A girls only soccer programme in Alexandra has built up the confidence of around 30 young girls to make new friends and learn new skills.

The six week Soccer Sisters programme was open to all girls aged 5-18 years old, organised by Football South with the support of the local Alexandra Football club.

Funding came from Sport Otago’s Tu Manawa fund and from the New Zealand Football Foundation. This covered the cost of t-shirts, footballs and staff travel costs. Around four mums and students from Dunstan High School also gave some time to assist with running the sessions afterschool on Thursdays at Molyneux park.

Football South Operations and Development officer Sarah Stephen said the ultimate goal was to give as many girls as possible to opportunity to get into football in a fun, social and safe environment.

“Studies have shown that girls…have a better time and build more confidence in a girls only environment. We hope that over the next few years we will have enough girls teams to have a girls only junior league in Central. 

“Skill sessions such as Soccer Sisters are the perfect way to set this up,” Sarah said.

The pathway to soccer can be that Football South first goes into schools and does a session there.

“We then invite [girls] to come along to Soccer Sisters and from there the club can then give the opportunity to sign up to the club and grow their membership.”

Sarah said the important thing with providing programmes like this, is that there needs to be a follow on opportunity after the six weeks finishes.

The girls took home a free t-shirt and soccer ball thanks to funding support from Sport Otago and New Zealand Football. PHOTO: Supplied

Barefoot bravery under blue skies: summer afternoon soccer with your sisters. PHOTO: Supplied

Sarah said there is more visibility of the women’s game at the moment which helps with getting new players.

"It’s been hard with covid though, numbers still haven’t quite recovered in the Football South federation compared to 2019.

"All we can do is keeping pushing women and girls in football and providing girls only initiatives to up the awareness.

"Girls and women’s month (March) is definitely a great way of doing this - activation events, school visits and skill sessions are go a long way in providing opportunity and access to the game."

She said the environment is what makes the girls only initiative special.

"The girls that attended this programme hopefully had a more supportive environment than they are use to. The thing about Soccer Sisters is that the participants don’t need to want to play football and they don’t need to have a lot of experience - everyone that is there just gets to have fun and meet new people their age while kicking a ball around."

"In the junior space... a lot of the time we are doing general movement work and working on confidence with and without the ball.

"Having a positive and comfortable girls only environment gives those girls that perhaps aren’t the most confident the chance to make new friends and try out a new sport.

"Another thing that is positive about this initiative is that we try to remove as many barriers as possible, providing a ball and t-shirt to wear, making it free to access...ensuring that as many girls can get along to the sessions as possible."