By Luke Voogt
It’s little wonder four-year-old Matilda McMahon is pumped for her Auskick debut, when mum Maddy plays footy for Geelong in Australia’s top female league.
“I like kicking and I like when the Cats win,” Tilda chimed in when the Independent caught up with her mother recently.
“She’s fast. She kicks goals… no, she tries to stop the goals.”
Tilda was showing the most interest in Aussie Rules out of her three children, Maddy revealed.
“She’s starting Auskick this year so she’s pretty excited,” the Cats defender said.
“I played footy as a kid and I never had those female role models. So it’s special for me, her starting that and having something to aspire to.”
Maddy played juniors for St Joseph’s Football Club, where being the only girl was never “an issue”.
“I didn’t feel like the odd one out and I was good mates with a lot of the boys,” the 30-year-old said.
But with no leagues for girls at the time, Maddy had to give up football after under nines.
“When I think about it now, it seems crazy that girls couldn’t play any further,” she said.
She pursued basketball and went on to represent the Australian Institute of Sport in the Women’s National Basketball League.
She also played elite level basketball for the Geelong Supercats and netball for local clubs.
But she never lost her love of footy.
She said when the VFLW kicked off in 2016 she would watch games with husband Matt, himself a highly-accomplished Geelong footballer.
In 2017, just after giving birth to her third child, she watched the Cats VFLW debut.
The AFLW had just kicked off too, although the Cats would have to wait another two years to enter the comp.
“I just remember watching and thinking this would be so good to play,” Maddy said.
“I went to watch round one down at Kardinia Park, and I had so much jealousy. Some of my friends were playing.”
Maddy made the Cats’ VFLW team in 2018.
“I was pretty unfit to be honest,” she said.
“But I played pretty much every game.”
After she impressed in the VFLW, the Cats selected her for their inaugural AFLW side in 2019.
Maddy would come third in Geelong’s best-and-fairest after the side made the semi-finals in its first season, despite a negative win-loss record.
“It was incredible,” she said.
“Now I sort of think, ‘is it actually real?’ It was a bit of whirlwind.”
But juggling motherhood with elite level football could be challenging, Maddy explained.
“You’re a parent during the day, which is an exhausting job in itself,” she said.
“You have to switch on again mentally, physically and emotionally during training and games – so you’re trying to be ‘on’ for so many hours of the day.”
She remembered instances when she had been too exhausted to train.
“One time the kids had just started school and kinder, and everyone was a bit out of whack and waking up in the middle of the night,” she said.
“I was trying to manage everyone’s emotions. And mine.”
But the coaching staff understood and, rather than have her risk injury training tired, told her to “go home and get some rest”, she said.
Motherhood also compounds the fear of injury, Maddy explained, as she recounted a hit to the neck against Brisbane last month.
“It’s one thing that makes me nervous playing,” she said.
“I tackled someone and her shoulder sort of got me in the throat – I couldn’t breathe that well at first.
“My first thought when I got hit was ‘I need to parent tonight and I can’t afford to get injured’. My day-to-day job is to look after three kids.”
Her kids and husband visited her in hospital while staff monitored her breathing as a precaution.
“They were a bit worried about what was going on. But Matt plays football, so he knows what that involves.”
And the enjoyment of playing elite football always overcame the fear, Maddy said.
“You kind of just put it to the back of your mind.”
Matt, a three-time GFL best-and-fairest winner, is often a “second coach” to his wife.
“We can actually talk about (games) in more of a coaching sense rather than just, ‘that was a good kick’,” she said.
“He’s picked a few midfielders out of our team, and he chats to them and gives them tips often.”
A plumber by day, Matt had also stepped up with dad duties to support Maddy during training and games, she said.
“It’s good that his boss is flexible with that stuff but it also means he gets to spend more time with the kids, which is great.”
Despite a “disappointing” start to the 2020 season, Maddy said she was “proud” of the “young” side’s first win against Richmond last Saturday.
Before the win the Cats went down valiantly to both conference leaders, Brisbane and Fremantle, and reigning premiers Adelaide.
They were improving their inside 50s and score conversion, areas where they had previously struggled, Maddy said.
Maddy acknowledged critics taking aim at the skills of AFLW players, despite the league only being four-years-old compared to the AFL’s 123-year history.
“People are expecting us to be elite in every aspect of the game but the reality is we’re only there 15 hours,” she said.
“We don’t get to work on it every hour like the men’s sides. But there’s so much more positivity than negativity.
“The crowds at games are getting larger every year. There’s always young girls at our games, which is amazing because you feel like someone to look up to.”
At one game she spotted a teenage boy, a family friend, at a game with his mates.
“They were getting autographs and enjoying it as well,” she said.
“That made me happy because all the boys are getting around it too.”
But if Matilda wants to play AFLW in 15 years or so, she could face stiffer competition for a place than her mum.
“Even now with the young players getting drafted, their skill level is so much better because they’ve been playing since they were five,” Maddy said.
“Girls that come in now are definitely more skilled than someone like me who has only been playing two years.”
