Why recruitment of a British coach is clearest sign yet Swimming Australia is ending its ‘boys club’

There is just one female coach on the swim team for next month’s world titles, but the gender imbalance is slowly changing despite Swimming Australia killing off a quota proposal for women.

The appointment of Mel Marshall as one of the coaches on the Australian swim team for next month’s world championships in Singapore barely caused a ripple even though the flow-on within the sport could be felt for years to come.

A master trainer with a long track record of producing champions, Marshall’s selection was no surprise after Australia poached her from Britain last year, but it still represented an important milestone for swimming and Australian sport in general.

Beyond the competitive benefits she brings to the Dolphins, Marshall’s inclusion on the otherwise all-male coaching line-up was a further sign that ever so slowly, the tide is starting to turn for females seeking equal opportunities with Australia’s favourite sporting teams, not just swimming.

Once criticised as being a ‘boy’s club’, Swimming Australia has made a stern promise to promote more females to senior roles within the sport and the recruitment of the Englishwoman who oversaw Adam Peaty’s global domination of men’s breaststroke is a big piece of that pledge.

“Swimming Australia is committed to best practice, and this includes our coaching appointments,” chief executive Rob Woodhouse said.

“Mel Marshall is highly respected globally, including in Australia where she has brought her team out for training camps for many years.”

Master coach Mel Marshall has been making waves since coming to Australia.

Addressing the scarcity of female coaches has become one of the main priorities for the entire Australian sports sector following shocking revelations about the mistreatment of female participants in a range of sports including gymnastics, hockey, athletics, football and swimming.

The overdue changes have been steadily evolving over a long time, too slow for some critics, but nevertheless progress is being made.

At the 2016 Rio Olympics, just nine per cent of Australia’s high performance coaches were female. In Paris last year, that number had more than doubled to 18.6 per cent, but federal authorities are advocating and pushing for more.

As one of the country’s highest-funded and most successful medal-producing sports, swimming invariably faces extra scrutiny although it’s just one of many sports with a gender imbalance.

While there have been a trickle of female coaches appointed for world championships, Paralympics and junior national teams over the past two decades, the vast majority of selected coaches are men.

Of the 11 coaches picked for the pool events in Singapore, Marshall was the lone female.

For the 2024 Paris Olympics, two women coaches were selected for the open water team but none for the higher-profile pool events.

Swimming Australia has launched a new program to increase the number of female coaches

In 2021, a scathing review into the sport’s treatment of females led to a raft of major recommendations, including the appointment of a minimum two female coaches on international squads.

While Swimming Australia has openly acknowledged the existing disparity, the mandated quota was scrapped in 2023 after consultation with the Australian Institute of Sport (AIS) because not enough female coaches were ready to step up to the elite ranks.

AIS Performance Executive General Manager Matti Clements agreed with the backflip, saying she supported a heavier focus on preparing new coaches.

“We understand that the shortfall of women in high performance coaching roles can’t be resolved overnight,” she said.

“Obviously we’d love to see more women in these roles but it would be detrimental to the coach themselves and to the experience of the athletes to appoint people that aren’t ready.

“The Australian Sports Commission has been very vocal about the need to increase the number of women in leadership roles right across the sector and we’ve got a range of programs and policies in place to address this.”

To fast-track the development of more female coaches, the Australian Sports Commission chair Kate Jenkins, whose previous roles included serving as the Australian Sex Discrimination Commissioner, last year launched the Australian Women in High Performance Coaching (WiHPC) project.

Australian swim coach Michael Palfrey and Rohan Taylor at the Paris Olympics. Picture: Adam Head

Stemming from that, in April this year, Swimming Australia announced its own initiative, aimed at increasing the representation of female coaches across all levels of the coaching pathway ahead of the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics and 2032 Brisbane Games.

Under the guidance of Tracey Menzies-Stegbauer, Ian Thorpe’s former mentor, there are already 27 female coaches enrolled in the project while Mel Tantrum was promoted as head coach of the Paralympic swim team and Marshall is actively helping out with the next wave of coaches as well as qualifying four of her own swimmers for Singapore.

“I know Mel will also be fantastic in developing the skills of many of the outstanding young female and male coaches here in Australia,” Woodhouse said.

“And as I have said previously, having a high-profile female coach in Australia would make a significant difference from an aspirational point of view for female coaches coming through.”

Originally published as Why recruitment of a British coach is clearest sign yet Swimming Australia is ending its ‘boys club’