20 Foreign Players Assigned

February 26, 2003 - arenafootball2 (af2) News Release

CHICAGO -In an effort to satisfy increased interest for Arena Football around the world, 20 foreign players have been assigned from a pool of nearly 300 international athletes, who were invited to send video to the league and/or participate in one of the overseas Arena Football training camps, to an af2 team for the 2003 season, the af2 League office announced today. An additional 27 players have been made eligible for af2 assignment.

"This is a historic day for Arena Football," said af2 Executive Director Jay Marcus. "It's always been a goal to expand the game around the globe and bringing these players into af2 for the 2003 season is a critical stage in that process."

Over the past two years, Arena Football training camps have been held in Australia, the Pacific Rim (held in Hawaii), Europe and Japan, sparking increased interest in the game and uncovering a previously untapped reserve of talented football players.

"The talent has always been there," said AFL Vice President of International Expansion Jerry Kurz. "The idea of the camps was to provide an opportunity for these players to demonstrate their skills and expose them to the game. Now we're taking the next step and bringing them into the league."

af2 rules allow each team to bring in a maximum of two international players without having those players count against the team roster, meaning a team could have a 23-man roster instead of the regular 21-man roster. The complete roster of international players is listed below.

INTERNATIONAL PLAYERS ASSIGNED TO af2 TEAMS:

POS NAME HT WT COUNTRY 2003 af2
TEAM QB Glenn Parke 6-4 225 Australia Quad City
FB/LB Peter Steve 6-0 240 Australia Quad City
OL/DL Aaron Williams 6-5 305 Canada Memphis
OL/DL Nick Tsatsaronis 6-2 250 Canada Memphis
QB Ben Chapdelaine 6-2 220 Canada Wichita
OL/DL Matt Goreski 6-2 285 Canada Cincinnati
WR/DB Kevin Johnson 6-0 205 Canada Rochester
QB Adam Lane 6-2 195 Canada Charleston
QB Ryan Reid 6-2 200 Canada Cape Fear
OL/DL Tommy Toussaint 6-4 300 Canada Charleston
DS Daniel Williams 5-9 185 Canada Green Bay
OL/DL Stephen Stursberg 6-4 313 Germany Tennessee Valley
DS Satoru Abe 5-11 180 Japan Cincinnati
QB Hiroki Inoue 6-0 180 Japan Hawaii
WR/DB Katsuhiro Motono 5-9 185 Japan Albany
DS Kohei Satomi 5-10 190 Japan Hawaii
WR/DB Mutsumi Takahashi 5-9 171 Japan Cincinnati
DS Yuichi Watanabe 5-7 155 Japan Albany
FB/LB Yusuke Yabe 6-1 260 Japan Bakersfield
OL/DL Dion Campbell 6-3 290 New Zealand Bossier City

INTERNATIONAL PLAYERS ELIGIBLE FOR af2 ASSIGNMENT:

POS NAME HT WT COUNTRY
FB/LB Nick Baldwin N/A N/A Australia
OL/DL Andrew Bennett 6-2 255 Australia
WR/DB Albert Bernard 6-2 230 Australia
WR/DB/QB Stephen Corwood 6-1 158 Australia
OL/DL Brett Davis 5-10 250 Australia
OL/DL Shayne Diener 6-2 281 Australia
WR/DB Michael Harvey 6-0 185 Australia
FB/LB Louis Lavea-Williams N/A N/A Australia
OL/DL Nigel Law 5-9 255 Australia
FB/LB Michael Mau'u 6-0 246 Australia
WR/DB Karl Robertson 6-0 169 Australia
WR/DB Anthony Sinton 6-0 180 Australia
OL/DL Chris Tia 6-3 360 Australia
OL/DL Richard Tia 5-11 270 Australia
QB Joseph Toilolo 6-2 236 Australia
OL/DL Andrew Tugaga 6-0 270 Australia
FB/LB Clema Vaka 5-9 214 Australia
OL/DL Jason Vaka N/A N/A Australia
QB David Ward 6-0 200 Australia
WR/DB Mark Legge 6-3 185 Australia
FB/LB Yuji Kimura 6-1 230 Japan
FB/LB Go Konishi 5-11 230 Japan
FB/LB Tsukasa Miyamoto 6-1 247 Japan
QB Takeshi Shinjo 6-1 185 Japan
FB/LB Takamasa Suzuki 6-0 230 Japan
DS Shinichi Takeda 5-6 205 Japan
WR/LB Teruhiro Ura 6-1 170 Japan

About af2

Entering its fourth season, af2 serves as a grassroots, developmental indoor football league for players, coaches and officials with teams in small- to mid-size markets throughout the United States. af2 operates under the same Mission Statement and Fans' Bill of Rights as the AFL, which is currently in its 17th season and first with NBC. NBC is providing the AFL with unprecedented exposure by televising up to 70 games, including all playoff contests and ArenaBowl XVII on June 22. The af2 season kicks off in late March.

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