Right: these two players from the Western Bulldogs and Melbourne women's teams show at least as much determination as their male counterparts.
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Background information
(The information below has been abbreviated from a Wikipedia entry titled 'Women's Australian rules football'
The full entry can be accessed at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Women%27s_Australian_rules_football
Information has also been taken from a news.com.au sport news report published on June 15, 2016, titled 'AFL launches women's league'. The full report can be accessed at http://www.news.com.au/sport/afl/afl-launches-womens-league/news-story/ccefddd075008b48274405258480dc0c)
Women's Australian Rules football (also known as Aussie rules, footy, or just football) is the sport of Australian Rules football as played by women, generally with some modification to the laws of the game.
Organised women's football matches began in the early 20th century, but for a number of years occurred only in the form of one-off exhibition games. State-based leagues began to be formed in the 1980s, with the Victorian Women's Football League (VWFL) forming in Melbourne in 1981 and the West Australian Women's Football League (WAWFL) forming in Perth in 1988. The AFL Women's National Championships were inaugurated in 1992. Women's football began to be professionalised in the 2010s, with teams being formed by existing Australian Football League (AFL) clubs. A national women's league, branded AFL Women's, was announced in 2016, to begin play the following year.
History
Australian Football had been played by men for almost half a century before the first women's football matches were played. Public attitudes and sexism generally prevented women from participating in organised football. However both world wars were a great liberator for women; as the men fought in the war, women were often called to perform many tasks typically done by men, including spectator sports.
Records exist of a football side in Perth, Western Australia made up of department store staff playing as Foy & Gibson's as early as 1917. Matches played in Western Australia were also recorded in 1918.
Following World War I, an exhibition match in Melbourne was held to show that women could play what had previously been seen to be a man's sport. The first women's match attracted a large crowd and interest. The umpire wore a dress.
Archives also show a charity women's match occurred on Bassendean Oval in Perth, Western Australia, 27 August 1944. It is unknown whether the game had been played continuously in the state.
Beyond this and occasional matches over the years, women's football was rarely organised, until the formation of the Victorian Women's Football League in 1981 with four teams competing at open level.
It was in 2000 that the sport began to grow rapidly, with the number of registered teams increasing by a phenomenal 450%.
There are now about 120 women's teams across the globe. Australian Football is becoming more and more popular with women and girls, particularly young women. In 2006, 22 years was the average age of players in the VWFL.
The first ever full international was held between the USA Freedom and Team Canada in Vancouver on Saturday 4 August 2007 in front of a crowd of almost 2,500.
Rule modifications
Some competitions, but not all, are played with modified rules. The main rule differences in Women's Football as opposed to Australian Football involve modified tackling rules. Typically aggressive slinging (swinging a player by the jumper or throwing the player to the ground) of oppositions players in a tackle is not allowed. Like the men's game, head high contact is strictly not allowed.
Another main difference is the size of the ball. A smaller ball to the men's version is often used to minimise hand injuries when marking the ball.
Games of International Rules are also played by many women's leagues against Gaelic Athletic Association clubs. Recreational Football, a fully non-contact version of Australian Rules football is also becoming popular amongst women in Australia and the United States. Many women's leagues also fall into the emerging 9-a-side footy or Metro footy format.
Scope of the game in Australia
During the 1970s, 1980s and 1990s, women's Australian rules football saw a large expansion in the number of competitors. In 1998, Auskick, a national program began. The program was designed to introduce the game to primary school aged children. By 2006, it had over 140,000 participants each year. Though the program was never specifically aimed at girls, the safe non-contact environment proved popular and in 2007 about 16% (12%) in of all Auskick participants were female.
In Australia, a total of 18,609 girls and women played Australian rules football in 2005 and in 2006 48,054 women played the sport in Australia, and it is one of the fastest growing sports among women in Australia.
There are women's Australian Rules football teams in all states and territories of Australia.
An eight-team national competition backed by the AFL is scheduled to commence in 2017. Bids for a licence to participate were submitted by 13 existing AFL teams.
The competition was announced in 2008 and was slated to commence in 2013 with four to eight teams, but this was changed after it was found that the new teams from the Gold Coast and Greater Western Sydney would not have time to submit their bids in full. The starting number of teams has also been increased due to the growth of women's football since 2008.
A licence had been granted to Fremantle under the umbrella of the Women's Football League in February 2010, but due to a review and the subsequent admission of the Gold Coast and Greater Western Sydney to the AFL, this licence was recalled; it was reissued in 2015, and Fremantle will play in the inaugural season of the competition in 2017.
How the 2017 AFL women's league will work
Eight-week competition, to run through February-March next year with a top four for the finals
Adelaide, Brisbane, Carlton, Collingwood, Fremantle, GWS, Melbourne and the Western Bulldogs will field teams
25 players per team
Each club is likely to play six games, with two weeks of finals
A team might have 16 players on the field, but it is more likely to be 18
The first step will be for each team to submit candidates for two marquee player positions, such as Melbourne captain Daisy Pearce and Brisbane star Tayla Harris
The marquee players will earn about $25,000 each
State-based drafts will be held in October, with a lottery to decide the order of picks