Since the 2000s, the
AFL began to look to increasingly recruit athletic talent from outside Australia. It is estimated over 100,000 people participate in the sport outside Australia and the
Australian Football International Cup takes place every three years in
Melbourne, where teams from 18 countries compete against each other. With the exception of international rookies, the AFL however has traditionally looked outside of its grassroots player base for amateur and professional athletes from other sports with transferrable skills. As such this is the primary aim of the International Combines. All AFL international combines have been indefinitely postponed since the
COVID-19 pandemic.
US Combine , an American college basketball player, is the most successful talent unearthed at an international combine, playing more than 100 senior AFL games. The US AFL Combine was held annually between 2012 and 2017. The first combine was run in 2012, and it has been run semi-annually since 2017. Each year, a minimum of two of the group were chosen to partake in the AFL National Combine held in
Melbourne. From 2015, the AFL shifted its focus exclusively to
rucks; and, as such, all 15 participants from the 2015 combine were from a college basketball background. After a poor yield between 2015 and 2017 while scouting for American athletes over 2 metres tall, the AFL put the program on hold to focus on talent in Ireland and New Zealand. Notable combines:
European Combine , a gaelic footballer from
County Mayo, Ireland, was signed by Geelong in 2021, began playing Australian rules in November 2022, and made his AFL debut in May 2023 The European Combine has been held annually since 2010 and overseen by the
AFL. Since 2015, it has been run by International Talent Manager
Tadhg Kennelly, a former player for the
Sydney Swans who was originally drafted from
Ireland. All of the early trials were held in
Dublin. Among those who try out, a large proportion are Gaelic footballers, as the skill set of
Gaelic football is considered similar to that of
AFL. Unlike the key positions sought from US and New Zealand athletes, AFL clubs are typically searching Ireland's gaelic talent for running midfielders and attacking (rebound) defenders. The two best-performing participants at the combine are then given the opportunity to attend the AFL National Combine. To date, only a couple of the tested players have been successful at AFL level, with the majority of successful Irish players scouted by other means. During a drought in combine talent, former Irish player
Pearce Hanley in 2016 was critical of the format as a recruiting method due to its primary focus on athletic testing over game adaptability. Many of the more successful players have been recruited directly or—in the case of
Colin O'Riordan,
Conor Glass and
Mark O'Connor—bypassed the European Combine altogether, instead flying directly to Melbourne, Australia, to participate in the AFL Combine there, where they have a more direct recruitment pathway. Others did not sign at the event but decided to sign sometime later, as was the case of
Darragh Joyce. In 2019, a women's combine was run for the first time as part of a pathway to the
AFL Women's competition. In 2022, the AFL flagged a return of the European Combine; however, it did not oversee them in 2023, with independent recruiters holding trials in Ireland instead. Notable combines:
New Zealand Combine The first New Zealand combine was held in 2013. Unlike the combines in the US and Europe, New Zealand's combine targets mainly junior (under-18s) rugby and soccer players with key-position potential.
Kurt Heatherley was signed by Hawthorn via the AFL Combine in Melbourne in 2012 before the New Zealand combines had begun. The first women's combine was held in 2014. Notable combines: == References ==