All Australian sports have been hit hard by the ongoing complications surrounding COVID-19, but one could argue that women’s sport has felt a greater impact over the past two years, considering many are run on much smaller budgets and female athletes receive less remuneration and fewer opportunities.

This quote from former US Olympics baseball pitcher Cheri Kempf sums it up best:

Yet, the amount of sportsmen that have complained about the sustainability of hubs and pay cuts, or breached the biosecurity rules during this time, may have made you think otherwise.

While many male athletes have taken their privileges for granted and struggled to follow the rules, expressing how tough it has been, female athletes have been working hard in the background – often jumping through hoops to ensure their competitions go ahead.

The events in the NRL last week portray a pretty poignant example of this and the stark contrast in the way men’s and women’s sports have handled the pandemic.

State border closures make for series of mad dashes

Super Netball was put into a frenzy midway through last week, when Queensland had an outbreak of COVID-19 cases and the league scrambled to relocate five of its teams – NSW Swifts, Giants, Queensland Firebirds, Sunshine Coast Lightning and West Coast Fever – to Victoria before the state shut its borders.

The Giants have now quarantined in three different states over the past five rounds.(

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For the two NSW teams, it was the second time they’d received the message to quickly pack their bags and fly interstate in just a week. While it was the Giants third in 2021, after an earlier trip to Western Australia for round five.

Each time these teams have crossed state borders in this manner, they’ve been promised one set of circumstances and received another upon on arrival.

Can you imagine that happening in the NRL or AFL?

Before their trip to Victoria, the Swifts and Giants were told the state government would honour the seven days they spent in Queensland in isolation as part of their mandatory 14-day quarantine period, but once they reached Melbourne, were instructed to isolate for a full fortnight.

The good news is that the travelling teams have had a bit more freedom in Victoria, where they are allowed to determine their own schedules around when they train and play, as well as being permitted to hold meetings in the conference rooms of the hotel.

But three weeks is a very long time to be stuck indoors, and as they reach their 14th day in isolation on Wednesday – their seventh in Victoria – Netball Australia is still trying to get an exemption to get both NSW teams out a week early.

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Former Aussie Diamonds player Sharni Norder was critical of the sport’s leadership on Offsiders on Sunday, suggesting some of this chaos and misunderstanding had been caused because the sport didn’t have as strong a relationship with the government as the footballing codes.

But Swifts general manager Nikki Horton told the ABC that she had recently been in consultation with the AFL and believes that they aren’t that far ahead.

“The AFL seem to be in the exact same predicament in terms of timing and last-minute exemptions as we do, so as much as you can try and predict what is going to happen, I think the current environment is challenging for everyone following the state-by-state decisions,” Horton said.

Netball’s frustration with footballers who break the rules

Netball has always been praised for its role models and they have certainly stood tall during the past two years, with so much uncertainty around their lives as they drop everything to keep the Super Netball competition going.

Briony Akle’s youngest son Xavier is also in quarantine in Victoria with the NSW Swifts team.(

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Many of these athletes juggle a second job or tertiary study around their netball commitments, and there is also a growing amount of mothers involved in the game.

These mad dashes to relocate and extended quarantine periods mean they are facing extra stresses on top of all the other challenges that come with playing in the COVID-19 environment, like loss of income, falling behind in their studies or having to drop subjects to keep up, and looking after their children without carers or leaving them at home for long stints at a time.

Swifts head coach Briony Akle is one of those mothers and had to split her family in half two weeks ago, taking two of her sons with her on the road and leaving the other two in Sydney with her husband Sarkis.

You can therefore understand why these people and their families may feel frustrated with the disregard and arrogance some male footballers have demonstrated in recent weeks, while earning a lot more money, receiving better exemptions from the government and more media coverage.

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Horton spoke about this with the ABC.

“Football players have more money to play with, so both parents may not be working full-time like they are in netball,” Horton said.

“One of the biggest challenges we’re facing as a club right now is that we’ve got a group of five young kids between our head coach, our assistant coach and our physio, stuck in isolation and travelling with the team.

“That has been tough for those mothers, especially without carers to help them, as their partners have jobs and responsibilities back home.

President of the Australian Netball Players’ Association Jo Weston believes the set of rules netballers are made to abide by at grassroots has helped form the sport’s compliant culture.(

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Vixens defender and president of the Australian Netball Players’ Association Jo Weston has her own theory why netballers behave themselves better than their male counterparts, and it all comes down to being able to see the bigger picture.

“At the end of the day, we only have 10 spots at the Vixens or at Collingwood in Victoria, so the numbers are never really in your favour for selection.

“Football will often overlook incidents for talent and people that have made major stuff-ups in that world are somehow still put into positions of power or as a commentator.

“There just seems to be no real consequences, other than what is usually a small drop in the ocean in terms of their cash penalties.”

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As for the coming weeks, the sport was relieved to hear its matches scheduled in Adelaide and Perth for Round 10 this weekend will be able to go ahead as planned.

But there is no doubt that some teams are facing greater challenges, particularly around mental resilience, energy levels and their physical preparation, with just five rounds left before the finals.

At this stage, even the last-placed Vixens still have a shot at making the top four, so this ongoing imbalance in teams’ prep could have a big impact on who makes it through.