Bulldogs vice-captain Jordan Roughead writes a fortnightly column for the Ballarat Courier. The following excerpt is from a piece published on 29 May 2015. For the full column, visit the Courier website.

The people who play AFL football are some of the luckiest I know. They have the opportunity to positively impact the lives of many Australians. 

Of late, the chance to influence people has been extended to a new group of people.

In a curtain-raiser to our round-eight match against Melbourne, the Western Bulldogs and Melbourne fielded teams of highly skilled amateur athletes in the third game of women’s AFL. 

I was fortunate enough to attend the draft for the two teams about a month ago and present players selected by the Bulldogs with their first red, white and blue jumpers – one of which was Ballarat’s Kaitlyn Ashmore. 

The emotion in the room was incredible. The elation of those selected was matched by the devastation of those who weren’t.

However, what surprised me the most was the incredible support these women showed for each other. 

Despite the fact that most of them go head-to-head playing in women’s leagues around the country every weekend, it was as if they wanted success for each other as much as they wanted it for themselves.

Standing on a windswept Whitten Oval, watching the Bulldogs team train, it crossed my mind that when I’m out there training with my teammates, I am one of about 800 men playing Australian rules at the highest level. But when I was out there with the women’s team, I was watching 22 of the best 50 female players in the country. 

The thing that I loved the most about seeing the women running around on the MCG was that it gave young girls everywhere something to aspire to. 

For years it has only been young boys that could dream about playing football on the “’G”, but now girls can, too.