Clubs playing numbers game as season nears

WOMEN’S football teams are still calling for players and staff with just over a month before the 2026 season begins.

The AFL Barwon women’s competition will welcome three new teams in 2026, with Portarlington, Bell Park, and Bannockburn all advertising to join or return to the competition this year.

But they are not the only clubs on the prowl for new recruits.

Despite winning a premiership in their inaugural season in 2022, just four years later, Anglesea has concerns it might not be able to field a side at all.

Female football coordinator Jenny Lingham said the club is determined to ensure its players can take the field but admitted the team currently could not play a game.

“We need more. It’s not enough to field a side,” she said.

“The hard thing is AFL Barwon haven’t told us when we’re playing yet, we haven’t got a fixture. It makes it hard for everyone to commit.”

The club took to Facebook this week to appeal for more players to join the club.

Lingham said changing game times and days in 2025 was an additional barrier for players.

With hospitality workers, nurses, university students and paramedics in the side, Lingham said it was near impossible for players to be always available.

Dedicated to ensuring the women have somewhere to play, she said Anglesea will start to explore the possibility of merging with another club.

For Lingham, if her players get to take the field, she has no qualms with them being part of a joint team.

“I will touch base with some clubs if we can’t field enough girls,” she said.

“I don’t want to lose them – once you lose a side it’s really hard to get another side going in the future.

“It’s so important for us to keep our women’s side going because they bring so much to the club.”

In 2025, St Albans and Thomson merged mid-season in the second division competition when both team’s numbers dropped below a sustainable amount.

Kyle Tyrrell, who coached the merged team last year, will again coach for the club in 2026, though this year the Tigers will only field one team.

He said player numbers appeared to be a concern across the competition.

“This is one of the tougher periods that we’ve had in terms of attracting players to the club,” Tyrrell said.

“Last year we had two teams, we’re going down to one team and generally speaking women’s footy is tough anyway.

“We don’t have players getting paid, we’ve got a lot of players who are shift workers, single mums, uni students, and it’s very difficult, if you don’t know what division you’re in and what your fixture is, to plan your life.”

Tyrrell said in his experience there was often a high turnover in women’s football due to changing life circumstances.

He felt the introduction of new clubs to the league may be exacerbating difficulties in finding enough players to field a full team.

“There’s a scarcity of women who want to play football and on top of that there is three or four new clubs coming into the competition,” he said.

“When you think about it that’s another 100 women footballers in the region that are going to new clubs, which has made recruiting even more difficult.”

Drysdale and St Albans have also been posting on their social media pages calling for additional players to join their squads.

Meanwhile Torquay has advertised both their senior women’s and under-17 girls’ coaching positions.

AFL Barwon said the operations team is still working on the women’s fixture and hope to have it sent to clubs soon.