15 Nov AFL National Inclusion Carnival Wins Award

On Monday, November 9th 2015, the AFL’s National Inclusion Carnival, hosted by AFL Victoria, was recognised by winning the Victorian Government’s Community Sporting Event of the Year Award.

The event brought together representative teams of footballers with intellectual disabilities to participate in a week long, round robin carnival.

This was the second running of the carnival that saw Victoria Metro take out the Peter Ryan Cup in the Grand Final at Punt Road against NSW/ACT.

As explained on the night, the stories outside of winning the games captured the true spirit of the carnival. They include the Victoria Country player handballing to his Tasmanian opponent so he could kick Tassie’s first goal of the game, and the independence gained by the Tasmanian player who, at age 27, had never spent more than a single night away from his parents.

The carnival would not have been possible without the work of a number of people from across our States who brought a team across – but particular acknowledgement needs to go to Andrew Hughes who managed this at a national level and Logan Whittaker from AFL Victoria who was the driving force of the event locally.

A list of all winners at the awards ceremony can be found on the link below.

http://www.sport.vic.gov.au/make-sport-inclusive/community-sport-and-recreation-awards

Source: Josh Vanderloo – AFL