MICHELLE Cowan, coach of the Melbourne female team, says she’s rapt to be guiding the side again this year.

Cowan, who is assistant coach at the South Fremantle Football Club in the WAFL and senior coach of the Western Australian under-18 female team, said she was “really excited” to be coaching the Demons against the Western Bulldogs before the male match on June 29 (round 15).

She was the inaugural coach of the female Melbourne team last year in the first AFL sanctioned female match against the Bulldogs. The Demons won the match and she is looking to make it back-to-back wins.

“Last year was great and it can only get better from here,” Cowan told melbournefc.com.au.

“It was just a matter of giving girls an opportunity to run out on the MCG and showcase the product on behalf of all of the women in Australia.

“I thought they did it really well and it is a great product – whatever gender plays it – people love the game.”

Cowan said she was overwhelmed to see “50 of the best female athletes on the park at once” last year.

“They’re extremely talented and there are even more out there, which is great,” she said.

“The level that that game was played at was really exciting and anyone who came and watched the game would probably agree.”

Cowan said the players relished the opportunity to play in the first female AFL match at the home of football.  

“It was an overwhelming response from them. For them to be able to pull on a Melbourne guernsey and run out on the MCG – they were just really excited about the opportunity and some of them were extremely speechless,” she said.

“From a female football perspective, everyone rates this draft as the No.1 thing to be part of because it has a lot of credibility and girls want to be involved in it.”

This year Cowan is eager to give several new players an opportunity.

“We delisted 12 of our players [from last year’s team], so we get to give an opportunity to another 12 players,” she said.

“We’re looking at exploring the talent in Australia and putting that on show again.

“We also just want to grow the female game and showcase it to a larger audience, so we can have a glimpse at how talented these girls really are.”

Cowan said she would love the game to be covered

“It would be great to see this game televised. It was great to see it on the website last year and see a documentary made by the AFL, which was great.”

“It would be great to get more exposure, just so people can see what talent is on show and hopefully we’ll get more females playing footy, which would be a great thing.”