Diagonal Pass

The Australian W-League will kick off this weekend with a match between Perth Glory and Sydney FC. A total of eight teams will take part in its inaugural season, including Canberra United. Due to the short length of the season — and, let’s admit it, the low likelihood of making a living wage — a number of Australian players will be playing their trade in two to three leagues per year, e.g. Heather Garriock, who’ll also be playing in Denmark and the US.

W-League matches will be broadcast on free-to-air TV, with the ABC screening one live match per weekend. Not as sweet a deal as one might’ve hoped for, but at least its availability on free-to-air will help publicise the league, coming in at the right time to take advantage of new sources of funding.

(Incidentally, what say you about the FFA’s marketing for the W-League?)

The Matildas meet Vietnam tonight in the finals of the ASEAN Football Federation Women’s Championships. Good luck!

Cute-as-a-bug goalkeeper Melissa Barbieri won’t be playing in the match — Lydia Williams will — but given the launch of the W-League I think it’s high time that I fulfill my promise of pictures.

Melissa Barbieri nearly didn’t go on to play football for Melbourne Victory and Australia at all. She was misdiagnosed with a back injury in 2000, after she’d already made it to the Matildas training squad as a midfielder. Told she would never play football again, Barbieri refused to give up and asked, “What if I don’t run around so much?” — and made the switch between the sticks.

It took two years for Barbieri to establish herself as the Matildas’ #1 goalkeeper.

Barbieri was the first player signed by Melbourne Victory’s women’s team, and playing for the club also holds something of a special significance: she worked for Melbourne Victory’s medical staff three years ago.

Photo by Tony Gough (click for a bigger version)

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