AFLW superstar Daisy Pearce pregnant with twins
DAISY Pearce has never been one to do things by halves. Page 13 can reveal the face of women’s football is pregnant with twins.
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DAISY Pearce, the face of women’s football, is pregnant with twins.
The AFLW superstar and trailblazer has never been one to do things by halves.
The 30-year-old Melbourne Football Club captain has benched herself next season, with the babies kicking their way into the world around the same time as the AFLW’s season-opening bounce.
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“It’s wonderful news I’m pregnant and I’ve go the added bonus of having two babies because its twins,” Pearce told Page 13.
Picture: Scott Barbour/AFL Media/Getty Images
“I’ve always looked forward to being a mum and now that journey begins.
“It’s a bit to get your head around.
“It’s probably going to be the most rewarding thing we ever do.”
The Channel 7 fan favourite just hit the 12-week mark with partner, CFA firefighter Ben O’Neill.
It’s a life-affirming role for the midfielder, who was the first female to be drafted to an AFLW club.
Considered the best player in the country, Pearce has shown her dominance on and off the field and has kicked through the glass ceiling in the male-dominated sport.
She also broke through as the first female footy caller on blokey radio station Triple M.
“I have no doubt more women will get these opportunities in future,” she said at the time.
A country girl at heart, the self-confessed tomboy and sports nut was the only girl playing footy when growing up in Bright.
“I played football and dressed myself in boy’s clothes and hated tying my hair up, people would often confuse me for a boy,” she said. “I remember being a bit reluctant to tell people my name because a name like Daisy usually gave it away.”
Her Olinda pool room must be chock-a-block — Pearce has won the Victorian Football League’s best and fairest award, the Helen Lambert Medal, six times. Think the Brownlow for females.
She was the AFL’s first All-Australian women’s team captain in 2017 and was named All-Australian vice-captain and again the Demons’ best and fairest winner this year.
But Pearce, who wears the great Ron Barassi’s No. 31, will have no trouble swapping the Sherrin for motherhood.
Before becoming a gun footballer, she trained as an elite athlete while juggling her full-time career as a midwife at Box Hill Hospital. Having delivered close to 150 babies, the mother-to-be said her ambition was always to play footy full-time.
“Me and so many of the women and girls who play our sport are so passionate about the game. It would be great to do it full-time instead of spending Mondays doing rehab with a sore knee in a world of pain while bending to catch babies,” she said before being drafted.
Pearce put midwifery on hold to become a champion and put it best herself when accepting the 2015 best female player for the Dees.
She said people might start talking about “the mother-son rule, or the father-daughter rule”.
Her twins — boys, girls or one of each — could be on every club’s recruiting radar. It’s in their DNA.
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