IN just a single game the Bathurst Giants women have sent a message out to the rest of the Central West AFL women’s competition: We mean business.
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Playing their first ever match of senior women’s football as a club, the Giants picked apart an understaffed Parkes Panthers side 83 to nil at George Park on Saturday.
Giants set out to simply apply their pre-season lessons and get through the contest with encouraging signs.
They never expected to come away with the dominant result.
Liz Kennedy is a very proud coach.
“I never saw that coming in my wildest dreams. All we wanted to do was to get through the game,” she said.
“We had no expectations whatsoever. It was just to get a team on the paddock, which was our goal for the full year, but the girls blew me away.”
The match tipped in the Giants’ favour early on but even with a team still learning to play together the Bathurst women hardly put a foot wrong.
At half-time the match was effectively sewn up with a 45-0 lead.
Even with the significant advantage the hosts didn’t relax, producing their best quarter of football at the resumption of play and kicking 26 points.
Giants finished with 11 goals. Tamara Thompson made history by picking up the team’s first hat-trick of majors.
“We clicked immediately, which is pretty much unheard of with a new bunch of girls. There’s only three girls out of the 21 who have played before,” Kennedy said.
“What they lacked in experience they made up for in enthusiasm.”
Meanwhile cross-city rivals and three-time premiers Bathurst Bushrangers were in another class against the Cowra Blues.
Bushrangers won 20-17-137 to 1-0-6 over the Blues, with Keeghan Tucker kicking six goals and Haylee Lepaio finding five.
Carla Arcuri and Sally Hennessy were named best on ground for the visiting Bushrangers at Mulyan Oval.