Lionesses generously gift gym equipment to the Mariners

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Central Coast Mariners Stadium
Image credit: Central Coast Mariners

The England women’s national team are planning on leaving their mark on Australian football long after the World Cup, with an announcement that they left $584,000 worth of gym equipment to the Mariners.

The team was living at the Crowne Plaza, Terrigal, and training at Gosford’s Industree Group stadium during the FIFA Women’s World Cup, which concluded last Sunday.

The gift from the Lionesses on top of the huge momentum through the amazing Matildas run and crowd numbers have presented Football Australia a huge chance to super-charge the future of women’s football and sport in general.

The Mariners will be fielding a Liberty A-League Women’s team for the first time next season and attracting fans will be a key goal in the teams infancy as the club projects to build on its Men’s success and rise in popularity.

Nick Montgomery, head coach of the Central Coast Mariners, in an interview with talkSPORT expressed his delight with the current European champions who have massively helped the Australian club throughout the World Cup.

“It is important we continue to build resources,” Montgomery told talkSPORT.

“FIFA invest a lot of money, and for us to get some gym equipment, the stuff they are leaving behind to the only club on the central coast, it is a great gesture from them.

“Not only will it help us develop the young kids, but also the first-team and W League team as well,” he continued in the interview.

The Mariners continue to be the club most involved in the A-League Men’s regarding business-to-business dealings. The club have emphasised an importance on the corporate side of the football club, with over 50 current partners, most of them local businesses, that share the same view of connecting with the Gosford and Central Coast community in improving grassroots football as well as their already amazing on-field performance.

Central Coast Mariners have provided a fantastic foundation for their women’s team, renovating Central Coast stadium to host their matches and creating a development pathway for female footballers in the Central Coast region so that they can ensure sustainable results.

This gift from the Lionesses will only further help their cause and is a reward of the fantastic business the club has done recently.

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Project ACL: The initiative leading the way on injury research

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Launched in 2024, the research project recently welcomed two US-based organisations: the National Women’s Soccer League Players Association (NWSLPA) and National Women’s Soccer League (NWSL).

 

About Project ACL

Led by FIFPRO, PFA England, Nike and Leeds Beckett University, Project ACL aims to research ACL injuries and understand more about multifactorial risk factors.

After piloting in England’s Women’s Super League (WSL), Project ACL will expand to the NWSL in the US, reflecting the global importance of the project’s research and outcome.

“We are incredibly excited to bring the NWSLPA and NWSL to Project ACL,” said Director of Women’s Football at FIFPRO, Dr. Alex Culvin, via official press release.

“Overall, we believe that player-centricity and collaboration with key stakeholders are central to establishing meaningful change in the soccer ecosystem and that players, competition organisers and stakeholdersaround the world will benefit from Project ACL’s outputs and outcomes.”

Interviews with over 30 players and team surveys across all 12 WSL clubs provided the project’s research team with valuable information about current prevention strategies and available resources.

Furthermore, the project tracks player workload and busy schedule periods during the season through the FIFPRO Player Workload Monitoring tool, therefore gaining insights into the link between scheduling and injury risks.

 

Looking to the data

Project ACL’s partnerships with the WSL – and now the NWSL – are immensely valuable for the future of player welfare in women’s football.

Although ACL injuries affect both male and female athletes, they are twice as likely to occur in women than men. However, according to the NWSL, as little as 8% of sports science research focuses on female athletes.

In Australia, several CommBank Matildas suffered ACL injuries in recent years: Sam Kerr was sidelined from January 2024 to September 2025, Ellie Carpenter for 8 months after suffering the injury while playing for Olympique Lyonnais, and Holly McNamara came back from three ACL’s aged 15, 18 and 20.

And this is just the tip of the iceberg. The 2025/26 ALW season saw several ACL incidents, including four in just two weeks.

 

Research, prevent, protect

Injury prevention and research are vital to sport – whether professional or amateur.

But when the numbers are so shocking – and incidents are so common – governing bodies must remember that player welfare comes above all else. Research can inform prevention strategies. Prevention means players can enjoy the game they love.

The work of Project ACL, continuing until 2027, will hopefully protect countless players across women’s football from suffering long-term or recurring injuries.

South Canberra FC Breaks the Mold: Equity-Driven Model Earns ‘Club Changer’ Honour

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Image Credit: SCFC

South Canberra Football Club has been named Club Changer of the Month for April, in a recognition that reflects a broader shift across Australian football toward rewarding clubs that are actively dismantling the structural barriers limiting women’s access to the game.

The AFC Women’s Asian Cup has just delivered record crowds and unprecedented visibility for women’s football in Australia, and the Club Changer program is now asking what comes next. Its decision to name South Canberra Football Club as Club Changer of the Month for April signals a clear shift in how the program defines contribution: away from participation numbers alone, and toward the equity frameworks that determine whether women stay in the game once they arrive.

South Canberra FC built that framework from the ground up. Established in 2021, the club set out to give women and female-identifying players a safe, inclusive environment to play football at any level. It runs entirely on volunteers, operates as a not-for-profit, and is governed by an all-female committee with 13 of its 14 coaches identifying as female.

 

Building the infrastructure of inclusion

In 2026, the club secured grant funding and put it to work immediately. Two coaches are completing their C Licence qualification, and ten coaches, players and community members have undertaken the Foundations of Football course, which directly tackles the cost and accessibility barriers that exclude women out of coaching pathways.

The club also commissioned a female-specific strength and conditioning program with sports physiotherapists ahead of the 2026 season, targeting injury prevention and explicitly supporting players returning after childbirth.

SCFC’s leadership team draws from LGBTIQ+ individuals, First Nations people and veterans, strengthening the club’s connection to the communities it was built to represent.

The Club Changer program is backing clubs that do this work- clubs that treat equity as infrastructure rather than aspiration. At a moment when Australian football is under pressure to turn its biggest-ever surge of women’s interest into something lasting, SCFC’s model offers a clear answer to the question of how.

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