The AFLW season has started again and usually, this is one of my favourite times of the year. It will surprise no one to hear that I’ve been a fanatic of this league since it started. So much so that I spent a bunch of time and money writing a book about my favourite team, that no one wanted to publish*. But I did it anyway.
I’ve tried to take a step back recently.
Last season that favourite team did not perform well, and I found it very painful to watch.
I realised it was perhaps unseemly for a woman of my age and education to care so much. (But then I realised it was sport, it’s not rational and your education has absolutely no bearing on these things).
Anyway, I was guarding my emotions when I attended the season launch of my favourite team. I would not allow myself hope.
With those pesky emotions dealt with – for the time being – I resolved to watch this season at a distance, in perhaps even a “scholarly” manner.
Of course, that didn’t last long.
Being a women’s sports fan is EXHAUSTING.
There is a portion of our society that are determined to denigrate women’s sport at every opportunity. This determination is particularly pointed when it comes to Australian Football.
On the weekend I watched the Giants defeat the Western Bulldogs in a display of attacking, fluid football. There were mistakes – just like the men make – but there also were moments of breathtaking skill.
In the first 15 seconds, Eilish O’Dowd – an Irish woman who was playing her first competitive game of Australian Football – picked up the ball after rucking it, bolted down the field, evading everyone, and kicked a goal.
But there were hundreds of “pundits” who jumped online to claim she had run too far. (In Australian Football you are required to bounce the ball every 15 metres. If you travel further than that without bouncing, you have “run too far”).
There are MANY examples of freakish goals scored in the men’s game where the player has run a distance that could be questioned. But they are allowed.
Just like O’Dowd’s goal was allowed.
A player can only play within the rules that are applied to them by the umpire on the field.
The Giants finished with their highest ever score and largest winning margin. Whilst I know this is painful reading for Bulldogs fans (my apologies), as a long-suffering Giants fan, this is cause for celebration.
But no.
“Chris” – who like so many Giants fans, lives in Cairns** - was there in the comments on Facebook to point out that the game was
“such a shambles of a game I'm really not saying this to be sexist but there is no competition no challenge I sincerely mean when I've watched under 16 local footy match's with more intensity in the game and actually good to watch but this... This is a joke every match every season no improvement literally the lowest scoring match's in any sport it's so boring” (sic).
I won’t address every point in Chris’ obviously well-argued piece, but when I read things like this my brain immediately sketches out the systemic issues that have stood in the way of women trying to play Australian football. I go through all the inequities I witnessed while embedded with the Giants. I mentally rehearse my points relating to the sexism that dominates Australian sport, preparing in advance arguments against those saying I’m making it “all about gender” when they’re just talking about skill.
Because they’re not talking about skill.
They often claim they are making legitimate criticisms of the way in which the women play the game, but we all know that this is rare.
They criticise because they can’t bear to see women playing at an elite level. They feel they could do better and if that’s the case, why isn’t someone paying THEM to play.
(“My third division team could flog every team in the AFLW” said one bright spark on Twitter last week. Sure they could Davo. But I’m pretty sure you haven’t seen a complex football strategy in your life or any inkling of what “elite” training requires).
They also criticise because our society is still underpinned by a gender inequality that pervades everything. (Seriously, name one aspect of Australian culture where you will not see it. I’ll wait).
This is the crux of it and it is why women’s sport is so important. I’ve maintained for years that playing football as a woman in this country is an inherently political act. It will remain so throughout my lifetime.
I am looking forward to the day when I can watch football as a fan without having to arm myself with a gender studies curriculum. I am looking forward to the day when announcing I coach a female football team doesn’t shock other women at women’s football-related events.
(Seriously, it happened on Friday at an AFLW event, put on by the AFL).
I’m looking forward to not having to explain that there is no one way to play football or be a football fan, that no one owns the game and that every team, M and W, plays their own interpretation, every single time they take the field.
I understand that I will never be rid of the emotional turmoil that comes with being a Giants W fan. That comes with the territory, and I’m too far gone down that particular path to turn back now.
Go Giants.
*Want a copy of my book? Send me an email at hello@georginahibberd.info and I’ll send one to you. I’ve seen secondhand copies for $45! I’ll give it to you for $10, which pretty much covers the postage.
** Irony alert. It would be very rare to find a Giants fan living in Cairns as it is in Far North Queensland and the Giants are a club with a smaller fanbase, based in Western Sydney.
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If you ever feel like showing your appreciation, feel free to ‘buy me a coffee’ (make a small, one-off contribution).
You got it right in the title. Ignore the jerks and just enjoy the footy.