Congratulations!
You are here – the website of the Australian All-Terrain Bocce League, the spiritual home of the world’s greatest game.
Based on the action comic book of the same name, the AATBL was initially a TV show in black and white. Nowadays it has all the colour of the inside of a travel sickness bag and it brings together the world’s finest exponents of a game that requires the wisdom of Solomon, the cunning of a fox, the hide of a rhinoceros, the eye of a newt, the legs of a chair and balls of steel.
There are some who will tell you that the AATBL is merely a vehicle by which a select group of men can get together to drink beer wearing baggy shorts and shirts so tatty they can’t ordinarily be worn in public. Others will lie to you.
Based in Perth, Western Australia, the AATBL plays on Sunday afternoons in a “home and away” season from February to September, about once a month.
Being a reasonably egalitarian competition, we do not discriminate against any player regardless of how distasteful he may be. We even have a member who once worked in the Department of Sport and Recreation.
Everyone will make a prediction. Some poor souls may wear self-aggrandising T-shirts. Only one will take home Glory, and that’s only because it is a soccer team what don’t got no self respect. None at all. Play a man’s game for God’s sake.
For the last few seasons, the teams have been re-cast using “the blender” at the end of each season. Players’ names are put into the blender, to randomise the teams for the following season. For more details of the current teams, see News and Teams.
After eight years of playing as a teams-based league, the AATBL changed to a hybrid format in 2021 and now plays with a mix of teams and solo players.
Although it has been suggested that playing as a singleton offers an advantage because those in teams don’t have the advantage of warming up, that hypothesis isn’t supported by the results. Also, a team need only have one player turn up to a fixture, but if a singleton misses a fixture, he forfeits it.
With the 2024 AATBL season hurtling through space at a terrifying rate, the sporting world asks itself:
- Is it true that Mattel is bringing out a Motherchucker action figure? Consider the debate in the US about how to depict Elvis on a postage stamp; Will the Mochu figurine be the lithe one, or the somewhat fuller jumpsuit version?
- Did Serge have words with Stella for his no-show performance in Round 1?
- When did Brad last wear denim jeans to an AATBL fixture? Was it really 2007?
- With Stormballs being the only team in the top four after Round 1, can they maintain the rage?
- How long will it take Mochu to bring out the icecreams again?
- Does he really have a curse that prevents him from winning at Mrs Herbert’s park, or can it be explained by lack of skill?
- How long will in before there is another forfeit?
- Who will be the next AATBL interview candidate?
- Will this year’s AATBL presidential election be properly administered? Is there any substance to the rumours about President Motherchucker having somehow improperly influenced the 2023 result?
- Cannonball and SNHDT found themselves in unfamiliar territory at the end of Round 1, in that they had won two games on a day. Can they keep it up?
Countdown to next match: