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Australian rules football

Australian rules football, also called Australian football or Aussie rules, or more simply football or footy, is a contact sport played between two teams of 18 players on an oval field, often a modified cricket ground. Points are scored by kicking the oval ball between the central goal posts (worth six points), or between a central and outer post (worth one point, otherwise known as a "behind").

During general play, players may position themselves anywhere on the field and use any part of their bodies to move the ball. The primary methods are kicking, handballing and running with the ball. There are rules on how the ball can be handled; for example, players running with the ball must intermittently bounce or touch it on the ground. Throwing the ball is not allowed, and players must not get caught holding the ball. A distinctive feature of the game is the mark, where players anywhere on the field who catch the ball from a kick (with specific conditions) are awarded unimpeded possession. Possession of the ball is in dispute at all times except when a free kick or mark is paid. Players can tackle using their hands or use their whole body to obstruct opponents. Dangerous physical contact (such as pushing an opponent in the back), interference when marking, and deliberately slowing the play are discouraged with free kicks, distance penalties, or suspension for a certain number of matches depending on the severity of the infringement. The game features frequent physical contests, spectacular marking, fast movement of both players and the ball, and high scoring.

The sport's origins can be traced to football matches played in Melbourne, in 1858, inspired by English public school football games. Seeking to develop a game more suited to adults and Australian conditions, the Melbourne Football Club published the first laws of Australian football in May 1859.

Australian football has the highest spectator attendance and television viewership of all sports in Australia, while the Australian Football League (AFL), the sport's only fully professional competition, is the nation's wealthiest sporting body. The AFL Grand Final, held annually at the Melbourne Cricket Ground, is the second-highest-attended club championship event in the world. The sport is also played at amateur level in many countries and in several variations. Its rules are governed by the AFL Commission with the advice of the AFL's Laws of the Game Committee.

Name
Australian rules football is known by several nicknames, including Aussie rules, football and footy. In some regions, where other codes of football are more popular, the sport is usually called AFL after the Australian Football League, while the league itself also uses this name for local competitions in some areas.

Origins
Primitive forms of football were played sporadically in the Australian colonies in the first half of the 19th century. Compared to cricket and horse racing, football was considered a mere "amusement" by colonists at the time, and while little is known about these early one-off games, evidence does not support a causal link with Australian football. In Melbourne, in 1858, in a move that would help to shape Australian football in its formative years, private schools (then termed "public schools" in accordance with nomenclature in England) began organising football games inspired by precedents at English public schools. The earliest match, held on 15 June, was between Melbourne Grammar and St Kilda Grammar.

On 10 July 1858, the Melbourne-based Bell's Life in Victoria and Sporting Chronicle published a letter by Tom Wills, captain of the Victoria cricket team, calling for the formation of a "foot-ball club" with a "code of laws" to keep cricketers fit during winter. Born in Australia, Wills played a nascent form of rugby football while a pupil at Rugby School in England, and returned to his homeland a star athlete and cricketer. Two weeks later, Wills' friend, cricketer Jerry Bryant, posted an advertisement for a scratch match at the Richmond Paddock adjoining the Melbourne Cricket Ground (MCG). This was the first of several "kickabouts" held that year involving members of the Melbourne Cricket Club, including Wills, Bryant, W. J. Hammersley and J. B. Thompson. Trees were used as goalposts and play typically lasted an entire afternoon. Without an agreed-upon code of laws, some players were guided by rules they had learned in the British Isles, "others by no rules at all". Another milestone in 1858 was a 40-a-side match played under experimental rules between Melbourne Grammar and Scotch College, held at the Richmond Paddock. Umpired by Wills and teacher John Macadam, it began on 7 August and continued over two subsequent Saturdays, ending in a draw with each side kicking one goal. It is commemorated with a statue outside the MCG, and the two schools have since competed annually in the Cordner–Eggleston Cup, the world's oldest continuous football competition.

Since the 1920s, it has been suggested that Australian football may have been derived from the Irish sport of Gaelic football. However, there is no archival evidence in favour of a Gaelic influence, and the style of play shared between the two modern codes appeared in Australia long before the Irish game evolved in a similar direction. Another theory, first proposed in 1983, posits that Wills, having grown up among Aboriginals in Victoria, may have seen or played the Aboriginal ball game of Marn Grook, and incorporated some of its features into early Australian football. There is only circumstantial evidence that he knew of the game, and according to biographer Greg de Moore's research, Wills was "almost solely influenced by his experience at Rugby School".

First rules
A loosely organised Melbourne side, captained by Wills, played against other football enthusiasts in the winter and spring of 1858. The following year, on 14 May, the Melbourne Football Club was officially established, making it one of the world's oldest football clubs. Three days later, Wills, Hammersley, Thompson and teacher Thomas H. Smith met near the MCG at the Parade Hotel, owned by Bryant, and drafted ten rules: "The Rules of the Melbourne Football Club". These are the laws from which Australian football evolved. The club aimed to create a simple code suited to the hard playing surfaces around Melbourne, and to eliminate the roughest aspects of English school games—such as "hacking" (shin-kicking) in Rugby School football—to reduce the risk of injuries to working men. In another significant departure from English public school football, the Melbourne rules omitted any offside law. "The new code was as much a reaction against the school games as influenced by them", writes Mark Pennings. The rules were distributed throughout the colony; Thompson in particular did much to promote the new code in his capacity as a journalist.

Early competition in Victoria

Following Melbourne's lead, Geelong and Melbourne University also formed football clubs in 1859. While many early Victorian teams participated in one-off matches, most had not yet formed clubs for regular competition. A South Yarra club devised its own rules. To ensure the supremacy of the Melbourne rules, the first-club level competition in Australia, the Caledonian Society's Challenge Cup (1861–64), stipulated that only the Melbourne rules were to be used. This law was reinforced by the Athletic Sports Committee (ASC), which ran a variation of the Challenge Cup in 1865–66. With input from other clubs, the rules underwent several minor revisions, establishing a uniform code known as "Victorian rules". In 1866, the "first distinctively Victorian rule", the running bounce, was formalised at a meeting of club delegates chaired by H. C. A. Harrison, an influential pioneer who took up football in 1859 at the invitation of Wills, his cousin.

The game around this time was defensive and low-scoring, played low to the ground in congested rugby-style scrimmages. The typical match was a 20-per-side affair, played with a ball that was roughly spherical, and lasted until a team scored two goals. The shape of the playing field was not standardised; matches often took place in rough, tree-spotted public parks, most notably the Richmond Paddock (Yarra Park), known colloquially as the Melbourne Football Ground. Wills argued that the turf of cricket fields would benefit from being trampled upon by footballers in winter, and, as early as 1859, football was allowed on the MCG. However, cricket authorities frequently prohibited football on their grounds until the 1870s, when they saw an opportunity to capitalise on the sport's growing popularity. Football gradually adapted to an oval-shaped field, and most grounds in Victoria expanded to accommodate the dual purpose—a situation that continues to this day.

Spread to other colonies
Football became organised in South Australia in 1860 with the formation of the Adelaide Football Club, the oldest football club in Australia outside Victoria. It devised its own rules, and, along with other Adelaide-based clubs, played a variety of codes until 1876, when they uniformly adopted most of the Victorian rules, with South Australian football pioneer Charles Kingston noting their similarity to "the old Adelaide rules". Similarly, Tasmanian clubs quarrelled over different rules until they adopted a slightly modified version of the Victorian game in 1879. The South Australian Football Association (SAFA), the sport's first governing body, formed on 30 April 1877, firmly establishing Victorian rules as the preferred code in that colony. The Victorian Football Association (VFA) formed the following month.

Clubs began touring the colonies in the late 1870s, and in 1879 the first intercolonial match took place in Melbourne between Victoria and South Australia. To standardise the sport across Australia, delegates representing the football associations of South Australia, Tasmania, Victoria and Queensland met in 1883 and updated the code. New rules such as holding the ball led to a "golden era" of fast, long-kicking and high-marking football in the 1880s, a time which also saw players such as George Coulthard achieve superstardom, as well as the rise of professionalism, particularly in Victoria and Western Australia, where the code took hold during a series of gold rushes. Likewise, when New Zealand experienced a gold rush, the sport arrived with a rapid influx of Australian miners. Now known as Australian rules or Australasian rules, the sport became the first football code to develop mass spectator appeal, attracting world record attendances for sports viewing and gaining a reputation as "the people's game".

Australian rules football reached Queensland and New South Wales as early as 1866; the sport experienced a period of dominance in the former, and in the latter, several regions remain strongholds of Australian rules, such as the Riverina. However, by the late 1880s, rugby football had become the dominant code in both colonies, as well as in New Zealand. This shift was largely due to rugby's spread with British migration, regional rivalries and the lack of strong local governing bodies. In the case of Sydney, denial of access to grounds, the influence of university headmasters from Britain who favoured rugby, and the loss of players to other codes inhibited the game's growth.

Emergence of the VFL
In 1896, delegates from six of the wealthiest VFA clubs—Carlton, Essendon, Fitzroy, Geelong, Melbourne and South Melbourne—met to discuss the formation of a breakaway professional competition. Later joined by Collingwood and St Kilda, the clubs formed the Victorian Football League (VFL), which held its inaugural season in 1897. The VFL's popularity grew rapidly as it made several innovations, such as instituting a finals system, reducing teams from 20 to 18 players, and introducing the behind as a score. Richmond and University joined the VFL in 1908, and by 1925, with the addition of Hawthorn, Footscray and North Melbourne, it had become the preeminent league in the country and would take a leading role in many aspects of the sport.

Interstate football and the World Wars
The time around the federation of the Australian colonies in 1901 saw Australian rules undergo a revival in New South Wales, New Zealand and Queensland. In 1903, both the Queensland Australian Football League and the NSW Australian Football Association were established, and in New Zealand, as it moved towards becoming a dominion, leagues were also established in the major cities. This renewed popularity helped encourage the formation of the Australasian Football Council, which in 1908 in Melbourne staged the first national interstate competition, the Jubilee Australasian Football Carnival, with teams representing each state and New Zealand.

The game was also established early on in the new territories. In the new national capital Canberra both soccer and rugby had a head start, but following the first matches in 1911, Australian rules football in the Australian Capital Territory became a major participation sport. By 1981 it had become much neglected and quickly lagged behind the other football codes. Australian rules football in the Northern Territory began shortly after the outbreak of the war in 1916 with the first match in Darwin. The game went on to become the most popular sport in the Territory and build the highest participation rate for the sport nationally.

Both World War I and World War II had a devastating effect on Australian football and on Australian sport in general. While scratch matches were played by Australian "diggers" in remote locations around the world, the game lost many of its great players to wartime service. Some clubs and competitions never fully recovered. Between 1914 and 1915, a proposed hybrid code of Australian football and rugby league, the predominant code of football in New South Wales and Queensland, was trialled without success. In Queensland, the state league went into recess for the duration of the war. VFL club University left the league and went into recess due to severe casualties. The WAFL lost two clubs and the SANFL was suspended for one year in 1916 due to heavy club losses. The Anzac Day match, the annual game between Essendon and Collingwood on Anzac Day, is one example of how the war continues to be remembered in the football community.

The role of the Australian National Football Council (ANFC) was primarily to govern the game at a national level and to facilitate interstate representative and club competition. In 1968, the ANFC revived the Championship of Australia, a competition first held in 1888 between the premiers of the VFA and SAFA. Although clubs from other states were at times invited, the final was almost always between the premiers from the two strongest state competitions of the time—South Australia and Victoria—with Adelaide hosting most of the matches at the request of the SAFA/SANFL. The last match took place in 1976, with North Adelaide being the last non-Victorian winner in 1972. Between 1976 and 1987, the ANFC, and later the Australian Football Championships (AFC) ran a night series, which invited clubs and representative sides from around the country to participate in a knock-out tournament parallel to the premiership seasons, which Victorian sides still dominated.

With the lack of international competition, state representative matches were regarded with great importance. Due in part to the VFL poaching talent from other states, Victoria dominated interstate matches for three-quarters of a century. State of Origin rules, introduced in 1977, stipulated that rather than representing the state of their adopted club, players would return to play for the state they were first recruited in. This instantly broke Victoria's stranglehold over state titles and Western Australia and South Australia began to win more of their games against Victoria. Both New South Wales and Tasmania scored surprise victories at home against Victoria in 1990.

Towards a national league
The term "Barassi Line", named after VFL star Ron Barassi, was coined by scholar Ian Turner in 1978 to describe the "fictitious geographical barrier" separating the rugby-following parts of New South Wales and Queensland from the rest of the country, where Australian football reigned. It became a reference point for the expansion of Australian football and for establishing a national league.

The way the game was played had changed dramatically due to innovative coaching tactics, with the phasing out of many of the game's kicking styles and the increasing use of handball; while presentation was influenced by television.

In 1982, in a move that heralded big changes within the sport, one of the original VFL clubs, South Melbourne, relocated to Sydney and became known as the Sydney Swans. In the late 1980s, due to the poor financial standing of many of the Victorian clubs, and a similar situation existing in Western Australia in the sport, the VFL pursued a more national competition. Two more non-Victorian clubs, West Coast and Brisbane, joined the league in 1987 generating more than $8 million in license revenue for the Victorian clubs and increasing broadcast revenues which helped the Victorian clubs survive. In their early years, the Sydney and Brisbane clubs struggled both on and off-field because the substantial TV revenues they generated by playing on a Sunday went to the VFL. To protect these revenues the VFL granted significant draft concessions and financial aid to keep the expansion clubs competitive.

The VFL changed its name to the Australian Football League (AFL) for the 1990 season, and over the next decade, three non-Victorian clubs gained entry: Adelaide (1991), Fremantle (1995) and the SANFL's Port Adelaide (1997), the only pre-existing club outside Victoria to join the league. In 2011 and 2012, respectively, two new non-Victorian clubs were added to the competition: Gold Coast and Greater Western Sydney. The AFL, currently with 18 member clubs, is the sport's elite competition and most powerful body. Following the emergence of the AFL, state leagues were quickly relegated to a second-tier status. The VFA merged with the former VFL reserves competition in 1998, adopting the VFL name. State of Origin also declined in importance, especially after an increasing number of player withdrawals. The AFL turned its focus to the annual International Rules Series against Ireland in 1998 before abolishing State of Origin the following year. State and territorial leagues still contest interstate matches, as do AFL Women players.

In the 2010s, the AFL signalled further attempts at expanding into markets outside Australian football's traditional heartlands by hosting home-and-away matches in New Zealand, followed by China. After several failed bids since the early 1990s for a Tasmania-based AFL team, the Tasmania Football Club secured the 19th AFL license in 2023, and is set to compete by 2028.

Players and equipment
In a standard match, a team may consist of anywhere between 14 and 18 players who may be permitted on the playing surface at any given time. Each team may have up to four interchange (reserve) players who may be swapped for those on the field at any time during the game. Although some leagues in less populated areas may use as few as 12 players. In addition, some leagues notably including the AFL, have each team designate one additional player as a substitute who can be used to make a single permanent exchange of players during a game for either medical or tactical reasons.

Players on the playing surface can be swapped with those on the interchange bench at any time. They must though pass through a designated "Interchange Area". In the event a player fails to pass through this area correctly, or if too many players from one team are found to be on the ground at a time, a free kick will be awarded to the opposing side.

While there is no set uniform, the basic equipment for Australian football consists of a guernsey, shorts, socks and boots, with additional pieces of apparel such as headbands and gloves additionally being permitted. Players may wear certain pieces of protective equipment, such as helmets or arm guards, if approved by the relevant controlling body. Mouthguards are strongly recommended for all players.

Players are not permitted to wear jewellery, or other materials which the field umpire has deemed to be either potentially dangerous or increase the risk of injury to other players.

Ball
Australian rules football is played with an ellipsoid ball, between 72 and 73 cm in long circumference, and 54.5 and 55.5 cm in short circumference. For women's competitions, a smaller ball size of 69 and 53 cm is used. The ball must be inflated to a pressure of 69 kPa. There are no defined laws regarding what material a ball must be made from, but standard AFL match-used balls are produced by Sherrin using cowhide leather.

While there is no standard colour of the ball, red and yellow are most common and the only colours used at AFL level. Yellow is used for games beginning after 3 pm or in an enclosed stadium, due to its greater visibility, and to assist score reviews.

Field

Unlike other forms of football which are played on rectangular fields, Australian rules football playing fields are oval-shaped, and are between 135 and 185 m long and 110 and 155 m wide.

At either end of the field, two sets of posts are erected in a straight line to indicate the scoring areas on the field, each with two kinds of posts, named the goal posts and the behind posts respectively. The goal posts are placed first, located 6.4 m apart from each other, with a behind post being placed a further 6.4 metres to the side of each goal post. The name for the field line between two goal posts is known as the Goal Line.

Around the perimeter of the field, two white lines are drawn between the set of behind posts in an arc-shape, marking the field of play.

Other field markings include:
 * An arc drawn 50 m from either end of the playing surface, known as the fifty metre arc.
 * A 50 x 50 m square located in the centre of the playing surface, known as the centre square.
 * A 10 x 10 m circle located in the centre of the playing surface, known as the centre circle
 * A rectangle drawn at either end of the ground, measuring 9 m out from each pair of goal posts. This is known as the goal square.

The 50m arcs, centre square, centre circle and goal square are used at the beginning of each quarter or after each goal. With each team permitted a maximum of six players in each 50m arc, with one in the goal square and four players in the centre square with one in the centre circle. If this is breached, a free kick is awarded.

Match duration
A game lasts for 80 minutes, split into four-quarters consisting of 20 minutes playing time, with the clock being stopped for stoppages in play such as scores, or at the umpire's discretion, e.g. for serious injury. Leagues may choose to employ shorter quarters of play at their discretion, such as the AFLW using 17 minutes per quarter.

For any given match, two timekeepers are appointed to officiate the duration. The timekeepers record all relevant statistics for the match, such as total quarter duration and score by each team. Additionally timekeepers are required to sound a siren prior to and at the conclusion of each quarter until such time they are acknowledged by the field umpires. To stop and recommence the clock, the field umpires are required to signal to the timekeepers to indicate when the clock should be stopped or restarted.

Between each quarter, a break is observed to allow players a rest period. Two six-minute breaks are observed between the first and second quarters, and the third and fourth quarters. A longer 20-minute break is observed between the second and third quarter, commonly known as half-time.

Officiation
Each game is officiated by at least five match officials, known as an umpire. These match officials are placed into three categories based upon their roles and responsibilities, with varying minimum numbers of Umpires required depending on position:

 * Field umpire: Field umpires are positioned within the playing area contained within the Boundary Lines, and are the primary match officials. A minimum of one field umpire is required to officiate the match, though it is common practice to employ more to reduce physical demand on individual umpires, and improve officiation quality.
 * Boundary umpires: Boundary umpires are positioned along the two boundary lines upon either side of the field. Their primary duties include determining when the football is deemed to be outside of the field of play, and to throw the football back into play when directed. A minimum of two boundary umpires are required for a match.
 * Goal umpires: Goal umpires are positioned at either end of the ground, with one stationed at either set of goal posts on the field. Their primary duties include judging what scores made by players, signalling scores, and recording scores made by each team during a match. A minimum of two goal umpires are required for a match.

At AFL level, a video score review system is utilised. Only umpires are permitted to request a review, and only scoring shots and potential scoring shots are permitted to be reviewed.

Ball movement
An Australian rules football may only be propelled forward in a select few ways as defined by the Laws of Australian Football, published by the AFL. The ball can be propelled in any direction by way of a kick or a clenched fist (called a handball)—deemed a correct disposal. Failure to dispose of the ball in one of these two methods will result in a free kick to the opposing team. If the ball is not currently in a player's possession, it can be moved legally through the usage of other means, such as punching. While in possession of the ball, players may run with the ball, but are required to either bounce or touch the ball on the ground at least once every 15 m.

Tackling
Tackling is a technique employed by players used to force opposition players to dispose of the ball when they are in possession. Failure to dispose of the ball when legally tackled may see the player penalised for 'holding the ball', except if the umpire deems there was a lack of prior opportunity to do so.

The ball carrier may only be tackled between the shoulders and knees from the front or side. If the player forcefully contacts the opposing in the back while performing a tackle, the opposition player will be penalised for a push in the back. If the opposition tackles the player with possession below the knees (a low tackle or a trip) or above the shoulders (a high tackle), the team with possession of the football gets a free kick. Furthermore, tackles deemed to be dangerous by the umpire and those conducted from front-on while an opposition player has their head over the football are deemed to be prohibited contact, and will incur a free kick against the offending player.

Additionally, players may perform a technique known shepherding when the ball is within 5 m of an opposition player. Shepherding involves the use of a player's body to push, bump or otherwise block an opposition player, providing they do not have possession of the ball.

Marking
If a player takes possession of the ball that has travelled more than 15 m from another player's kick, by way of a catch within the field of play, it is deemed as a mark. Upon a mark being taken, one opposition player may choose to stand on the point on the field where the mark was taken, known as "the mark". When a mark is taken, a small protected zone is established on the field, extending 10 m either side of "the mark" and the player who marked the ball, with a small protected corridor between "the mark" and the player. The opposition player is permitted to jump, but is not allowed to move from their position on "the mark". Any other movements result in a 50-metre penalty. The player who was awarded the mark may then choose to either dispose of the ball over "the mark" or may choose to attempt disposal via a different method, in which case the field umpire will call "play on"—a verbal instruction to continue play. "Play on" may also be called if the umpire deems the player awarded the mark to be taking an unreasonable amount of time to dispose of the football.

Once the player has disposed of the ball, or "play on" is called, normal play resumes.

Misconduct
In the event a player breaks a rule, a free kick is awarded to the opposing team, from the location that the misconduct occurred, or the ball's current location—whichever is closer to the team's scoring zone. As when a mark is taken, this location is called "the mark", and the same protections regarding the space apply.

In the event a player engages in unsportsmanlike conduct after a free kick has been awarded or a mark has been paid to the opposing team, the umpire may instead award a 50-metre penalty. When imposed, the field umpire will advance "the mark" an additional 50 m down the field or to the goal line, whichever is closer. Additional 50-metre penalties may be awarded if the behaviour continues after the initial penalty.

The laws of the game allow umpires to send off players for egregious foul play, although this law does not apply to the AFL and is largely only used at the local level.

Scoring
There are two types of scoring shots in Australian football: goals and behinds. A goal is worth six points, and is scored when the football is propelled between the goal posts and across the goal line at any height by way of a kick from the attacking team. It may touch the ground, but must not have been touched by any player from either team or a goalpost prior to crossing the goal line.

A behind is worth one point and is scored when:

 * The ball passes between a goal post and a behind post at any height.
 * If the ball hits a goal post.
 * If any player sends the ball across the goal or behind line by touching it with any part of the body other than a foot or lower leg.

A behind is also awarded to the team if the ball touches any part of an opposition player, including a foot, before passing across their goal or behind line. A free kick is awarded against any player who is deemed to have deliberately rushed a behind.

The team that has scored the most points at the end of play wins the game. If the scores are level on points at the end of play, then the game is a draw; extra time applies only during finals matches in some competitions.

As an example of a score report, consider a match between Sydney and Geelong with the former as the home team. Sydney's score of 17 goals and 5 behinds equates to 107 points. Geelong's score of 10 goals and 17 behinds equates to a 77-point tally. Sydney wins the match by a margin of 30 points. Such a result would be written as:

 * "Sydney 17.5 (107) defeated Geelong 10.17 (77).

And spoken as:

 * "Sydney, seventeen-five, one hundred and seven, defeated Geelong, ten-seventeen, seventy-seven".

Additionally, it can be said that:

 * "Sydney defeated Geelong by 30 points".

The home team is typically listed first and the visiting side is listed second.

A draw would be written as:

 * "Greater Western Sydney 10.8 (68) drew with Geelong 10.8 (68)".

Structure and competitions
The football season proper is from March to August (early autumn to late winter in Australia) with finals being held in September and October. In the tropics, the game is sometimes played in the wet season (October to March).

The AFL is recognised by the Australian Sports Commission as being the National Sporting Organisation for Australian football. There are also seven state/territory-based organisations in Australia, all of which are affiliated with the AFL. These state leagues hold annual semi-professional club competitions, with some also overseeing more than one league. Local semi-professional or amateur organisations and competitions are often affiliated to their state organisations.

In 2002, the AFL became the de facto world governing body for Australian football when it pushed for the closure of the International Australian Football Council. There are also a number of affiliated organisations governing amateur clubs and competitions around the world.

For almost all Australian football club competitions, the aim is to win the Premiership. The premiership is typically decided by a finals series. The teams that occupy the highest positions on the ladder after the home-and-away season play-off in a "semi-knockout" finals series, culminating in a single Grand Final match to determine the premiers. Between four and eight teams contest a finals series, typically using the AFL final eight system or a variation of the McIntyre system. The team which finishes first on the ladder after the home-and-away season is referred to as a "minor premier", but this usually holds little stand-alone significance, other than receiving a better draw in the finals.

Some metropolitan leagues have several tiered divisions, with promotion of the lower division premiers and relegation of the upper division's last placed team at the end of each year.

Women and Australian football
The high level of interest shown by women in Australian football is considered unique among the world's football codes. It was the case in the 19th century, as it is in modern times, that women made up approximately half of total attendances at Australian football matches—a far greater proportion than, for example, the estimated 10 per cent of women that comprise British soccer crowds. This has been attributed in part to the egalitarian character of Australian football's early years in public parks where women could mingle freely and support the game in various ways.

In terms of participation, there are occasional 19th-century references to women playing the sport, but it was not until the 1910s that the first organised women's teams and competitions appeared. Women's state leagues emerged in the 1980s, and in 2013, the AFL announced plans to establish a nationally televised women's competition. Amidst a surge in viewing interest and participation in women's football, the AFL pushed the founding date of the competition, named AFL Women's, to 2017. Eight AFL clubs won licences to field sides in its inaugural season. By the seventh season, which began in August 2022, all 18 clubs fielded a women's side.

Variations and related sports
Many related games have emerged from Australian football, mainly with variations of contact to encourage greater participation. These include Auskick (played by children aged between 5 and 12), kick-to-kick (and its variants end-to-end footy and marks up), rec footy, 9-a-side footy, masters Australian football, handball and longest-kick competitions. Players outside Australia sometimes engage in related games adapted to available fields, like metro footy (played on gridiron fields) and Samoa rules (played on rugby fields). One such prominent example in use since 2018 is AFLX, a shortened variation of the game with seven players a side, played on a soccer-sized pitch.

International rules football
The similarities between Australian football and the Irish sport of Gaelic football have allowed for the creation of a hybrid code known as international rules football. The first international rules matches were contested in Ireland during the 1967 Australian Football World Tour. Since then, various sets of compromise rules have been trialed, and in 1984 the International Rules Series commenced with national representative sides selected by Australia's state leagues (later by the AFL) and the Gaelic Athletic Association (GAA). The competition became an annual event in 1998, but was postponed indefinitely in 2007 when the GAA pulled out due to Australia's severe and aggressive style of play. It resumed in Australia in 2008 under new rules to protect the player with the ball.

Global reach
During the colonial period, Australian rules was sometimes referred to as Australasian rules, reflecting its popularity in New Zealand. The game was played outside Australasia as early as 1888 when Australians studying at Edinburgh University and London University formed teams and competed in London. By the early 20th century, it had spread with the Australian diaspora to South Africa, the United States and other parts of the Anglosphere; however this growth went into rapid decline during and after World War I, leading also to a decades long hiatus in New Zealand. After World War II, it experienced growth in the Pacific region, particularly in Papua New Guinea and Nauru, where Australian football is now the national sport.

Today, the sport is played at an amateur level in various countries throughout the world. Twenty-three countries have participated in the International Cup, the highest level of international competition, held triennially in Australia since 2002. Nine countries have also participated in the AFL Europe Championship with both competitions prohibiting Australian players. A fan of the sport since attending school in Victoria, King Charles is the Patron of AFL Europe. In 2013, participation across AFL Europe's 21 member nations was more than 5,000 players, the majority of which are European nationals rather than Australian expats. The sport also has a growing presence in India. Over 20 countries have either affiliation or working agreements with the AFL.

Most present-day international amateur clubs and leagues are based in North America, Europe and Asia, with the oldest typically having originated in the 1980s. That decade, the sport developed a cult following in the United States when matches were broadcast on the fledgling ESPN network. Growing international interest has been assisted by exhibition matches, players switching between football codes, and Australia's multicultural makeup. Many VFL/AFL players were born overseas, with a growing number recruited through various initiatives. One notable example is the Irish experiment, which, since the 1980s, has seen many Gaelic footballers leave the amateur GAA to play Australian rules professionally.

Although Australian rules football is not an Olympic sport, it was showcased at the MCG as part of the 1956 Summer Olympics, held in Melbourne. In addition, when Brisbane hosted the 1982 Commonwealth Games, an exhibition match was held at the Gabba.

Cultural impact and popularity
Australian football has attracted more overall interest among Australians than any other football code, and, when compared with all sports throughout the nation, has consistently ranked first in the winter reports, and third behind cricket and swimming in summer. Over 1,057,572 fans were paying members of AFL clubs in 2019. The 2021 AFL Grand Final was the year's most-watched television broadcast in Australia, with an in-home audience of up to 4.11 million.

In 2019, there were 1,716,276 registered participants in Australia including 586,422 females (34 per cent of the overall total) and more than 177,000 registered outside Australia including 79,000 females (45 per cent of the overall total).

In the arts and popular culture
Australian football has inspired many literary works, from poems by C. J. Dennis and Peter Goldsworthy, to the fiction of Frank Hardy and Kerry Greenwood. Historians Manning Clarke and Geoffrey Blainey have also written extensively on the sport. Slang within Australian football has impacted Australian English more broadly, with a number of expressions taking on new meanings in non-sporting contexts, e.g., to "get a guernsey" is to gain recognition or approval, while "shirt-fronting" someone is to accost them.

In 1889, Australian impressionist painter Arthur Streeton captured football games en plein air for the 9 by 5 Impression Exhibition, titling one work The National Game. Paintings by Sidney Nolan (Footballer, 1946) and John Brack (Three of the Players, 1953) helped to establish Australian football as a serious subject for modernists, and many Aboriginal artists have explored the game, often fusing it with the mythology of their region. In cartooning, WEG's VFL/AFL premiership posters—inaugurated in 1954—have achieved iconic status among Australian football fans. Australian football statues can be found throughout the country, some based on famous photographs, among them Haydn Bunton Sr.'s leap, Jack Dyer's charge and Nicky Winmar lifting his jumper. In the 1980s, a group of postmodern architects based in Melbourne began incorporating references to Australian football into their buildings, an example being Building 8 by Edmond and Corrigan.

Dance sequences based on Australian football feature heavily in Robert Helpmann's 1964 ballet The Display, his first and most famous work for the Australian Ballet. The game has also inspired well-known plays such as And the Big Men Fly (1963) by Alan Hopgood and David Williamson's The Club (1977), which was adapted into a 1980 film, directed by Bruce Beresford. Mike Brady's 1979 hit "Up There Cazaly" is considered an Australian football anthem, and references to the sport can be found in works by popular musicians, from singer-songwriter Paul Kelly to the alternative rock band TISM. Many Australian football video games have been released, most notably the AFL series.

Australian Football Hall of Fame
For the centenary of the VFL/AFL in 1996, the Australian Football Hall of Fame was established. That year, 136 significant figures across the various competitions were inducted into the Hall of Fame. Each years since the creation of the Hall of Fame, a panel selects a small group of players they deem worthy for this prestigious honour, resulting in a total number of more than 300 inductees as of 2024.

In addition to the Hall of Fame, select members are chosen to receive the elite Legend status. Due to restrictions limiting the number of Legend status players to 10% of the total number of Hall of Fame inductees, there are currently only 32 players with the status in the Hall of Fame as of 2024.

title: Australian rules football


text:
Aon (company)

Aon plc is a British-American professional services and management consulting firm that offers a range of risk-mitigation products. Aon has approximately 50,000 employees across 120 countries.

Founded in Chicago by Patrick Ryan, Aon was created in 1982 when the Ryan Insurance Group merged with the Combined Insurance Company of America. In 1987, that company was renamed Aon from aon, a Gaelic word meaning "one". The company is globally headquartered in London with its North America operations based in Chicago at the Aon Center. Aon is listed on the New York Stock Exchange under AON with a market cap of $65 billion in April 2023.

History
W. Clement Stone's mother bought a small Detroit insurance agency, and in 1918 brought her son into the business. Mr. Stone sold low-cost, low-benefit accident insurance, underwriting and issuing policies on-site. The next year he founded his own agency, the Combined Registry Co.

As the Great Depression began, Stone reduced his workforce and improved training. Forced by his son's respiratory illness to winter in the South, Stone moved to Arkansas and Texas. In 1939 he bought American Casualty Insurance Co. of Dallas, Texas. It was consolidated with other purchases as the Combined Insurance Co. of America in 1947. The company continued through the 1950s and 1960s, continuing to sell health and accident policies. In the 1970s, Combined expanded overseas despite being hit hard by the recession.

In 1982, after 10 years of stagnation under Clement Stone Jr., the elder Stone, then 79, resumed control until the completion of a merger with Ryan Insurance Co. allowed him to transfer control to Patrick Ryan. Ryan, the son of a Ford dealer in Wisconsin and a graduate of Northwestern University, had started his company as an auto credit insurer in 1964. In 1976, the company bought the insurance brokerage units of the Esmark conglomerate. Ryan focused on insurance brokering and added more upscale insurance products. He also trimmed staff and took other cost-cutting measures, and in 1987 he changed Combined's name to Aon. In 1992, he bought Dutch insurance broker Hudig-Langeveldt. In 1995, the company sold its remaining direct life insurance holdings to General Electric to focus on consulting.

Aon built a global presence through purchases. In 1997, it bought The Minet Group, as well as insurance brokerage Alexander & Alexander Services, Inc. in a deal that made Aon (temporarily) the largest insurance broker worldwide. The firm made no US buys in 1998, but doubled its employee base with purchases including Spain's largest retail insurance broker, Gil y Carvajal, and the formation of Aon Korea.

Responding to industry demands, Aon announced its new fee disclosure policy in 1999, and the company reorganised to focus on buying personal line insurance firms and to integrate its acquisitions. That year it bought Nikols Sedgwick Group, an Italian insurance firm, and formed RiskAttack (with Zurich US), a risk analysis and financial management concern aimed at technology companies. The cost of integrating its numerous purchases, however, hammered profits in 1999.

Despite its troubles, in 2000 Aon bought Reliance Group's accident and health insurance business, as well as Actuarial Sciences Associates, a compensation and employee benefits consulting company. Later in that year, however, the company decided to cut 6% of its workforce as part of a restructuring effort. In 2003, the company saw revenues increase primarily because of rate hikes in the insurance industry. Also that year, Endurance Specialty, a Bermuda-based underwriting operation that Aon helped to establish in November 2001 along with other investors, went public. The next year Aon sold most of its holdings in Endurance.

In the late 2007, Aon announced the divestiture of its underwriting business. With this move, the firm sold off its two major underwriting subsidiaries: Combined Insurance Company of America (acquired by ACE Limited for $2.4 billion) and Sterling Life Insurance Company (purchased by Munich Re Group for $352 million). The low margin and capital-intensive nature of the underwriting industry was the primary reason for the firm's decision to divest.

This growth strategy manifested in November 2008 when Aon announced it had acquired reinsurance intermediary and capital advisor Benfield Group Limited for $1.75 billion. The acquisition amplified the firm's broking capabilities, positioning Aon one of the largest players in the reinsurance brokerage industry.

In 2010, Aon made its most significant acquisition to date with the purchase of Hewitt Associates for $4.9 billion. Aside from drastically boosting Aon's human resources consulting capacity and entering the firm into the business process outsourcing industry, the move added 23,000 colleagues and more than $3 billion in revenue.

In January 2012, Aon announced that its headquarters would be moved to London, although North American operations and jobs remained in Chicago.

On 10 February 2017, Aon announced that it was selling its employee benefits outsourcing business to private equity firm The Blackstone Group for US$4.8 billion (£3.8 billion).

In February 2020, Aon named Eric Andersen as president of Aon after co-president Michael O'Connor departed the company to pursue new opportunities. He will be reporting to Greg Case, the firm's CEO.

In June 2020, Aon announced it was planning to repay the temporary 20% pay cut from 70% of employees that was published in a statement in April 2020 regarding the COVID-19 pandemic. On 30 June 2020, Aon announced it would repay staff in full, plus 5% of the withheld amount.

In June 2020, Willis Towers Watson called its shareholders to two meetings to discuss its acquisition with Aon for August 26, 2020. It was revealed that the US Department of Justice has requested more information on the deal under antitrust rules.

September 11 attacks
Aon's New York offices were on the 92nd and 98th–105th floors of the South Tower of the World Trade Center at the time of the September 11 attacks. When the North Tower was struck by American Airlines Flight 11 at 8:46 a.m., an evacuation of Aon's offices was quickly initiated by executive Eric Eisenberg, and 924 of the estimated 1,100 Aon employees present at the time managed to get below the 77th floor before United Airlines Flight 175 crashed between Floors 77 and 85 at 9:03 a.m.

Many, however, did not manage to get beneath in the 17 minutes they had between the two impacts. As a result, 176 employees of Aon were killed in the crash or died in the eventual collapse of the tower or from smoke inhalation. At 9:59 a.m., the tower finally collapsed, killing any survivors still within, including Eisenberg and Kevin Cosgrove.

Spitzer investigation
In 2004–2005, Aon, along with other brokers including Marsh & McLennan and Willis, fell under regulatory investigation under New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer and other state attorneys general. At issue was the practice of insurance companies' payments to brokers (known as contingent commissions). The payments were thought to bring a conflict of interest, swaying broker decisions on behalf of carriers, rather than customers. In the spring of 2005, without acknowledging any wrongdoing, Aon agreed to a $190 million settlement, payable over 30 months.

UK regulatory breach
In January 2009, Aon was fined £5.69 million in the UK by the Financial Services Authority, who stated that the fine related to the company's inadequate bribery and corruption controls, claiming that between 14 January 2005 and 30 September 2007 Aon had failed to properly assess the risks involved in its dealings with overseas firms and individuals. The Authority did not find that any money had actually made its way to illegal organisations. Aon qualified for a 30% discount on the fine as a result of its cooperation with the investigation. Aon said its conduct was not deliberate, adding it had since "significantly strengthened and enhanced its controls around the usage of third parties".

US Foreign Corrupt Practices Act violations
In December 2011, Aon Corporation paid a $16.26 million penalty to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission and the U.S. Department of Justice for violations of the US Foreign Corrupt Practices Act. According to the Securities and Exchange Commission, Aon's subsidiaries made improper payments of over $3.6 million to government officials and third-party facilitators in Costa Rica, Egypt, Vietnam, Indonesia, the United Arab Emirates, Myanmar and Bangladesh, between 1983 and 2007, to obtain and retain insurance contracts.

Major acquisitions
On 5 January 2007, Aon announced that its Aon Affinity group had acquired the WedSafe Wedding Insurance program.

On 22 August 2008, Aon announced that it had acquired London-based Benfield Group. The acquiring price was US$1.75 billion or £935 million, with US$170 million of debt.

On 5 March 2010, Hewitt Associates announced that it acquired Senior Educators Ltd. The acquisition offers companies a new way to address retiree medical insurance commitments.

On 12 July 2010, Aon announced that it had agreed to buy Lincolnshire, Illinois-based Hewitt Associates for $4.9 billion in cash and stock.

On 7 April 2011, Aon announced that it had acquired Johannesburg, South Africa-based Glenrand MIB. Financial terms were not disclosed.

On 19 July 2011, Aon announced that it bought Westfield Financial Corp., the owner of insurance-industry consulting firm Ward Financial Group, from Ohio Farmers Insurance Co. Financial terms were not disclosed.

On 22 October 2012, Aon announced that it agreed to buy OmniPoint, Inc, a Workday consulting firm. Financial terms were not disclosed.

On 16 June 2014, Aon announced that it agreed to buy National Flood Services, Inc., a large processor of flood insurance, from Stoneriver Group, L.P.

On 31 October 2016, Aon's Aon Risk Solutions completed acquisition of Stroz Friedberg LLC, a specialised risk management firm focusing on cybersecurity.

On 14 November 2016, Aon acquired CoCubes an online Indian Assessment firm, facilitating hiring of entry-level engineering graduates.

On 10 February 2017, Aon plc agreed to sell its human resources outsourcing platform for US$4.8 billion (£3.8 billion) to Blackstone Group L.P. (BX.N), creating a new company called Alight Solutions.

In September 2017, Aon announced its intent to purchase real estate investment management firm The Townsend Group from Colony NorthStar for $475 million, expanding Aon's property investment management portfolio.

On 9 March 2020, Aon announced its merger with Willis Towers Watson for nearly $30 billion in an all-stock deal that creates the world's largest insurance broker. As of 21 May 2020, Willis board was under probe over merger agreement with Aon. The deal was called off in July 2021.

In December 2023, Aon agreed to acquire NFP, a middle-market provider of risk, benefits, wealth and retirement plan advisory services company, for $13.4 billion.

In March 2024, Aon plc acquired the technology assets and intellectual property of Humn.ai, an AI-powered platform. This will enhance its commercial fleet proposition.

Manchester United
On 3 June 2009, it was reported that Aon had signed a four-year shirt sponsorship deal with English football giant Manchester United. On 1 June 2010, Aon replaced American insurance company AIG as the principal sponsor of the club. The Aon logo was prominently displayed on the front of the club's shirts until the 2014/2015 season when Chevrolet replaced them. The deal was said to be worth £80 million over four years, replacing United's deal with AIG as the most lucrative shirt deal in history at the time.

In April 2013, Aon signed a new eight-year deal with Manchester United to rename their training ground as the Aon Training Complex and sponsor the club's training kits, reportedly worth £180 million to the club.

Awards

 * Aon was awarded Investment Consultancy of the Year and Fiduciary Manager of the Year at the FT's 2014 Pension and Investment Provider Awards
 * Aon received a perfect score on the Human Rights Campaign's 2013 Corporate Equality Index
 * Aon was named to Working Mother's list of the 100 Best Companies for 2012
 * Aon Risk Solutions was the most recommended broker in 2012 for service and expertise by middle market buyers in Business Insurance's Buyers Choice Awards
 * Aon Risk Solutions was named Broker of the Year and Training Programme of the Year in 2012 by Insurance Times
 * Aon Benfield was named 2012 European Reinsurance Broker of the Year, Best European Property Reinsurance Broker and Best European Casualty Reinsurance Broker at the European Intelligent Insurer Awards
 * Aon Benfield was named Best Global Reinsurance Broking Company for Analytics at Reactions Global Awards 2012
 * Aon Hewitt was named Top Retirement Consultant of 2012 by PLANSPONSOR Magazine2
 * Aon Hewitt was named Actuarial and Investment Consultant of the Year for 2012 at the Professional Pensions Awards

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: Aon (company)


text:
Alban Berg

Alban Maria Johannes Berg (, ; 9 February 1885 – 24 December 1935) was an Austrian composer of the Second Viennese School. His compositional style combined Romantic lyricism with the twelve-tone technique. Although he left a relatively small oeuvre, he is remembered as one of the most important composers of the 20th century for his expressive style encompassing "entire worlds of emotion and structure".

Berg was born and lived in Vienna. He began to compose at the age of fifteen. He studied counterpoint, music theory and harmony with Arnold Schoenberg between 1904 and 1911, and adopted his principles of developing variation and the twelve-tone technique. Berg's major works include the operas Wozzeck (1924) and Lulu (1935, finished posthumously), the chamber pieces Lyric Suite and Chamber Concerto, as well as a Violin Concerto. He also composed a number of songs (lieder). He is said to have brought more "human values" to the twelve-tone system; his works are seen as more "emotional" than those of Schoenberg. His music had a surface glamour that won him admirers when Schoenberg himself had few.

Berg died from sepsis in 1935.

Early life
Berg was born in Vienna, the third of four children of Johanna and Konrad Berg. His father ran a successful export business, and the family owned several estates in Vienna and the countryside. The family's financial situation turned to the worse after the death of Konrad Berg in 1900, and it particularly affected young Berg, who had to repeat both his sixth and seventh grade to pass the exams. One of his closest lifelong friends and earliest biographer (under the pseudonym Hermann Herrenried), architect Hermann Watznauer, became a father figure (partly at Konrad's request), being ten years Berg's senior. Berg wrote him letters as long as thirty pages, often in florid, dramatic prose with idiosyncratic punctuation. Berg was more interested in literature than music as a child and would consider a career as a writer several times, turning to music slowly and at times unconfidently until the success of Wozzeck. He did not begin to compose until he was fifteen, when he started to teach himself music, although he did take piano lessons from his sister's governess. With Marie Scheuchl, a maid in the family estate of Berghof in Carinthia and fifteen years his senior, he fathered a daughter, Albine, born 4 December 1902.

In 1906 Berg met the singer Helene Nahowski (1885–1976), daughter of a wealthy family (rumoured to be in fact the illegitimate daughter of Emperor Franz Joseph I from his liaison with Anna Nahowski). Despite the outward hostility of her family, the couple married on 3 May 1911, although "her father insisted on a Protestant ceremony to facilitate the divorce he foresaw as inevitable."

Early works (1907–1914)
With little prior music education, Berg began studying counterpoint, music theory, and harmony under Arnold Schoenberg in October 1904. By 1906 he was studying music full-time; by 1907 he began composition lessons. His student compositions included five drafts for piano sonatas. He also wrote songs, including his Seven Early Songs (Sieben frühe Lieder), three of which were Berg's first publicly performed work in a concert that featured the music of Schoenberg's pupils in Vienna that year.

The early sketches eventually culminated in the Piano Sonata, Op. 1, published in 1910 and likely composed 1908–1909; it has been described as one of the most formidable "first" works ever written. Berg studied with Schoenberg for six years until 1911. Among Schoenberg's teachings was the idea that the unity of a musical composition depends upon all its aspects being derived from a single basic idea; this idea was later known as developing variation. Berg passed this on to his students, one of whom, Theodor W. Adorno, stated: "The main principle he conveyed was that of variation: everything was supposed to develop out of something else and yet be intrinsically different". The Piano Sonata is an example—the whole composition is derived from the work's opening quartal gesture and its opening phrase.

Berg was a part of Vienna's cultural elite during the heady fin de siècle period. His circle included the musicians Alexander von Zemlinsky and Franz Schreker, the painter Gustav Klimt, the writer and satirist Karl Kraus, the architect Adolf Loos, and the poet Peter Altenberg.

In 1913 two of Berg's Altenberg Lieder (1912) premiered in Vienna, conducted by Schoenberg in the infamous Skandalkonzert. Settings of aphoristic poetic utterances, the songs are accompanied by a very large orchestra. The performance caused a riot, and had to be halted. Berg effectively withdrew the work, and it was not performed in full until 1952. The full score remained unpublished until 1966.

Berg had a particular interest in the number 23, using it to structure several works. Various suggestions have been made as to the reason for this interest: that he took it from the biorhythms theory of Wilhelm Fliess, in which a 23-day cycle is considered significant, or because he first suffered an asthma attack on the 23rd of the month.

Wozzeck (1917–1924) and Lulu (1928–1929)
From 1915 to 1918 Berg served in the Austro-Hungarian Army. During a period of leave in 1917 he accelerated work on his first opera, Wozzeck. After the end of World War I, he settled again in Vienna, where he taught private pupils. He also helped Schoenberg run his Society for Private Musical Performances, which sought to create the ideal environment for the exploration and appreciation of unfamiliar new music by means of open rehearsals, repeat performances, and the exclusion of professional critics.

In 1924 three excerpts from Wozzeck were performed, which brought Berg his first public success. The opera, which Berg completed in 1922, was first performed on 14 December 1925, when Erich Kleiber conducted the first performance in Berlin. Today, Wozzeck is seen as one of the century's most important works. Berg made a start on his second opera, the three-act Lulu, in 1928 but interrupted the work in 1929 for the concert aria Der Wein which he completed that summer. Der Wein presaged Lulu in a number of ways, including vocal style, orchestration, design and text.

Other well-known Berg compositions include the Lyric Suite (1926), which was later shown to employ elaborate cyphers to document a secret love affair; the post-Mahlerian Three Pieces for Orchestra (completed in 1915 but not performed until after Wozzeck); and the Chamber Concerto (Kammerkonzert, 1923–25) for violin, piano, and 13 wind instruments: this latter is written so conscientiously that Pierre Boulez has called it "Berg's strictest composition" and it, too, is permeated by cyphers and posthumously disclosed hidden programs. It was at this time he began exhibiting tone clusters in his works after meeting with American avant-garde composer Henry Cowell, with whom he would eventually form a lifelong friendship.

Final years (1930–1935)

Life for the musical world was becoming increasingly difficult in the 1930s both in Vienna and Germany due to the rising tide of antisemitism and the Nazi cultural ideology that denounced modernity. Even to have an association with someone who was Jewish could lead to denunciation, and Berg's "crime" was to have studied with the Jewish composer Arnold Schoenberg. Berg found that opportunities for his work to be performed in Germany were becoming rare, and eventually his music was proscribed and placed on the list of degenerate music.

In 1932 Berg and his wife acquired an isolated lodge, the Waldhaus on the southern shore of the Wörthersee, near Schiefling am See in Carinthia, where he was able to work in seclusion, mainly on Lulu and the Violin Concerto. At the end of 1934, Berg became involved in the political intrigues around finding a replacement for Clemens Krauss as director of the Vienna State Opera.

As more of the performances of his work in Germany were cancelled by the Nazis, who had come to power in early 1933, he needed to ensure the new director would be an advocate for modernist music. Originally, the premiere of Lulu had been planned for the Berlin State Opera, where Erich Kleiber continued to champion his music and had conducted the premiere of Wozzeck in 1925, but now this was looking increasingly uncertain, and Lulu was rejected by the Berlin authorities in the spring of 1934. Kleiber's production of the Lulu symphonic suite on 30 November 1934 in Berlin was also the occasion of his resignation in protest at the extent of conflation of culture with politics. Even in Vienna, the opportunities for the Vienna School of musicians were dwindling.

Berg had interrupted the orchestration of Lulu because of an unexpected (and financially much-needed) commission from the Russian-American violinist Louis Krasner for a Violin Concerto (1935). This profoundly elegiac work, composed at unaccustomed speed and posthumously premiered, has become one of Berg's frequently performed compositions. Like much of his mature work, it employs an idiosyncratic adaptation of Schoenberg's "dodecaphonic" or twelve-tone technique, that enables the composer to produce passages openly evoking tonality, including quotations from historical tonal music, such as a Bach chorale and a Carinthian folk song. The Violin Concerto was dedicated "to the memory of an Angel", Manon Gropius, the deceased daughter of architect Walter Gropius and Alma Mahler.

Death
Berg died aged 50 in Vienna, on Christmas Eve 1935, from blood poisoning apparently caused by a furuncle on his back, induced by an insect sting that occurred in November. He was buried at the Hietzing Cemetery in Vienna.

Before he died, Berg had completed the orchestration of only the first two of the three acts of Lulu. The completed acts were successfully premièred in Zürich in 1937. For personal reasons Helene Berg subsequently imposed a ban on any attempt to "complete" the final act, which Berg had in fact completed in short score. An orchestration was therefore commissioned in secret from Friedrich Cerha and premièred in Paris (under Pierre Boulez) only in 1979, soon after Helene Berg's own death.

Legacy

Berg is remembered as one of the most important composers of the 20th century and the most widely performed opera composer among the Second Viennese School. He is said to have brought more "human values" to the twelve-tone system, his works seen as more "emotional" than Schoenberg's. Critically, he is seen as having preserved the Viennese tradition in his music.

Berg scholar Douglas Jarman writes in The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians that "[as] the 20th century closed, the 'backward-looking' Berg suddenly came as [George] Perle remarked, to look like its most forward-looking composer."

The Alban Berg Foundation, founded by the composer's widow in 1969, cultivates the memory and works of the composer, and awards scholarships. The Alban Berg Monument, situated next to the Vienna State Opera and unveiled in 2016, was funded by the Foundation.

The Alban Berg Quartett was a string quartet named after him, active from 1971 until 2008.

The asteroid 4528 Berg is named after him (1983).

Major compositions
Piano
 * Piano Sonata, Op. 1

 * String Quartet, Op. 3
 * Lyric Suite, string quartet
 * Chamber Concerto (1925) for piano, violin and 13 wind instruments

Orchestral
 * Three Pieces for Orchestra, Op. 6
 * Violin Concerto

Vocal
 * Seven Early Songs
 * Vier Lieder (Four Songs), Op. 2
 * Five Orchestral Songs on Postcard Texts of Peter Altenberg, Op. 4
 * Der Wein
 * Schließe mir die Augen beide

Operas
 * Wozzeck, Op. 7 (1925)
 * Lulu (1937)

title: Alban Berg