6 goals a game, topping just the Brisbane Lions, St Kilda and Gold Coast.
 
Swans coach John Longmire told the Daily Telegraph the Swans hadn't been able to find the right mix of players on their forward line in 2011. 

Sam Reid, Adam Goodes, Jesse White, Shane Mumford, Lewis Roberts-Thomson, Ryan O'Keefe and Andrejs Everitt are among the players Longmire has tried in attack this year, his first season in the top job.

Longmire said he was confident he had other players in good form, such as Lewis Johnson and Mark Seaby, whom he could bring into the forward line.

In short

Former Adelaide Crows star Brett Burton says Brisbane Lions skipper Jonathan Brown took some blows to his surgically repaired face in a boxing session in preparation for his comeback game against North Melbourne last Saturday night, The Advertiser reports. Burton, who is now the Lions' physical performance manager, said Brown was the most courageous player he'd seen.

As the AFL continues to bolster the integrity protocols governing football betting, The Australian reports the League is considering banning all its officials and players from betting on credit. AFL football operations manager Adrian Anderson told the paper the AFL had asked the Coalition of Major Professional and Participation Sports (COMPPS), which is headed by former ICC and Cricket Australia chief executive Malcolm Speed, to investigate the "pros and cons" of betting on credit.

Newly appointed head of player management company Phoenix
Scott Lucas says he will not abuse his part-time forward-line coaching role with Essendon by attempting to recruit Bombers tied to rival management groups, the Herald Sun reports.

Adelaide's Richard Douglas says the Crows' struggles to stop opposition sides' momentum are not due to a lack of alternative strategies but his team's inability to maintain its intensity for four quarters, The Advertiser reports.

The views in this story are those of the author and not necessarily those of the clubs or the AFL