ONE club had too many players, the other not enough. Together they are ensuring their footballers can take the field.
Ocean Grove and Barwon Heads are two of six football clubs that will field merged teams in the 2026 AFL Barwon women’s season.
Like St Mary’s and Geelong Amateur, Barwon Heads had enough players to fill a team and a half: too many for
their team sheet but not enough to make a stand-alone seconds team.
Ocean Grove was committed to having their players on field, but like Thomson and St Albans did not have enough to go it alone.
When they realised their neighbours were in the same half-a-team conundrum, it made sense for these two cross-bridge rivals to join forces.
Barwon Heads female football director, Nicole Bacely, said the merge is bigger than any club rivalries.
“It’s more about the girls than it is the club,” Bacely said.
“At the moment it’s about getting girls on the field, in the game, it’s a different program for men versus women.”
Ocean Grove director of female football, Bianca Quinn, said the merge has ensured their young players can continue to play football.
Having the guidance of experienced players has already paid dividends.
“Barwon Heads have been amazing at including our girls and making them feel really welcome,” Quinn said.
“They’re really excited, they’ve loved training, it’s just really important for those young girls to have really strong female footy role models.”
Bacely said the clubs had been working with the league so players can move between Barwon Heads’
division one team and the merged second team.
She said ensuring movement between the teams was key to player retention for both clubs.
“The league has worked really closely with us, and we’ve worked really closely with the league, and they’ve given those girls an exemption to play division 1 or division 2 if they are good enough to be selected for division 1,” Bacely said.
“There is no point having them just play division 2 if they’re a standout and should be playing division 1.”
Bacely and Quinn agreed that allowing clubs to work together so players can take the field, rather than forcing them into recess, is part of a sustainable competition.
“The league talked about wanting to really build a sustainable program and this is what it looks like,” Bacely said.
“To be able to maintain and sustain players in the game, you need to be able to be flexible because women’s needs are so much different to men.”
Quinn believes Ocean Grove and Barwon Heads have the chance to build a strong women’s program into the future.
With both clubs prioritising access, she sees a bright future for women’s footy at both clubs.
“We’ve got to compete with the likes of St Joey’s, St Mary’s and Ammos,” she said.
“They’re well established really successful senior, women’s clubs so I think that if we could join forces a bit, share resources and all of that sort of stuff that, you know, we could become a really big force.”
Senior female footy will begin on Friday 17 April.