Joeys honoured with Grand Final appointment

ST JOSEPH’S Football Club is hailing AFL Barwon’s appointment of Herne Hill Reserve to host the Senior Female Grand Finals as a big moment in the club’s 50-year history.

AFL Barwon recently released the female football finals venues appointments, with Anglesea, Drysdale, Ocean Grove, Leopold and South Barwon all named as hosts to see out the 2022 season across all three divisions, but Joeys president Todd Devine said it was an honour for the club to get the grand final slot.

“It is an honour to have been appointed the role of grand final hosts, the first time we will host the women’s football decider,” Devine said.

“We have to give a big thanks to the council and state government, who assisted us in obtaining our new facilities and gender neutral changerooms, without them wouldn’t be able to host the event.

“We’re very excited and it’ll be awesome for us to host what will presumably be the best female footballing talents of our region, so it’s a really exciting opportunity and I know the whole club will get behind it and support it.”

The senior female football grand finals are scheduled for August 13.

St Joseph’s FNC, home to 800 players across both football and netball – 42 per cent of which are female – has one senior women’s side, which is sitting at the top of the Division 2 ladder.

Joeys vice president and head of the female football program Sue Cormack said while the notion of the club’s senior women’s side playing a grand final on its home soil was a promising one, the day was bigger than any one club in the grand scheme of things.

“We knew we would be strong this season, we’ve got some strong girls who were very close to getting drafted, so the prospect of the girls playing here on grand final day makes things even better.

“It’s actually bigger than us though, it’s about the whole region, it’s about female football.

“These girls, up until about four years ago, when they got to Under 14s, they couldn’t play football any more.

“That’s why we started female football here at our club because we were seeing junior hit an absolute dead-end.

“It’s wonderful they get this opportunity.”

In the same announcement by AFL Barwon, Geelong Amateur’s KFC Oval and Shaw Oval were appointed the grand final venues for junior football.