Clubs raise concerns that AFL Barwon female football date of play move will impact participation numbers

Clubs are concerned that sides could be forced to fold and numbers will be significantly impacted if an AFL Barwon date of play move goes ahead. And the governing body has responded.

Clubs have raised concerns over a fixture move in women’s football.

There are grave fears a fixture change for women’s football in the Geelong region will have a significant impact on participation numbers.

AFL Barwon confirmed on Monday that female senior and under-19 competitions will be primarily played on Friday instead of Sunday in 2024 with double headers, citing desire from female footballers to be involved in events on Saturday nights.

The governing body has confirmed that female matches will be mostly played on Saturday in 2025, with the 2024 move part of a transition period.

The official statement from AFL Barwon on Monday claimed that the move to Friday was made to “ensure that female participation continues to trend positively across the Barwon Region”.

But the surprise move might have the opposite effect, with St Mary’s women’s football director Amanda Flynn saying that the club could lose 35 players under the new arrangement, meaning they would only be able to field one senior side instead of two.

It is understood other clubs could struggle to field one female senior side next season.

Serious concerns have been raised over availability of players, coaches and volunteers on Friday nights.

Flynn said Friday matches are set to begin at 5:55pm and 7:45pm, the former being a logistical nightmare for players and volunteers, many of which work until 5-5:30pm.

An alarming poll conducted by Flynn this week with her St Mary’s players revealed that 65 per cent of her playing list were unable to commit to Friday fixturing.

And it isn’t just players that are pulling out.

St Mary’s fears it could lose one of its senior sides. Picture: Mark Wilson

“Off the back of this fixturing my two division two senior coaches who are both females have said they are unable to coach next season if it is on Friday nights,” Flynn said.

“My under-19 girls coach, who is a senior player, told me that she will be unable to coach the under-19s off the back of this fixturing because, ideally she will be playing football.

“So I think there is a bigger picture here around not just who is unavailable in the way of players, because if you haven’t got people to run and administrate games, then that’s sort of a factor as well that I think in a lot of the conversations is being overlooked.

“Friday nights is a very difficult time to find people. The end of a working week, I know what most people would want to be doing – I’m pretty sure it’s not standing out in the cold at a local football game.

“The league have categorically told me that double headers on Friday nights will be 5:55pm and 7:45pm … Who is available at 3:55pm on a Friday afternoon to get to a ground?”

Anglesea faces an immense challenge for players and volunteer numbers.

Many of the club’s players live in Melbourne, meaning they will be forced to rush back to the Bellarine in peak hour traffic to play — and some work in hospitality or night shifts.

Roos female football co-ordinator Jen Lingam said that Friday night games had been organised among the clubs in the past and that Sunday matches were working fine before.

“I’m just concerned that we might have trouble fielding a side every week. We possibly could but then you’ve got people rushing from jobs, you’ve got apprentices that work out of town,” Lingham said.

“The uni students do placement so that is usually Monday to Friday and it’s not always in our area, it could be in Melbourne so getting through the traffic to go to our game, that could be a bit of a challenge.

“Our coach has a business in town and Friday night is his night, so we could possibly lose the coach.

“We have lots of hospitality workers and those are the busy times that they need to work. And we have got uni students, if they are doing hospitality work, that’s when they do their work.

“The girls have to finish work or uni early or school … they are under-19s, some of those girls aren’t driving yet so the parents will have to finish work early to try and get them to a game.

“It was working fine before … we did occasionally ask for a Friday night game, if we had a club function. If we had a club function we would have a Friday night game just so the girls don’t miss out.”

Geelong Amateur and Grovedale clash in the Division 1 grand final.

Flynn, who has been a women’s football pioneer in the region and was a finalist in this year’s Essendon Women’s Network Community Awards, said that Friday football for women had been trialled with limited success in the past.

She understands AFL Barwon’s reasoning for allowing players to be able to enjoy social events on Saturday nights, but her chief concern is dwindling numbers in all departments.

“We know that women want to participate more in club events and things that are happening in our clubs on a Saturday night, it is a really important part of being at a club is being social at your club,” Flynn said.

“Obviously with Friday night fixturing they are imagining that they will then be able to participate more freely in Saturday night activities at the club.

“For me I think that, although that is an important part of a club, I think that’s a little further down the list of priorities for me, particularly when I’m looking down the barrel of people not playing.

“A couple of years ago we did attempt, we did try to run two games on Friday nights for our div 1 and div 2 female teams and for a number of different reasons it didn’t work.

“Most of which were around, at the end of a working week, how difficult it was for women to get to the ground in time to even prepare properly to play. Getting volunteers there in time to play.

“People have much bigger things going on their life than football and I feel like making football a difficult thing to participate in or to administer or to coach will drive people away from playing football in our region.”

HOW DID IT HAPPEN?

While AFL Barwon claims it received majority support, it is understood that most clubs who will be hosting the Friday night games under lights actually voted against it.

Clubs were consulted via a poll in the lead-up to the season about potential changes, including fixturing on Friday nights.

It is believed the majority of clubs who have lights – the only clubs who can host home Friday matches – voted ‘no’ to the move.

Several clubs privately believe they have been blindsided by the change of day, saying the extensive consultation in the lead-up was not followed through for the decision-making process.

In a draft model fixture that was handed to clubs before the decision process began, Anglesea had the most Friday night games with 14 of a possible 15 for its seniors.

St Mary’s division one senior side and Torquay had 13, while Geelong West, Geelong Ammos, Bannockburn, Lara, St Albans each have 12.

Women's Div 1 grand final: Geelong Amateur v Grovedale No 29. Georgie Irvine for Geelong Ammos.

Flynn said the expectations on female clubs with lighted grounds is unreasonable.

“I believe that the process should have been, ‘it looks like there is a push for running the competition on Friday nights, we need lights for that. So why don’t we get all the clubs with lights and put them in a room and talk to them about what’s possible’,” Flynn said.

“But it didn’t happen that way.

“It’s incumbent on them to speak to the clubs that have lights and separate how they feel about it because they are going to have to facilitate those games and bear the cost of running those games.

“We’ll have a couple, but we don’t want 12 games on a Friday night.”

But AFL Barwon regional manager Ed Wilson said that this model was not an accurate reflection of how the fixture would look in reality.

Speaking to this publication, Wilson insisted that all clubs’ separate circumstances — including Anglesea requesting just a couple of Friday matches — would be taken into consideration and he is confident that all preferences will be able to be met.

He said that feedback about moving away from Sunday fixtures has been growing for several years, prompting the governing body to make the change.

The draft model shown to clubs.

“I would certainly hope that clubs don’t take that as literal, as it was very part of the conversation that ticked off fixturing for 2024, and not what was locked in for 2024. Because we don’t know how many teams we are going to have yet,” Wilson said.

“That was purely a draft as part of a modelling process and we took it to the clubs to then open the conversation. So that draft was provided before the conversation began that AFL Barwon said, ‘we are looking to make a change for 2024’.

“(The feedback) started several years ago, we started receiving feedback from clubs that playing games on Sunday for senior female footballers created a challenging dynamic when their male counterparts get to play on a Saturday.

“We went through an extensive modelling process with the clubs to share with them the vision based on the feedback we have received for several years and from that we have received majority support.

“It’s taken extensive consultation to reach the point that we are at now where we implemented this two-year transition model. We are confident that participation numbers will grow in the long-term under this as we make it a more attractive proposition to be playing female football at a senior level within the Barwon region.

“We certainly understand different teams and different clubs have different sets of circumstances and some prefer to play games on one day of the week rather than another. And we will make sure our fixturing in 2024 is accommodating for those different considerations.”

Originally published as Clubs raise concerns that AFL Barwon female football date of play move will impact participation numbers