Pam Grant, Mel Andreatta and women’s director of coaching Rob Askew attended a recent meeting at ANZ Stadium to discuss issues, problems, solutions and the future of Premier League level football.

Rob Askew and Pam Grant have prepared a report on the outcome of the meeting, which has been coming for years. All this time there has been murmurings of discontent and players have voted with their feet leaving the game early and in large numbers.

This season the Souths club pulled out in the 4th round and some time shortly after Lions pulled out their reserve grade. This combined with the struggle every club has to fill its roster and the massive scorelines between the top and bottom clubs has finally brought the issue to a head.

There is also a continuing climate of reform in Australian football that just maybe has finally reached women’s football.

Issues on the agenda were:

  • Attitudes to Women’s Football (FIFA, FFA, FQ, FB, Clubs, Coaches, Players, etc);
  • Current Structure of Women’s Premier League Football Competitions;
  • Restructuring and Limitations;
  • Effects on Other Local Competitions (Premier League, Div 1, etc);
  • Financial considerations;
  • Length of Competition;
  • State and National Titles;
  • Age limitations;
  • Women’s National League; and
  • Women’s Standing Committee.

For years now the Premier League has been stagnating. There has been a falling average age of players (the average age of the Premier League is 19.5 years of age), massive drop out rates, a gulf in standard between the top and bottom teams and despite a continuing upward trend of female participation in the sport at best the standard of play as remained static. There are a number of historical reasons for this.

Firstly, there is the introduction of the QAS in the early 1990s. Although this changed women’s football fundamentally it has amazingly taken nearly 20 years to come to grips with the fact that this is the most likely pathway to national team representation.

The QAS has made Open Age representative football redundant and the result is that there has been little to offer older players to keep them involved in the game at a competitive level.Clearly, club football has not been able to fill this void.

This, however, is not fully the clubs’ fault. There is a strong historical culture to representative football in Queensland women’s soccer and the powers that be have not looked to the clubs. This may be because generally speaking clubs are male dominated and at best have tolerated women’s football.

Women’s football has been centred around players who have often been itinerant moving from one club to the next because clubs, being what they are, have not really made them feel included. As a result, the Premier League has been dying a death by a thousand cuts.

Despite what the clubs do everyone around them from the national team coach who ordered the removal of elite players from local competitions in 2005 to the QAS, to the school system and state federation who put in place a calendar of representative football that destroys the flow of competitions and even finals series undermines the status, standard and credibility of local competitions.

This it appears may be about to all change. Women’s football might be about to step into the mainstream. In October this year the FFA will launch a women’s national league.

Queensland will be represented by the Queensland Roar. There will be a minimum age of 16 for this competition and the FFA is hoping that it will encourage older players to strive to play in it and encourage players to remain in the game.

However, the Queensland Roar will not contribute a cent to this team.Why then is it called the Queensland Roar if it is to be funded by the FFA and FQ? This is because for this entity to participate in Asian Champions League it MUST be a club team.The Asian Confederation and FIFA place great importance on clubs. Clubs all over the world are the basis of our game and they are the basis of the Associations that make up FIFA.

Football culture now appears likely to influence the way the Premier League is structured. One of the main themes discussed at the meeting on Friday night was the massive gap between the standard of the Premier League and the QAS.

There is a culture of social football in at least half the clubs in the Premier League and perhaps four or five teams of a sufficient standard. With 10 teams and an insufficient number of players with the commitment and temperament of a competitive athlete the end product is all too often a poor standard of play.

This does not create a level that is good enough to not only motivate competitive players but to give them an environment in which they can develop their playing standard. Older players with aspirations but who missed out on the QAS pathway as a teenager are the great neglected component of the women’s football community and it is their needs that are now being addressed.

Support at the meeting was for a new prestigious State League including regional areas like the Gold and Sunshine Coast, South West Queensland and perhaps Northern NSW which would provide an elite level of competition below the national league. There is someway to go and plenty of negotiations between FQ and FB as to who would administer it so there is of course no certainty as yet.

It is hoped it will provide a platform for players, especially late developers, to make it to the national league and with luck national teams. It happens in men’s football and structures need to be in place so that this opportunity is available for women.

In 2009 perhaps we will see four or five of the best Brisbane clubs do battle with the best from the South-East corner of Queensland. Maybe we will see a return of QAS and national team players to the local league and better still wearing the Gold And Purple of our great club.

Perhaps also we will see parity in prizemoney between the men and women’s Premier Leagues. These were all issues raised and discussed which will be discussed further in August after the FQ board has met. One thing is certain – The Gap will be expected to be part of this competition and The Gap should ensure that it is.

The bar will be raised and the great challenge for our club will be in whether we have the off-field resources to ensure we meet our match day presentation and the possible financial obligations. The Gap will always be able to offer a participation level of football.

As a club we have to make sure we continue to stay at the top of the women’s game and provide that pathway to the highest levels of the game for those in our community who have the ability and desire to play at the highest levels.

You just have to see Gap girls like Lilly Bremner and Chantelle Brdjanovic who have been invited to the AIS for a camp for the under-17 Matildas or Ruth Blackburn who played for the under-19 Matildas this year for the first time or Ellen Beaumont who became a senior Matilda in China three weeks ago to know its worth the effort.

So, if you have a skill or some time to give step forward and help our club meet these new and exciting challenges.