Queensland's Women Roar

thesimplestgame has a remarkable interview to post. David Taylor, author of English Settlement, was generous enough to answer some questions so we’ve been looking forward to posting it.

And I will, soon enough.

Not today though. Today, its hats off to the Queensland Roar’s W-League team who followed their minor premiership win by taking out the grand final on Saturday.

The game itself wasn’t a great spectacle. Two good goals inside the first 25 minutes wrapped it up for Queensland. Canberra United never recovered. The event though, the winning of the inaugural league in front of over 5,000 paying fans, is something to consider. If a women’s league final can generate this much interest the game is clearly gathering strength and position in this country.

A-League fans would tell you that it’s been happening for a few years already. Their detractors, and there are still a lot more of them, would have you believe otherwise. For thesimplestgame, avid supporters of the W-League and our local team, a noisy women’s final is surely all the evidence that’s needed.

My wee lassie’s first trip to a big game was the story for the day. It’s hardly news right enough and she’s been in a stadium before, a glorious stadium, but she was too young to that remember now. She’s a sturdy, ‘grown-up’ (her words not mine) six year old.

One hot dog and 20 minutes of concern over the food wrappers being blown onto the pitch later, she’d missed the first goal. She was elated to have caught the second, and cheered along with the rest of us. I spent the remainder of the half explaining as much of the football as I could. Like any dutiful daughter she listened politely. She even exhibited some signs of interest.

Half time refreshments called for a run up and down steep stairs and a trip to the merchandise van, despite the Aladdin’s cave of orange attire on offer, all she wanted was a flag. So we got one. She waved the living shit out of it for the first 15 minutes of the second half. We stayed away from seated punters so she could do so with a reasonable amount of freedom. I then managed to get her back to our seats, but not before we’d tried higher in the stand and then lower, before settling back to the midway point. We sat in front of the wall at the bottom of the tier. She could not see the pitch and spent the duration of the game standing on my knees shouting as loud as her wee voice would allow.

With only a few minutes left we decided to start making our way to an exit. Thankfully she missed the streaker, if only because my explanation of that incident would have generated slightly more confusion than the offside rule.

Most importantly she wants to go again. She wants to go as soon as the season starts. I’ve not pushed her. Yes the game was my idea and the onus was on me to entertain but the Queensland Roar women’s team helped me out, enough to see her want to return.

It goes without saying that the more popular the game is, interest in football fiction will follow suit.