Siren 46: Queensland footy (finale), By The White Line diaries, a big year in cricket & more
A Women in Sport Collective
Welcome to our final full edition of the Siren Sport newsletter for 2020!
It’s the first of December and as the Siren team begin to wind down a little, have a break and look forward to spending time with loved ones once again as restrictions ease, we hope you, too, are coming up to some time to recover and relax.
It’s been a year!
This year we have produced some incredible stories, delivered newsletters every week for 46 weeks and secured some important partnerships to deliver programs and opportunities during a pandemic—we can’t quite believe it!
We’re so grateful for all the support we’ve received in our first year. We could not have continued to build and deliver content without the wonderful women in sport and fans of women’s sports communities. It’s a beautiful space that we treasure being a part of.
It’s really validating to know that our work is valued. We’re passionate about continuing to build on what we started this year, doing more, covering more and continuing to grow the Siren community. So thank you all for believing in us.
We want to especially thank a few key people who have supported the growth of Siren as we end the year. Associate Professor Kim Toffoletti and Deakin University. Kim was supportive of the idea of Siren from the start and helped us to develop our internship program with Deakin. Our first intern, Brielle Quigley wraps up her placement this week and working with her and developing the next generation of #womeninsport is something we’re very proud to contribute to.
Thanks to the Sport Innovation Research Group at Swinburne University who partnered with us to ‘cover the coverage’ of women’s sports during the onset of COVID-19 to measure the impacts of the coverage of women in sport in mainstream media. An important project we were excited to be part of to help with ongoing research and our first sponsored piece of work as a collective.
A few people and businesses who have also reached out to offer invaluable advice, donations, airtime and support, thank you to Game Legal, Gripsters, JOY FM, Women Onside, Peter Holden and Women’s Australian Rules Football Radio, Mary Konstantopoulos/Ladies Who League, Gender Equity Victoria, Chyloe Kurdas, Rana Hussein, Emma Race and The Outer Sanctum team. And to our wonderful Siren Supporters, whose subscriptions help keep the lights on and ensure we can commission more women and cover more women’s sports.
Over the coming weeks, we’ll bring you some special editions, announcements and content here and there to get you through the break and keep us connected, and we look forward to returning to regularly scheduled programming in the new year.
Be kind to yourselves over the holiday period, celebrate safely and we’ll see you around on the socials for some #womeninsport love.
In this issue
We’re proudly sharing the third and final part of Kirby Fenwick and Gemma Bastiani’s look into the development of women’s footy in Queensland, with a focus on the shift to AFLW and what the next steps for growth are. Rachel Bach is back with the final By The White Lines diary entry of 2020, a reflection on what has been a tough year. And Mary Konstantopoulos looks back on a wild year of women’s cricket.
The State of Play: the development of women’s footy in Queensland—part three
By Kirby Fenwick & Gemma Bastiani
The Gold Coast Suns joined the AFLW competition in 2020. Image: Megan Brewer
In the third and final part of our deep dive into the development of women’s footy in Queensland, we focus on the move toward AFLW, the ripple effect on the community ranks and what needs to come next to continue this growth.
Finding and losing and finding myself in 2020
By Rachel Bach / By The White Line
Sabrina Frederick in pre-season training. Image: Rachel Bach / By The White Line
To round out the first year of Siren and our collaboration with Rachel Bach (By The White Line), here’s her final diary entry for 2020.
Reflections on the WBBL season
By Mary Konstantopoulos
Sydney Thunder celebrating their WBBL06 title win. Sourced: Sydney Thunder
In what has been a strange year, women’s cricket has lit up the sporting calendar. Mary Konstantopoulos shares her reflections on the year, and WBBL06.
Siren Call is supported by Game Legal
The W-League 2020/21 fixtures have officially been released, so open your calendars and lock in those reminders to make sure you get your women’s football fix over the silly season!
Brisbane Broncos skipper/rugby league royalty Ali Brigginshaw officially has a street named after her, and if that isn’t up there with the coolest news of the week we don’t know what is!
A huge Siren congratulations to Eva Jeler on her official appointment as national coach for Table Tennis Australia. Eva brings to the role 37 years of experience and will undoubtedly excel in this new venture. More women in coaching, please!
If you’ve ever wondered if there is anything Billie Jean King can’t do, the answer is resounding no. The tennis legend has dropped an Audible documentary on the Original 9 and the events that lead to that iconic one dollar contract, so basically there’s your listening needs sorted for the week! Will it distract you from those pesky end-of-year reports? Yes. Will it be worth it? Duh.
Incredible news! Hawthorn Football Club have made history after becoming the first AFL club to commit to an all-female coaching panel for the VFLW competition. The club identified the *enormous* gap in coaching representation and decided to take action, and we are all the way here for it!
Of course, the Darebin Falcons did it first, taking an all-female coaching panel into the 2018 VFLW season.
The WBBL final was surrounded by aaaaall the excitement, and it was an absolute doozy. But despite all its glory, it also sparked some really important conversations in the Twittersphere (and beyond) around whether the decision to broadcast on Seven’s secondary channel, Seven Mate, was one that sent the right message.
I've been thinking a lot about the @WBBL Final being on Seven Mate. I understand that in today's world that these channels are accessible to all. But one is the primary channel and one is secondary. My view is that by putting it on Seven Mate it suggests the game is secondary.Sports can’t drive change without their partners though - particularly broadcast partners. So decisions like showing today’s #WBBLFinal on @7mate...? 🤔 As much as we all love #Frozen, c’mon @7Sport. Let as many people as possible watch a cracking match! https://t.co/vI1bOLr9WdAnd then there were two! ⭐⚡ @ThunderBBL @StarsBBL #WBBLFinals https://t.co/HZ1eyTgQIDRebel Women's Big Bash League @WBBL
The incredibly skilled Sarah Fuller has made history as the first woman to participate in a Power 5 college football game in the US, stepping in as place-kicker for Vanderbilt. Now if only there was a women’s NFL…
Tokyo hopeful and world champ Kaylee McKeown has set a world record (!) after shaving nearly half a second off the 200 metre backstroke short-course and is it just us or is the Olympics hype really starting to set in?! Fingers crossed we get to see the 19-year-old powerhouse in action come 2021!
And of course, congratulations are in order to Shabnim Ismail who was awarded Player of the Final after Sydney Thunder’s epic win against Melbourne Stars. Mary Konstantopolous spoke with the talented bowler days before the final took place to get the lowdown on what would set the Thunder apart, and this is one story where knowing the ending makes it all the more sweeter!
Everything about this.
Runner up
What a champion—Tiana Mangakahia got back on the court in the U.S. for the first time since her breast cancer diagnosis, and what a comeback it was with the young Aussie star scoring a game-high 16 points. We are in awe.
Support us
Our Siren Supporters are our biggest source of income. Every paid subscription helps us to commission more women’s sport features and profiles, cover more women’s sports and bring you more women in sport stories. For the price of a coffee a month you can help us to keep doing just that!
You can sign up as a monthly supporter today for only $5 per month. We also offer an annual supporter option for $60 a year.
All funds from our Siren Supporters go directly back into Siren to help run the collective, commission writers and deliver programs like the Siren Emerging Sports Writer Program.
Alternatively, you can get your hands on some official Siren merch and wear your support of women in sport proudly.