The AFL's new western Sydney team could make its under-18 debut as early as next season alongside the Gold Coast in the TAC Cup competition.
The competition's working party dealing with the yet-to-be-named team met for the first time last week and will almost certainly grant the new side most of NSW and the ACT as an exclusive recruiting zone to potentially enter the under-18s competition in 2009 and make its AFL debut in 2012.
So bullish is the AFL on the growing NSW talent pool it is also looking at lowering the age requirement for its scholarship scheme to 13, and could also remove the six-player-per-club limit, allowing any AFL club to take on as many teenagers as it wants.
While AFL chief executive Andrew Demetriou yesterday ruled out restricting the scholarship teenagers to the new Sydney club, he added: "The scholarship scheme has been very, very effective and we're starting to see the benefits. Maybe we'll have to look at more radical and ambitious ways to capitalise on the talent we are seeing emerge out of NSW. Maybe we would lower the age of the players, maybe we would remove the six-player limit."
When asked whether the western Sydney team could join the Gold Coast as an under-18s outfit next year, he replied: "Possibly. That's something we'll be looking at over the next month or two."
Underlining the AFL's enthusiasm was last Saturday's victory by the NSW/ACT Rams over the Victorian Country team in the national under-18s championships. The Rams team had seven scholarship players.
http://www.realfooty.com.au/news/news/new-sydney-club-on-fasttrack/2008/06/12/1212863835609.html
Last Modified on 13/06/2008 10:35