Jessica Wuetschner tells why it’s not easy being a female footballer

PLAYING with the Bulldogs was a dream come true but Jessica Wuetschner tells how hard it is to balance a normal work life around her goal of playing in the women’s national league.

Melbourne v Bulldogs Bulldogs player Jessica Wuetschner on her knees post game Picture:Wayne Ludbey

I HAVE played football for eight years, not counting the weekends of running around on the field at halftime for 20 years in Tasmania trying to prove that I can play, too.

Football is my life. I’ve planned around it for a long time, especially the past three years with East Fremantle in the WAWFL, Western Australia’s premier women’s football competition.

Playing with the Western Bulldogs in 2015 was my dream come true; now with the proposed national league — or. as I like to call it, the AFL — beginning in 2017, it’s time for me to take my experience with the Bulldogs and do everything I can to make it onto the elite stage.

Unfortunately, getting the chance to prove my ability at elite level is becoming increasingly difficult.

Juggling training, playing, nutrition and physical fitness with work, study, bills and everything life throws at you is made harder by the fact national league aspirants have to maintain an elite standard without support.

I suffered a pretty severe back injury with some nerve-related issues when I was playing with the Boston Lady Demons in America late last year.

We have a physio who sponsors us at the club who’s generally there only on match days and she provides her services to us for $70 a session. I’ve seen her three times already this pre-season and it’s going to take at least another two sessions to get my back right.

The pain affects my hamstrings so every time I run they tighten up and feel like they are going to snap. I haven’t been able run beyond 50 per cent of my top pace for a few months.

When I returned from the US, I wasn’t able to see a physiotherapist for about two months due to lack of work.

The injury will affect my season going into the first few rounds, at least.

Playing with the Western Bulldogs was a dream come true for Jessica Wuetschner.

Pushing through injury to meet a deadline is common for any elite level athlete in any sport, but the lack of support provided in comparison to other athletes means just getting the opportunity to prove myself is a big ask.

I work in marketing and sales work five days a week and often on Saturdays, as well, to make a bit of extra money. I leave home at 7.30am and get home at 6.30pm, so it doesn’t leave a whole lot of time to train, get conditioned and have my hands on the footy.

On top of working, I’m currently studying online for Cert 3 and 4 in fitness.

I pay about $350 in club fees, which is pretty standard for women playing footy throughout Australia, and then you have expenses such as camps, travel costs, gym membership and nutrition. It costs me about $1000 a year just to have the opportunity to play.

You see men with beer-bellies and a right foot no better than mine getting paid to play on a Sunday after a few beverages the night before. It’s not fair, and it must change.

It pains me to say it because I love football more than anything, but I have thought about giving the game away.

With work and travel, it’s a mental and physical strain just to get to training.

I’m just grateful that I have very giving and supportive parents who generally have helped me out and allowed me to play footy this season and stay here in Perth. If I didn’t have their support and the Regan family here in Perth, I wouldn’t be here.

The imbalance between the financial support given to talented males and females playing footy makes it nearly impossible to maintain an elite status.

I can’t put a pinpoint whose fault the discrepancy is, but it’s appalling, to be honest, that there are amateur male players around the country getting paid a couple of hundred dollars a weekend to play while females — who want to play in the national league and are branded as “elite” by the AFL — have no financial support.

It will become even harder if I do make an AFL list next year.

Jessica Wuetschner in full flight for East Fremantle. Picture: Getty Images

As far as we know, the competition will span three or four months. I’ve been in my new job only about six weeks now and taking three months off will be impossible. It’s certainly not a job I could continue to do and play in the national league.

You’ve got to be looking at earning $15,000-$20,000 for a three or four-month period of training and playing to be in a liveable situation, on top of assistance with housing, physio and other expenses vital for elite athletes in top competitions.

However, how much I would need to earn to make being a national league player plausible depends on the commitment the AFL requires of us throughout the year.

The AFL hasn’t been open with whether the national competition teams will be drafted or zoned so hopeful players don’t really know what our situation will be in 2017.

If we are backed financially for physio, housing and stuff like that, then of course I would move interstate. I love this game; to move in order to play in the AFL would be an absolute honour.

But you’ve got to think financially about the future rather than just focusing on that three or four months. I would move but it would have to be plausible in the long run.

From my point of view, $20,000 for a four-month commitment is basically a genuine wage anyway, and it’s the kind of income players would need if they were going to play football for a living.

The current situation for aspiring women’s national league players is not good enough. How can any female footballer be expected to be at an elite level when there isn’t enough support behind her?

We get injured and have to pay to treat the problem; we have to eat the right food without being told what the right food is; we have to have a strong, fit body with no strength and conditioning coaches or gym access; and we have to deal with fees, transport and uniform costs out of our back pockets.

On the other hand, you see men with beer-bellies and a right foot no better than mine getting paid to play on a Sunday after a few beverages the night before.

It’s not fair, and it must change.

JESSICA WUETSCHNER, 23, is a footballer for the Western Bulldogs, East Fremantle Sharks, Western Australia and most recently the Boston Lady Demons, and is widely regarded as one of Tasmania’s best female footy exports. Drafted by the Bulldogs in 2015 after only one full season with the Sharks since moving from Clarence in Tasmania, Wuetschner travelled to the US only weeks after the televised Bulldogs-Demons match to coach, mentor and play in the USAFL.