South Metro juniors stripped of points over ineligible player

A South Metro junior football team has been “silenced” after a “really poor” league decision stripped them of premiership points, and dropped them from second place to last.

A junior footy team has been penalised enough premiership points to drop them from second to last on the ladder on the eve of finals, after they mistakenly fielded a junior who had played too many senior matches.

The volunteer team manager of the Port Melbourne South Melbourne Districts under-18 girls team made an error in not tracking the number of games the player was playing for another club in the VAFA competition.

The team been devastated by the penalty decided which they describe as “really poor” and “super unfair” from the South Metro Junior Football League.

The league could have informed the Bolts earlier or had a ‘red flag’ notice sent, the club said, so that the issue could have been resolved earlier.

It is believed multiple clubs in the junior league were affected, with both boy and girl teams in different age groups having premiership points taken away for ineligible players.

Bolts coach Melissa Kuys said the player who was ineligible “just loves footy” and was naive about the rules.

Players were given the news before the last home and away round of the season, in which the Bolts had a bye — a decision by the league that Kuys has labelled “really poor”.

“They need to get a system in place to stop these things happening,” she said.

“We don’t want to stop any footballer from playing any finals or in-season games.

‘This should have been red flagged weeks and weeks ago, not one week into finals.

“The system needs to be looked at. ... The repercussions of the whole team being affected by one player is just way too dramatic.”

“Knowing that it would take us from second place to the bottom? They really need to think about the repercussions of what’s going to happen going forward,” she said.

“We just want junior players to enjoy it but they’re kind of taking that away from them.”

It’s understood several other clubs in the league have been impacted by the same rule and have had premiership points removed.

Sources say all clubs in the South Metro division one under-18 competition had discussed and agreed that the ineligible Bolts player had not made enough of an impact on the result of games for any premiership points to be taken away.

Kuys says the decision to push the team out of finals was having a major impact on the players’ mental health, many of whom would not be playing another season of junior footy.

“This ending the way it is, I can see 50 to 40 per cent of these girls coming back and playing footy again,” she said.

“So it’s not just the ripple effect of missing out on finals, it’s the mental health and pushing girls out of the game.

“Mental health is the big one for me in keeping kids that love sport to stay in sport, and if this continues the way it is, they are going to lose players to that.

“I don’t think the league is thinking about the repercussions of the punishment.”

In response to the decision, the club brought in Play Like A Girl Australia founder Holly Bailey — who runs a leadership development program that guides the personal and professional journey of girls through sports — to speak with the players.

“Even herself (Bailey) coming out of the session, she said it was hard to watch so many young girls at the age of 16 and 17 so affected by this,” she said.

“Some of the girls have never played finals before and for some, it’s their last season of junior footy.

“It’s a full stop right there. They don’t know what they’re going to do right now and if they will play finals. They think it’s super unfair.”

The South Metro Football League was contacted for comment.