Team Canada at the World Games in 2017?

As much as I enjoy recording the history of the National teams, I want to do so with an eye to fthe future as well.

So it is with a significant amount of glee that I share this news (more like a rumour at the moment) from the IFAF Facebook page.

Founded in 1981, the International World Games Association (IWGA) is a non-governmental and non-profit-making international organization constituted under Swiss law. Made up of International Sports Federations, it administers a quadrennial and multidisciplinary sports event, The World Games, which aspires to equal and exceed the importance of world championships organized by each federation individually. The 2017 World Games will be played in Wroclaw, Poland.

What does this mean to IFAF? Well, American Football might be included in the 2017 World Games! There were 25 sports that applied, 8 that made the shortlist, and the official participating sports will be again narrowed down to 5.

The confirmation is not final, but IFAF President Tommy Wiking made the announcement on Twitter earlier today that a reliable source put American Football on the shortlist to be included in the 2017 games in Wroclaw, Poland! If selected, it will be a 6 team full-contact tackle tournament.

You can read more about The World Games on their website: http://www.theworldgames.org

There's no need to get ahead of ourselves.  The sport is not yet accepted in the World Games and if it is, we don't know for certain that Canada would field a team. But it is sometihng to keep an eye on.