Social media is currently awash with requests for Expressions Of Interest from NSW-based players looking to play National Premier League football in 2025, with the midway mark of the 2024 season having passed and young footballers being prompted to think about their next step in the game. Rumours have been swirling, for years even, of an alignment of the NPL2 Women’s structure to that of the top tier NPL1 Women’s league; so what exactly are we expressing our interest in for 2025?
The Sydney-centric Football NSW Leagues Women’s structure was reworked into its current format at the conclusion of the 2021 season. The top flight, the NPL Women’s, was to be expanded by two teams to bring it up to a 22-game home-and-away season, with finals, adhering to the remit that footballers need to play more football in this country. The 2022 season in the second tier, the NPL League One Women’s, was a marathon slog, a thirty-game season that started in the hazy heat of mid-February; the newly formed sixteen-team competition was a transition for some clubs to representative football, and with no relegation from the top tier and two clubs being promoted, this was a one-off double chance to hit the big time.
As at 2022, the youth structure of the top tier involved steps from GSAP (Girls Skills Aquisition Program) to Under 14s, then Under 15s, Under 16s and Under 18s. The senior teams were Reserve Grade and First Grade, and those two senior grades, along with the Under 18s formed part of the Club Championship that would determine future club champions and the dreaded relegation position. It was no good just being the best in first grade, each club would need to excel across all three levels.
The second tier, the League One Women’s, was identical up to Under 16s and that’s where the two levels of women’s football diverged. There was no Under 18s in League One Women’s, and the senior first grade was complemented by an Under 20s division. Again, a club championship would determine promotion places, so it was imperative for clubs to be strong across both levels in order to push for the coveted number one spot and a place in the promised land of the NPL Women’s.
Since the 2022 season’s reshuffling to two divisions of 12 and 14 teams, the structure has remained the same. Even the somewhat predictable tidal wave of interest in the women’s game midway through 2023, as the Women’s World Cup captured the nation, didn’t provoke a change in the structure to align the two divisions to have the same age groups. Instead, what we saw was an unhealthy attrition rate of players who simply had nowhere to go after Under 16s. The return to club football, of shorter seasons and games at the mercy of the weather, meant that a huge batch of quality footballers were left in limbo, their heads turned by other sports and other interests, potentially lost from the system altogether. No room for late bloomers.
Which brings us to the middle of 2024. We’re just about to go through the same merry-go-round of player movements ahead of the 2025 season, and clubs are readying themselves. The Expressions Of Interest adverts are everywhere, even though official trials season is not until after the last games have been played. Top-tier clubs want to attract the best, and with the Under 18s competition counting towards the Club Championship, they will happily dispense of Under 16s players in order to keep their younger Under 18s players and replenish with fresh talent from other clubs and from club football. Those Under 16s players will now find themselves vying for a spot in an Under 20s league in the second tier – an unenviable task, given the volume of players already in that position from the previous two seasons.
What is an Expression Of Interest anyway? The amount of interest in women’s football right now means that hundreds of potential players will make contact with multiple NPL clubs in the hope of attracting attention ahead of the 2025 season. There are no resources to follow up each and every one of these EOIs, and those players or parents expressing interest will simply form part of a mailing list to make sure there are plenty of bodies at trials and pre-trials training sessions in late September or early October. Perversely, all those trials will be taking place on the same weekends, clubs running trials at the same time on the same day, and players will need to choose carfefully which ones to attend. In most cases, the trials will be the very last step in formulating a squad for the following season. Often, the selection process has already been done by the time the hordes of hopeful trialists turn up for their one-hour shot at the big time and in some cases the clubs are simply going through the motions with squads already finalised. The decision whether or not to align the two divisions of NPL Women’s with the same age groups is therefore important and pertinent : all of a sudden there will be a new age group in the second tier, potentially 200+ new places available, and the trial process will be turned on its head.
So, the rumour mill is in motion. Are we going to get an Under 18s competition in the second tier, to match the top division? Has the horse already bolted? Are we too late to make that change, now that the Expressions Of Interest are already circulating? Or are we just about to see women’s football in NSW move to the next level, and nurture the talent for two more years before throwing the girls to the mercy of senior football? Will the Matildas’ World Cup legacy be fulfilled? All will be revealed…
