There are moments in sport that you know you’ll remember forever. Not because of the scoreboard, but because you were fortunate enough to be there when something changed forever.

Representing Australia in the first AFLW international match against Ireland is one of those moments.

To pull on an Australian jumper alongside some of the best footballers our game has produced is something I’ll never take for granted.

The football was always going to be exciting. Two proud sporting nations. Two different styles. Two teams desperate to create history. What I didn’t expect was how much I’d take away from everything that happened before the first ball was bounced.

Walking into camp on Thursday felt a little like the first day of school. You leave the comfort of your club, your routine and the teammates you’ve built trust with over years, and step into a completely new environment.

You know everyone’s name before you arrive. You’ve watched them for years. You’ve planned against them, competed against them and admired them. But suddenly you’re all wearing the same colours, sitting in the same meeting room trying to work out where you fit.

I’ve spent the better part of the past decade trying to stop players like Chloe Molloy from impacting games. I’ve chased Courtney Hodder as she’s burst away from contests, tried to limit the influence of Ella Roberts as she’s taken games apart, and watched Monique Conti do things with a football that most players simply can’t. For years, they’ve been the opposition.

As footballers, we spend countless hours analysing one another. We know each other’s strengths, we search for weaknesses and build game plans.You become so familiar with the player that it’s easy to forget you don’t actually know the person behind the footballer.

Then, almost overnight, those opponents become your teammates. For the first few hours, everyone naturally gravitates towards familiar faces. You sit with teammates from your own club, conversations are polite and there’s a little uncertainty. It’s not uncomfortable, just unfamiliar.
That changed quickly.

On our first night together, Daisy Pearce took us through a connection activity. Every player shared a photo that represented an important part of their football journey and explained why it mattered. Within an hour, the room changed. You stopped seeing All-Australians, premiership players and rivals. You saw people. Stories of sacrifice, family, setbacks, resilience and opportunity quickly replaced club colours and old rivalries.

By the end of the evening, the laughter had become louder than the awkwardness. It no longer felt like 30 players from different AFLW clubs. It simply felt like Australia. That was probably the biggest surprise of the entire week.

I thought bringing together the best players in the country would be the hardest part. Every club has different systems, different terminology and different ways of doing things. We’d spent years trying to outsmart one another.

Instead, everyone arrived with the same mindset. Early in the week, coach Darren Crocker left us with a message that stayed with me: “Let’s be remembered as great teammates.”

It wasn’t about who kicked the most goals, won the most possessions or took the best mark.
It was about the impact we’d have on each other. There were no egos, no concern about individual accolades and no sense of club rivalries beneath the surface. Everyone wanted the same thing — to connect quickly, learn from one another and represent Australia in a way that honoured the jumper.

I think that says everything about where AFLW is today. The standard of football is incredibly high, but the quality of the people might be even higher. Having Darren Crocker and Daisy Pearce leading the program made that transition feel seamless. There was never any panic about trying to fast-track chemistry. They trusted that if you put good people together with a shared purpose, the football would take care of itself. And they were right.

There was another moment during the week that gave all of us a little more perspective. Like many of us, I’d always thought this was the first time Australian women had represented their country against Ireland. It wasn’t until we came together that I learned about the remarkable group of women who had organised an Australian team back in 2006.

Long before AFLW existed, before professional contracts and the support systems we now have, they made the tour happen off their own backs simply because they wanted the chance to represent Australia. To have Pearce, who played in that team, standing in front of us as one of our coaches, along with pioneer Debbie Lee, was a powerful reminder that while we were creating history, we were also continuing a legacy built by women who came before us.

Walking into North Sydney Oval and seeing thousands of people there to witness this moment gave me goosebumps.

Standing shoulder to shoulder during the national anthem, hearing it echo around a packed North Sydney Oval, it wasn’t just a feeling of pride. It was perspective. We weren’t only representing ourselves or our clubs. We were representing every AFLW player who had helped grow our game to a point where this occasion was possible.

The Irish played exactly how we’d expected — passionate, fearless, physical and relentlessly competitive. They challenged every contest and embraced the occasion. It made the experience even more special because both teams knew they were creating something much bigger than themselves.

With the AFLW season just around the corner, there was naturally some outside curiosity about whether players would hold back. From the first contest, that question disappeared. The intensity was like a final. Bodies hitting each other with no fear of injury.

Years from now, people will remember the result. They’ll remember who won, who kicked
the first goal and who captained the first Australian team.

I’ll remember something different: sitting beside players I’d spent years trying to beat and realising how quickly rivalry disappears when everyone is chasing the same purpose. I’ll remember the conversations over breakfast, the laughter on the bus and friendships formed in just a few days.

If this week proved anything, it’s that representative football has a place in the AFLW calendar. Whether it’s this format or something that grows into a regular series, I’d love to see more opportunities for players to wear the green and gold. It celebrates our game, honours those who came before us and gives the next generation something even bigger to aspire to.

Now it’s back to club land to take on season 11.

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