In a country that loves its footy and has embraced a burgeoning national women’s league, one jurisdiction leads the pack.

The Northern Territory has the nation’s highest participation rate of girls’ and women’s Australian Rules football, with females making up more than 40 per cent of registered players — double the national average.

In the past four years, 41 female teams and 291 participants have joined the NT Football League (NTFL).

Part of that increase is due to the timing of the competition, which runs from October to March, allowing professional and semi-professional interstate players to come to the NT after southern seasons end.

It’s a trend that’s long fuelled the growth and standard of men’s footy in the territory and now appears to be having the same effect on the women’s league.

“There is an injection of really talented girls off the back of AFLW that do come into the NTFL following a good season there — the likes of [Adelaide Crows player] Danielle Ponter and previously [Hawthorn player] Janet Baird,” Jasmyn Hewett said.

Hewett, a former AFLW premiership player for the Adelaide Crows, is today the assistant coach of the PINT Football Club’s women’s premier league team in Darwin.

She said the territory had become “the place to play” for female players around the country and “a really good platform for girls that want to be seen”.

“AFLW clubs are watching. It’s the only footy that’s playing in Australia [in the summer months],” Hewett said.

“It’s exciting. It’s electric, it’s fast. It’s not really like southern football that we’re used to seeing on TV.”

As they do for men’s teams, several NTFL clubs now sponsor female “fly-ins” to come play with their teams for a few games or an entire season. 

Ms Hewett said that “brings everyone else up to a higher standard” and helps develop the competition as a whole.

“To get the opportunity to play against some of Australia’s best players, it’s huge,” she said. 

A growing part of the NT ‘experience’

As much as the territory has become a training ground for those with their eye on competing professionally, for many, women’s footy has also become a unique part of the Top End “experience”.

Banks Bulldogs Football Club doesn’t have a women’s premier league team but instead champions players seeking a more casual game in the NTFL’s divisions 1 and 2.

Banks Bulldogs vice-president Leah Reilly said 80 to 90 per cent of the club’s female players were new arrivals to the NT.

“When people move up here, they don’t usually come up with a huge friendship circle — people are coming up for work, or maybe their partner’s work,” she said.

Ms Reilly said the vast majority of Banks Bulldogs’ female players had also never played footy before moving to the territory.

“Nearly everyone who has joined Banks are not footballers, they’ve never played down south, they’ve never done it as a junior,” she said.

“It’s during the wet season, it’s really fun. I think learning a new skill as an adult is really exciting.”

Anna Bowie is just one Banks Bulldogs player who never had the chance to play footy before moving to Darwin.

She said the town she grew up in, Deniliquin — a small country town in New South Wales — was “passionate about footy” but doesn’t have girls’ or women’s teams.

“I watched my brother play for years and I’ve always liked watching but I never played myself until [last] year,” she said.

“It was never really something that crossed my mind, until being up here.”

She said she had made great friends through the sport both on and off the field.

“Everyone’s learning, everyone makes mistakes, has a laugh about it,” she said.

“But then it’s also great to play with some girls who have played a lot of footy, you can learn so much off them as well.”