Marita Shoulders' and her Australian Police Rugby League team-mates win the women's Affiliates Cup

It's why the Bathurst talent rates season 2022 as the biggest of her football career.

Shoulders' path to the Australian league outfit - becoming a dual national representative as she'd already worn green and gold in police rugby union - began in May.

That's when the hard working prop lined up for the Country South Steelers at the inaugural women's NSW Police Cup. Her side made the grand final, she was named the women's player of the carnival and earned 2022 NSW Country selection.

From there Shoulders impressed off the bench as NSW Country posted a 14-0 win against City in the NSW Women's Police game and earned state selection.

In her first game in the coveted blue of NSW, Shoulders set up two tries to help her side to a 10-4 win over Queensland at Leichhardt Oval. It earned her selection in the inaugural Australian Police Rugby League side.

Before she laced up her boots and pulled on the green and gold colours, Shoulders found out she'd earned more honours for her efforts in Country South Steelers colours too.

"Getting named in the team of the year was pretty cool, they're a good supportive bunch, and I got Steelers' women's player of the year as well," she said.

"It's been a pretty big year, I wouldn't say that capped it because I knew this [Australian game] was coming, but it was a still a good part of my season.

"There's also another part of my season, that's with the [Panorama] Platypi, so it's been the biggest year I've ever had in footy, it hasn't stopped."

Though her experience with the Australian Police Rugby League side wasn't a multi-game series as initially planned, she still felt plenty of pride and excitement at the chance to take on the Australian Defence Force women's side in the Affiliates Cup.

It was excitement that built when she joined her team-mates in Penrith and then had her jumper presented to her by four-times NRL premiership winner Cronk.

"We got a tour of Penrith's Academy, we got to have a look at what their days are like, their set up, we saw [Nathan] Cleary's locker and his captain's hat still sitting there which was pretty cool," she said.

"We were based out of the stadium, we trained on the back field and we got to use their sheds ... they gave us full access to their facility.

"Samantha Bliss our captain, she's on the Queensland Rugby League board, so she works alongside him and hence we got Cooper Cronk to present our jumpers. That was a pretty big honour.

"It was good to hear him talk, get some inspiration from him because he's been there done all that before.

"Sam had spoken to Billy Slater and he passed on some thoughts as well, so yeah, it was pretty big."

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Then came the game itself. It began with an emotional national anthem, it included a early try-saving tackle from Shoulders and then a brilliant second half comeback from her team.

When the final whistle sounded Shoulders and her team-mates were 12-10 victors.

"There were a few tears from a few people at national anthem time, some of us were loving it, some of us were crying," she said.

"It was pretty good, when the national anthem I was on I looked up into the stands and Simon, my partner, had come, Mum was there and for the first time my brother, his wife and two of his girls were there.

"He'd never got to see me play league before and being a league family - yeah it was pretty big.

"We were 10-0 down at half-time. We've got two coaches, Gav Lennon is our head coach, he was very calm and contained and just went back to basics and Joel, he's our assistant coach, he unleashed and gave us a bit of a spray, but a good one.

"It was what we needed to hear, just breaking down some of the things we could do better and it just all worked I guess.

"We'd bombed a few tries in the first half so we knew we could do it, we just had to make the right decisions at the right time. We just came good at the end."

The winning try came with a cross-field kick with 90 seconds left on the clock.

"To win it in the last minute was great. I missed the last try unfortunately, one of our girls got injured so I was try assist with that and I just looked up and everyone was screaming that we won," Shoulders said.

"It was pretty good to win and that we are the first women to wear those jerseys too, that's our number, we started that and to come away with a win at the death showed we all clicked.

"The coaches were amazing, the support staff was amazing, they all had belief in us. They gave us a simple game plan and we executed it."

To ice the experience, Shoulders and her team-mates wore their full kits out that evening.

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