Vanuatu dreaming for Swans hopeful

Kilip Andrew from Vanuatu at the AFL's South Pacific Academy Squad skills and agility testing session in Wellington Picture: Phil Hillyard Source: The Daily Telegraph

CLEARING crabs from a football field before you can have a kick with your mates - welcome to the life of Swans hopeful Kilip Andrew.

But Andrew's home country of Vanuatu and other islands in the South Pacific are the next hotspot of potential AFL talent.

Andrew and a dozen other promising youngsters who are part of the AFL's South Pacific academy completed a skills and agility workshop under the gaze of some of the sport's top talent spotters in Wellington last week.

"Who knows if any of these kids here today will make it to the highest level, what this program is about is showing them and everybody else there is a pathway for them to do it,'' AFL international development manager Tony Woods said.

The Sydney Swans have lead the league in scouring the corners of the earth to find premiership players with the likes of Tadgh Kennelly (Ireland) and Mike Pyke (Canada).

Now they are taking a look at talent a lot closer to home in New Zealand and the South Pacific.

"You're always looking for other ways to gain some sort of competitive advantage and add value to your list,'' Swans football development manager Stuart Maxfield said.

"We've been reasonably successful with our international recruiting.''

Regardless of the country from which they hail, Maxfield believes there are some characteristics which are vital for all players to succeed.

"The guys have to have a natural competitive streak in them, but they also have to have the capacity to listen and learn and put that into practice,'' Maxfield said.

"Mike Pyke is a classic example of a guy who is a fantastic competitor but also a really good listener and he's able to put that into practice and he has the work ethic to back it up day after day.

"Hawthorn have lead the way in recruiting from New Zealand and have four Kiwis on their books including Kurt Heatherley who only played his first game of Aussie Rules just over two years ago and initially knew very little about the game including the rules.

"I didn't even know it had four goal posts and I didn't know it was an oval field,'' Heatherley said.

"`I got caught for running too far with the ball I ran about 35 metres.''

The 18 year old was spotted playing under 16 basketball for New Zealand in Tasmania two years ago.

When the Hawks approached Heatherley he thought it was a joke.

"I thought they were taking the Mickey out of me so I never went to this meeting in Auckland they organised,'' Heatherley said.

Hawthorn persisted and signed the 18 year old up this year.

``I've still got a long way to go to get there but if I can compete hard and give everything a go I've got a chance.''

It's not just Heatherley that's still coming to terms with his change of sports, many of his family and mates are struggling to understand his move.

``There's a couple of my mates think AFL's for pussies,'' Heatherley said.

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