Trailblazing women unite behind netballers as inspirational Matildas win 2023 Don award | OneFootball

Matildas’ striker Kyah Simon has backed netball players in their dispute over pay and conditions, saying Australia’s footballers have deep empathy for their plight and that all the nation’s women athletes should continue to push for better rights.

The Central Coast Mariners star made the comments at the MCG, where she accepted the Sport Australia Hall of Fame’s Don Award on behalf of the Matildas, who were judged to be the athletes to provide the most inspiration to Australians in 2023. The national team finished fourth at the World Cup in a tournament that broke ratings records and attracted millions of fans.

Netball Australia and its players have been locked in negotiations this year over their latest pay deal. The parties are meeting in Melbourne on Friday with hopes to find a resolution to the long-running funding brawl.

“We can really empathise,” Simon said. “The Matildas team were in that same position only a few years ago when we were fighting for our CBA [collective bargaining agreement] rights.” In that case, the Matildas went on strike in 2015 for two months, the action only concluding when a new deal was struck that gave players better wages with improved conditions.

In recent years the footballers have enjoyed a more harmonious relations with Football Australia as their profile has risen. The Matildas and Socceroos secured a new pay deal last month that includes a revenue sharing component, that has been described as “a partnership in growing the game.”

Australian Netball Players’ Association chief executive Kathryn Harby-Williams said on Thursday some netballers had been “weeping” and “sleeping in cars” during the bargaining dispute. It struck a chord with Simon who asked for recognition that these kinds of negotiations affect athletes on the field and in their personal lives.

“I really feel for the girls, I know what they’re going through,” she said. “It’s never easy fighting for the rights that you truly deserve, and you’re being starved of, so I hope they can come to a resolution fast.”

At the same event, Australia’s pioneering 2000 women’s water polo team was awarded this year’s Dawn Award. The accolade is for athletes who have “changed sport for the better”. The team was recognised for their 20-year struggle to have women’s water polo included in the Olympics in 2000, when they won gold in Sydney.

Accepting the Dawn, one of those pioneering players, Taryn Woods, said there was solidarity between all women athletes.

“Out of something that is really difficult and challenging, hopefully there will come some really long term change, and something better for the athletes, for the sport and for women’s sport,” she said. “They’re fighting a battle not just for themselves, but for women’s sport across the board, so we’re all behind them absolutely.”

Former Socceroo Tim Cahill was presented with a medal for being inducted into the Hall of Fame and said men’s and women’s sport shouldn’t compete, and the Matildas should be acknowledged as heroes in their own right.

“Men’s and women’s sports should stand next to each other, it’s not ‘how amazing they can do’ and ‘how amazing I can do’. We have Sam Kerr who is doing amazing things as a goalscorer,” Cahill said, acknowledging that the Matildas’ striker had passed Cahill’s tally of international goals last year.

“For me, sharing the stage or even sitting underneath, it’s not a competition. I’m just happy that I got the opportunity to create a pathway for boys and girls in Australia.”

This year’s other inductees into the Hall of Fame include rugby league player Johnathan Thurston, rower Kim Brennan, wheelchair athlete Kurt Fearnley, freestyle skier Lydia Lassila, athlete and hockey player Nova Peris and rower Tim McLaren.

Australian Rules' star Bob Skilton, seven-time surfing world champion Layne Beachley and indigenous rugby union icon Mark Ella were elevated to ‘legend’ status.

Header image: [Photograph: Jono Searle/AAP]