AFLW Round four: St Kilda gear up for reigning premiers

Since moving to Australian, Irish recruit Saoirse Lally admits the learning curve has been steep.

The former county Mayo captain was poached by St Kilda and has quickly had to adapt to new food, traffic signs and footy lingo.

The Gaelic star spoke to this masthead and said one of her biggest enjoyment has come from learning about Australian Indigenous culture, ahead of Sir Doug Nicholls round.

Lally and new Saint Sophie Butterworth visited Chelsea Heights Primary School earlier in the week to meet with First Nations students who created their banner for the clash with North Melbourne.

North Melbourne’s win last week over the Western Bulldogs was overshadowed by a horrible jumper clash – both clubs in predominantly blue and white guernseys, and blue shorts in their Indigenous jerseys.

Pundits on social media, plus commentators and even the players struggled to identify who was who.

The AFL is reviewing its playing kit approval process after last week’s jumper clash.

One idea being discussed to avoid a similar scenario is to introduce different coloured shorts for the players.

In 2022, the league announced that female footballers will no longer have to wear the white shorts traditionally donned by the “away” team after the AFL changed its uniform rules to ease anxiety for AFLW players who are menstruating.

Suzie Miller has been mulling over the idea for play centred around the AFLW since witnessing the inaugural grand final at the venue formerly known as Metricon Stadium on the Gold Coast in March 2017 when Adelaide defeated the Brisbane Lions.

“I grew up in Melbourne, so you’d think I’d be a massive AFL fan,” Miller says. “But as a young girl I thought: how come it’s just boys? So I didn’t really invest in it the way other people did.

“It didn’t even occur to me that maybe girls could play AFL. So I was blown away when the AFLW came to pass. I thought, how many other areas in the world do we not envisage that this is a possible place to have equality until we actually see it happen before us?”

Miller rolled up her sleeves and interviewed players, coaches, commissioners, people involved at the grassroots – “everyone you could imagine”.

“They had to get over all the hurdles of ‘how are we going to get sponsorship?’ ‘How are we going to get media on board?’ Because every single person had the same view: ‘Oh, no, women don’t play football’.”

Read more here

Good afternoon and welcome folks.

Round four of the AFLW is kicking into gear, and the Western Bulldogs are up first facing Sydney at Whitten Oval, followed by a clash between St Kilda and reigning premiers North Melbourne.

Stay tuned across the weekend for Sir Doug Nicholls round and the latest W news.