Australia Sights: Sports

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Weekend sport is an integral part of the Australian culture from the capital cities to country towns. The vast majority of games are played over the Weekend, with the most important games generally played on Friday night. Every professional league is televised, with every match to be viewed on either Free to Air or Pay television.

• In the winter in Victoria Aussie Rules (Australian Football) is more than just a sport, it is a way of life. Catch a game at the Melbourne Cricket Ground. There are many teams from Melbourne, with Adelaide and Western Australia hosting two teams each, Sydney and Brisbane both have a single team.

• In summer, international cricket is played between Australia and at least two touring sides. The games rotate around all the capital cities. To experience the traditional game catch the New Year's test match at the Sydney cricket ground played for 5 days starting from the 2nd of January. Melbourne also hosts the iconic Boxing Day Test match, with Adelaide, Brisbane and Perth almost always hosting one Test Match per Season. Darwin and Tasmania also host the occasional match.

Or for a more lively entertaining form, that only takes a few hours, try a twenty-twenty match. The final form is "One Day" Cricket, international matches generally start at 1PM and finish at 10 or 11PM (a "Day-Nighter"), with most domestic and occasional international matches played from 11AM to 6PM. The traditional Australia Day game, once a 5 day match but now a One Day International, is held in Adelaide every January 26th.

• The Australian Open, one of the tennis Grand Slams, is played annually in Melbourne. Or the Medibank International in Sydney Olympic Park in January.

• Catch a rugby union Super-14 game, with teams playing from Australia, New Zealand and South Africa in Brisbane, Canberra, Sydney and Perth during late Summer/Autumn. The Australian national team, the Wallabies, also host international teams during winter, including New Zealand and South Africa for the Tri-Nations tournament.

• Rugby League is played mainly in New South Wales and Queensland, with the National Rugby League competition played in Winter. Teams include Melbourne in Victoria, Brisbane, North Queensland and the Gold Coast in Queensland, a team from New Zealand, with the rest of the teams coming from suburban areas in Sydney, and some in regional areas of New South Wales such as Newcastle and Canberra.

• Netball is Australia's largest female sport, and there are weekly games in an international competition between Australia and New Zealand teams.

• Football is a small event by European standards, but there is still the A-League, which is a fully professional league involving teams from Australia and one from New Zealand competition, with games played weekly during the summer. Most cities have a semi-professional "state league" played during winter, with most clubs being built around a specific ethnic/migrant community.