The Carlton Football Club has kicked off its celebrations for the AFL’s Multicultural Round by welcoming the Centre for Multicultural Youth (CMY) and Adult Multicultural Education Service (AMES Australia) to Ikon Park. 

AMES Australia provides a range of comprehensive settlement support programs and services to migrants, refugees and asylum seekers while CMY provides a combination of specialist support services to remove the barriers young people face as they make Australia their home.

In an effort to combat social isolation for migrants and refugees, international students from CMY and recently arrived refugees and migrants from AMES Australia, were invited to the Blues’ home base where they were introduced to the game of AFL and taken on a tour of the team's facilities ahead of the 2017 Multicultural Round.

At this weekend’s clash with the Cats, Carlton will recognise the work of AMES Australia throughout the community, by having them acknowledged as the Blues Foundation’s Community Champion for Round 19 and inviting those who visited the Club during the week to form the team’s guard of honour before the match. 

Fans attending the game can expect to see the hashtag #ManyCulturesOneGame written on the field as well as bilingual messaging painted on the 50m arc to recognise the various cultures that make up Australian football. In a display of harmony, the umpires at each match will wear orange wristbands with orange goal flags to be used in place of the traditional white flags. 

Carlton will take on Geelong at Etihad Stadium on Saturday night from 7:25pm. Be there to be a part of the 2017 Multicultural Round celebration, purchase your tickets here.