The women’s side will play on Saturdays alongside the senior and reserve-grade men’s teams in the AFL Canberra competition.

The news is a strong indication for the future of the club, and caps off a fantastic year which saw the senior men’s side win their first premiership since 2008.

Senior men’s coach Mick Kenny said interest in a women’s side had been strong for a while now, but the club’s efforts to move the juniors to the Sapphire Coast AFL last summer delayed the process.

“We’ve had a lot of people showing interest in it over the past couple of years, but we were trying to work out our junior and senior grades,” he said.

“We feel the women playing on the same day as the men’s grade will be really good for the club going forward.

“I don’t have exact numbers just yet, but there’s enough interest for us to push for the team and for the AFL Canberra to say yes. We should also be announcing a coach in the next couple of weeks.”

The club has worked hard to get approval from AFL Canberra after being knocked back earlier in the year.

“About half way through last season we asked what the process was, and we got knocked back,” he said. “Through dealings with the AFL and Arlo Ireland (club president), they’ve managed to work it out.”

The big winners from this decision are women and girls from Batemans Bay who will be given the opportunity to play regular, competition Aussie rules. Previously, players were forced to travel to either Moruya or Narooma to play footy.

However, Kenny said the club will also benefit from the new team.

“It’s good to have more bodies at the club,” he said. “Not only are you getting more people to functions and gamedays, but you’ve got more volunteers around the club.

“I watched the Batemans Bay Tigers a couple of times this year, and their league tag girls were always heavily involved on gamedays, which was great to see.”

While there is still work to do before fielding a side next season, Kenny can’t see any reason why the team won’t take the field in round one.

“We’re still very much in the preliminary stages, but everyone is really excited,” he said. “I believe they’ll do preseason training with the men, so that’ll be something new for us.”