New AFL radio rights deal to cover women's football

http://www.girlsplayfooty.com/2016/09/new-afl-radio-rights-deal-to-cover.html

The Australian Football League has confirmed a new radio broadcast rights for the next six years, with the new national women's league having a place in the deal.

People will be absolutely flocking to their radios

I'm not sure if that's the case, but given it will be the inaugural season, every little bit of coverage will help the new comp.

Bahahaha. Gonna break out the old transistor for this! 

Women's AFL competition could spark turf war with netball, cricket, W-League and rugby

Updated 35 minutes ago

With the kick-off of an inaugural national AFL women's competition approaching, a turf war may be looming which will only benefit female athletes.

The battle for the services of the most talented sportswomen in the country has already begun to escalate.

Cricket, football, Aussie rules and rugby and netball are all vying for as big a share of the talent pool as they can get and, with any luck, that will gradually result in a more attractive sporting career path for young players.

With innovations like Fast5 netball and the Women's Big Bash (WBBL), the national leagues are already becoming bigger, brasher and flashier as they attempt to playing talent, bigger audiences and advertising dollars.

Netball came out firing this week with theannouncement of improved wages and conditions for its top players.

Netball Australia made it very clear that it is top of the pops in the sporting charts, and it intends to stay there. Deputy chief executive Marne Fechner mapped the sport's masterplan on Wednesday.

"Today we do lift the bar, by announcing a record pay deal for elite netballers, a deal that will see our national league athletes maintain their position as the highest paid sportswomen in this country," Ms Fechner said.

Amid all the excitement surrounding the start of the women's league in March of next year, it came as something of a buzzkill when it was revealed just how much, or little, the players would be earning.

Under the current offer from the AFL, an entire club's list will be restricted to a $200,000 salary cap — over $100,000 less than the average wage of a single male player.

The base salary for most players in season one is a measly $5,000, while high-profile players will make $10,000 and the top two stars in each side are to take home $25,000.

Under netball's new collective bargaining agreement, the average salary for athletes will rise from about $40,000 to $67,500, and the minimum wage more than doubles to $27,375.

AFL chief executive Gillon McLachlan had an explanation for this disparity.

"We don't have a broadcast deal, we don't have a sponsorship deal, at the moment we don't have any commerciality around the league," Mr McLachlan said.

"We've got to start up, a complete start-up, so we're investing millions of dollars next year in establishing a league."

If netball was nervous about viewing figures for the women's AFL exhibition match between the Bulldogs and the Demons at Whitten Oval, which attracted a peak TV audience of over 1 million people on Channel 7, it has the advantage of a long-established national competition, albeit an ever-evolving one.

Conditions often as crucial as wages

A vital component of the new netball deal, and something that makes it such a big step forward, is the conditions written into the basic contracts.

The contracts are part time, averaging 20 hours a week, but most importantly the hours from 10am to 4pm will be protected, meaning players have the opportunity to work or study during that time.

Athletes will also receive $1,500 of private health insurance contributions per year and a parental care policy for players with small children.

They also get 100 per cent income protection on all earning for up to two years in the event of injury or pregnancy.

Until full-blown professionalism becomes a reality in women's sport, improvements like these can make a huge difference to athletes.

Aussie Diamonds shooter Caitlin Thwaites spoke to ABC in April about seeking a sport/work life balance.

"Semi-professionalism is being able to have that work-life balance and not putting all your eggs in one basket," said Thwaites, who once pursued an Olympic volleyball dream before netball came calling.

"Being a well-rounded person comes as a result of that; pursuing careers outside of sport."

The jostle for talent

The fledgling women's AFL competition has already made waves by scouting and recruiting talent from other sports to bolster its ranks, putting other codes on notice.

Olympic javelin thrower Kim Mickle signed up for the Fremantle Dockers in recent days, while Opals and Dallas Wings player Erin Phillips is set for a stint with the Adelaide Crows.

Matildas stars Sam Kerr and Mackenzie Arnold were approached by AFL sides in February, the Herald Sun reported, which must be of major concern to the W-League. The majority of the players in the league earn between $1,000 and $5,000 a season.

The top echelon of Aussie women who play the world game do earn far more than the AFL is currently able to pay, though, with contracted Matildas making $45,000 a year plus their W-League wages of $10,000-$15,000. There are also opportunities to earn more in overseas leagues, most commonly in the National Women's Soccer League in the US.

But while each W-League club has a salary cap of $150,000, there is no minimum wage, so some players in the squad can be earning almost nothing.

The WBBL is also in the poaching game, having picked up tennis young gun Ash Barty for a season with the Brisbane Heat.

Earlier this month it held its inaugural Future Stars trial at the SCG, with tennis player Laura Kent and former Australian baseballer Renee Straumietis beating out competition from a field of more than 20 women to earn training contracts for the Thunder and Sixers respectively.

The success of the Australian women's rugby sevens team at the Rio Olympics was built on the back of a recruitment drive which targeted athletes from a range of different sports.

There is sure to be a frenzy of activity from September 19 when athlete contracting to the eight domestic netball teams begins.

Divide between the sexes remains vast

If we were comparing the earning potential for male athletes in Australia's most popular codes with their female counterparts, there is no point even sticking with war analogies. Unless we would like to imagine a battle between the entirety of the modern US military's might and, say, the Duke of Wellington's forces. That's how far behind women's sport is.

The base pay for a rookie in the AFL is $55,440, though only one player in the league earned less than $60,000 in 2015, according to afl.com.au.

The average wage in the AFL was $302,104, compared to $244,000 in the NRL and $250,000 for Australian contracted cricketers. NBL players made an average of $100,000, while in the A-League it was $146,666.

And that's saying nothing of the massive amount high-profile male sports stars can bring in through advertising and sponsorship.

As women's sport attempts to break out of the vicious circle of low wages, poor conditions, minimal coverage and a subsequent lack of sponsorship dollars, healthy competition between the women's codes may, eventually, lead to a shrinking of this divide.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-09-15/turf-war-in-womens-sport-would-be-great-for-female-athletes/7844516

"Turf war" and "talent pool" ok.... 

That D's chick looks alright. I like how flexible she is. 

Tayla Harris, 19 yo marquee for Brisbane.  Already the best high mark in Australia, and scored a goal from outside 50 in the exhibition match.  Likely to become one of the more high profile queensland sportswomen over the next couple of years.

She plays aussie rules not swimming. 

How does that relate to W-League ?

Unfortunately for Tayla that's as far as she'll go. Unless she gets signed up by an Aussie Rules womens club overseas.

And that's a problem because....

Better hope she doesn't blow her ACL out then

She has already featured a number of times in the Courier Mail, so she is well on the way to becoming one of the states best known sports women.

And how does that relate to the W-League ?

Ok... yeah nah i take it back.. her forearms are too big.

No problem at all Mr Calcio, this is a huge opportunity for her to perhaps take the game of Aussie rules to Queensland. If the game becomes established in that part of the world she may move on to bigger and better things.

FFS, there are even women surfers who earn more than the biggest AFL male superstars, let alone the sheilas. I doubt women will be lining up for a few grand playing AFL for anything other than being failed at other sports of international standing, or perhaps if they're just fairly butch. 

She already has a well-earned reputation for being able to take a hanger:

while the other sports have to many players coming through to fit them all in, like mens afl who basically have buggèr all players playing the game to fill 18 professional teams, the women's afl is 1000 times worse off, there would be lucky to be 10k playing the sport in the country.

 Now mister egg-chaser will give us some bullcrap afl figures saying 300k girls play afl, but the reality women  like the men, is no one is really playing the sport at amateur level, so they have to entice players who are failing at there chosen sport to come play afl with cash.

The Brisbane Lions have announced Kate Deegan as their first rookie player ahead of the 2017 AFL Women's Season.Deegan comes to the Lions with a soccer background, having played for Annerley in the Brisbane Women’s Premier League and has played for Coorparoo in the Queensland Women’s Australian Football League.


http://www.lions.com.au/news/2016-09-15/first-rookie-signing

You know this isn't the place for your bullshit, yeah? Fuck off to the AFL portion of the thread or go to BigFooty.

Any chance of seeing her play her sport in the Olympics ?

Football provides girls taking up the sport with so many opportunities, unfortunately one that counts most (money) is not one of them. It is important for the FFA to do everything possible to match and beat the money being offered to girls at the highest level by other sports in order to retain the numbers playing football at junior level. Surely the Federation can attract sponsors to a sport that has so much to offer world wide. It is also vital to have the W League and every Matilda games on FTA TV.  It is also the duty of every football supporter to get behind women's football and attend matches as often as possible and please don't ridicule it. This is most discouraging and gives other sport a free kick.   

Great post.  Too bad the knuckle draggers can't see your point.

Looking at you MT.

Let me translate this article: Afl has to poach players from other codes. Its all optics/spin.

And any young lady with a level head knows which sport she should be playing....and Im sure any competent parent has enough sense to steer their daughters away from dangerous collision sports. 

Lol big

In case you didn't realise it, no other country has a professional league - so it's a problem.
Now you can go back to your newspaper strewn room and think that saturation coverage in the southern states of Australia is so very exciting 

AFL chief executive Gillon McLachlan had an explanation for this disparity."We don't have a broadcast deal, we don't have a sponsorship deal, at the moment we don't have any commerciality around the league," Mr McLachlan said.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-09-15/turf-war-in-womens-sport-would-be-great-for-female-athletes/7844516

W-League could be next in line for much-needed pay boost

Updated 54 minutes ago

As competition heats up to pay higher wages to female athletes, FFA has admitted many W-League players have been playing for nothing.

As recently as last season, W-League clubs have used amateur players that receive no ongoing or match payments.

But that could change in time for season 2016/17, when FFA is expected to bring in new base standards to boost the sport at the bottom end of the national league.

Through Professional Footballers Australia (PFA), Australia's elite female footballers - the Matildas - fought for and won wage rises in September last year that included drawn-out negotiations and strike action.

That pay deal looped in the Socceroos, Matildas and A-League but left the W-League untouched.

Now, with new women's leagues from Netball Australia and the AFL to begin in 2017, FFA are likely to address the remuneration landscape in the W-League.

The salary cap for the national women's league is set at $150,000 per club, with a minimum spend of just $35,000.

The all-conquering Melbourne City side and Canberra United are the only two clubs that came within cooee of paying the cap last season, which would mean payments averaging $7,500 to each player in a 20-woman squad across the 16-week competition.

Teams that paid the minimum spend would have paid a 20-woman squad an average amount of just over $100 a week per player - with no recompense for pre-season.

Perth Glory, the 2014 W-League premiers, won the league paying their squad just $50,000 - or under $160 a week per player.

"There is currently no prescribed minimum wage for Westfield W-League players," an FFA spokesperson said.

"FFA is in constructive dialogue with PFA about establishing a joint working group, including Westfield W-League clubs, to look at the growth and professionalisation of the competition as part of the overall commitment to women's football."

Matildas receive ongoing wages and match payments for their international commitments on top of W-League salaries.

Pay is one part of the equation for W-League players, with improved standards seen as equally important.

W-League 'in a real bind'

Football commentator and former national team co-ordinator Sarah Groube told the ABC the W-League cannot afford to be complacent.

"Football Australia's W-League is in a real bind. There's now a suite of sports offering attractive salary and off-field benefits that some W-League clubs have turned a blind eye to in recent seasons - a minimum payment, access to paid child care arrangements that netball just announced, and even the provision of quality training gear," she said.

"This week's own-goal from football was the announcement that all three Melbourne Victory teams, including W-League, will wear a playing shirt this season that features the words of a Melbourne Victory chant 'Melbourne boys are still number one'.

"Contrast that with the exquisite gesture of the Western Bulldogs to design a jersey for the last women's AFL exhibition match that featured all of the names of players who have featured in past women's exhibition matches."

A groundbreaking SBS report published in May lifted the lid on poor training and medical conditions experienced by W-League players - including the denial of change rooms at some venues.

Earlier this year, PFA announced their intention to campaign for minimum medical standards for the W-League, after the introduction of similar measures for the A-League five years ago help cut down on injuries.

It is unclear how much money the naming rights sponsor for the W-League, Westfield, tips into the wage pool.

FFA chairman Steven Lowy is also the co-chief executive of the retail giant.

"The FFA can't afford to rest on the fact they provide opportunities at World Cup and Olympic level because there are not many positions in the Matildas squad," Ms Groube said.

"This dream holds even less sway for athletes now that the national team maintains players on contract, reducing the hope for would-be contenders who aren't paid to train the way the national team players are, which extends the gap even further."http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-09-16/w-league-could-be-next-in-line-for-much-needed-pay-boost/7852276