WA Football to meet with AFL in search of $3 million grant to improve Indigenous representation

WA Football believes it has developed a solution to the AFL’s dramatic decline in Indigenous representation. ELIZA REILLY has the intel.

WA Football will hold key meetings with the AFL this week as it attempts to secure a $3 million grant to implement the findings of its talent review and address a dramatic decline in Indigenous representation.

League powerbrokers have started arriving in Perth for the Indigenous All Stars game at Optus Stadium on Saturday. With Indigenous participation in the spotlight, WA Football believes it has developed a solution following a comprehensive review of the state’s talent pathways. But it needs funding to make it a reality.

Indigenous players developed in Western Australia currently make up more than 40 per cent of all Indigenous players in the AFL.

Indigenous players in the WA state 18s team have reduced from 20 per cent to just five per cent in the past five years. That’s despite the fact that Indigenous participation in WA has never been stronger, making up 12.2 per cent of the 87,000 registered players.

Liam Ryan in the Indigenous All Stars guernsey. Picture: Getty Images

Nationally, the number of Indigenous players on AFL lists has dropped from 87 in 2020 to 63 in 2025.

Without a specific strategy to address the downturn, WA Football would risk a talent shortfall, given WA has been a breeding ground for Indigenous talent.

“If nearly half of your Indigenous players are coming from one state, it would make sense to invest more there and take the time to look at what’s going on,” WA Football chief executive Michael Roberts told Code Sports. “It shouldn’t actually be a massive fix because we have the pool of players there and they just need a helping hand to get to the next stage.

“The numbers at the pointy end of the pathway are declining at a rapid rate, whereas they’re actually growing at the base.

“WA plays such a big part in it. If we’re getting it right, the raw numbers show that it will ultimately benefit the AFL.

“The All Stars game is going to be great because it brings awareness. We want to make sure WA is recognised as a key component of fixing the problem of Indigenous player decline.

“We believe we’ve got a plan. We hope that the AFL can partner with us to solve this and break down that barrier of us being a stand-alone organisation.”

The AFL reported an underlying operating surplus of $45.4 million in 2024.

Roberts said that it would cost $3 million to implement all 39 findings of WA Football’s talent review, which revealed that 20 per cent of WA’s best talent is yet to be discovered and growing the size of the talent pool depends on equity and access.

Specific to Indigenous participation, the review found that WA Football needs to co-design the Indigenous talent pathways with the input of communities and elders.

“WA is such a big state,” Roberts said. “We can no longer rely on people making their way to Perth to be a part of the program.

“We need to make sure we have dedicated Indigenous people working in communities.

“What we’re hearing is that the football pathway, while it’s a dream for a lot of players, is taking players away from their communities. We need to show that you can combine both working and playing football and we don’t have the resources to do that.

West Australian Lance Franklin is one of the greatest players of all time. Picture: Phil Hillyard

“Kids come to Perth in their 17th or 18th year and we’re trying to cram everything into two years. They’re having to go to school, find a trade and develop their football skills.

“We need an environment where coaching and training is better in the regions so players can stay there longer.”

Roberts believes that the findings of WA’s talent review can also be implemented nationally.

Asked whether the AFL would consider financially supporting WA Football’s bid to improve Indigenous talent pathways, Executive General Manager of Social Policy and Inclusion Tanya Hosch said the industry first needs to understand the reasons for the drop-off.

“What I think we need to start with is really making sure that we fully understand why we are in the position we are in terms of playing numbers,” she said. “We’re definitely concerned about it.

“There’s a lot of attention being paid towards it at the moment and hopefully, we’ll come up with the right structures and frameworks and then we’ll apply the resources accordingly.

“No one has ever reached out for minuscule funding. But the reality is that it’s so important to the quality of the game and the values of the code that Aboriginal Torres Strait Islander players can see themselves represented in the game and can see it as a legitimate pathway if they have the talent.

“It’s all of our collective jobs to make sure that we put the right pathways in place to make that possible.”

Originally published as WA Football to meet with AFL in search of $3 million grant to improve Indigenous representation