Adelaide Crows women’s coach Bec Goddard says now footy’s a game for everybody

WHO is the real Bec Goddard — the new coach of the Adelaide Crows women’s team?

Adelaide women’s coach Bec Goddard with her dog Howard. Picture: Matt Turner

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LOOK very closely at Bec Goddard’s hands when she’s giving her halftime address at Thebarton Oval on Saturday, and you’ll notice her fastidious attention to detail.

Each of the 38-year-old’s fingernails is painted red, yellow or blue. She’s purposely chosen a particular polish so it’s virtually impossible to bite them.

“Growing up, I was a terrible nail-biter,” Goddard told The Advertiser.

“It’s just so unprofessional.”

Of course, Goddard chose those colours because she was hand-picked to lead Adelaide Football Club’s history-making female footy team.

It’s just one of the surprising intricacies of the down-to-earth, talkative cop turned footy coach.

Born and bred in Canberra, she has an extraordinary life resumé and has already ticked off many firsts, including being the first female umpire and then coach in the all-male North East Australian Football League.

Bec Goddard after coaching Canberra Eastlake to a premiership.

By day and for the past 16 years, she has worked for the Australian Federal Police.

She currently works as a sergeant in the joint anti-child exploitation team (with SAPOL), and her key role is hunting down paedophiles.

Goddard was part of the the clean-up operation in Phuket in Thailand following the devastating Boxing Day tsunami in 2004 and was also in Bali after the 2005 bombings.

But through everything, her constant has always been footy.

“I was conceived in the off-season of 1977 and my dad was playing for the Belconnen Football Club (in Canberra) and I was born in the middle of football season in June, I reckon at their oval,” she said with a laugh.

“As soon as I could walk and talk, I just remember growing up at the footy ... going with my grandparents; I ran the scoreboard, even if I got the score wrong, it didn’t matter — I was at the footy.

“I played footy and then turned 13 and of course, like so many girls, there was no competition.

“But I kept hanging around the footy. I was part of the Belconnen cheer squad, I made banners, I kept doing the scoreboard and then I turned 17 and I became a qualified goal umpire for the league.”

Goddard is sporty, that’s for sure. She played basketball and was a fast bowler for the ACT’s women’s cricket team.

Then, when she was about 20, Canberra launched its first women’s competition — the ACTWAFL — and once again, Goddard found herself playing footy.

“I got to play at the Belconnen footy club, the club that I followed growing up, that my dad played for,” she said.

“I wore the same number as my dad — No.22.”

But aged 29, a serious injury to her left leg (a cracked shin) forced Goddard out of the game and further propelled her into coaching — both men and women — in Canberra.

At the end of 2015, the AFP transferred her to Adelaide and Goddard landed herself a coaching job at the Woodville West Torrens Football Club.

Her success there led to a gruelling interview process with the Adelaide Football Club, that landed her the job at the Crows.

“It’s been crazy,” she said. “It’s not like your community football — it’s not like anything they (the girls) are used to, it’s not like anything I’m used to either.

“While coaching comes naturally, everything around it, everything’s happening for the first time.

“How you set up your list, who you’re going to draft, all the politics around that, working out what training times will be, because all the girls work.”

Bec Goddard and her younger brother in her younger days.

And when Goddard sets her mind to something, she has to finish it.

She studied journalism at university and began her career as a media adviser in the Labor Government before she was accepted into the AFP.

“I’m one of those people that if I start something, I have to finish it even if I’m not enjoying it,” she said.

And, just when you think you’ve exhausted every possible topic, she continues to surprise with more details of her long list of talents and skills.

Goddard knows how to play the trumpet and also plays the guitar and sings in a cover band in Canberra.

“I bought a trumpet and I didn’t like it but I can now play the trumpet — that’s me,” she said.

She has just finished a language degree in Farsi at the Australian National University and now has a desire to learn Arabic.

So far, she said her toughest moment in the top coaching job was telling five women they were not selected to play in Saturday’s inaugural game against Greater Western Sydney.

“It’s a little bit different coaching girls versus guys, they communicate differently,” she said.

“When you talk to guys about selection, it’s done (but) girls are obviously very emotional.”

So what are Goddard’s hopes and dreams for the future of women’s footy?

“I hope it will be recognised in its own right in a conversation about it just being the AFLW, not ‘this is what the guys do and then that comparison’,” she said.

“There’s now an opportunity for little girls to do this — they’ve now got their Chelsea Randall and Erin Phillips to look up to, because all they’ve been looking at are guys.

“AFL is Australia’s greatest game and now it’s a game for everybody.”

Originally published as Adelaide Crows women’s coach Bec Goddard says now footy’s a game for everybody