No ‘premier’ games annoys female footballers

A109 Light Utility Helicopter flight with mayor Gisborne City from the air in November 2023.

GISBORNE District councillor Amber Dunn yesterday voiced the concerns of the city’s female footballers, who say Central Football had refused them the chance to play on Gisborne’s premier football pitch “time and time again”.

Dr Dunn asked the council’s community development and services committee if council staff had responsibility for scheduling games on public reserves, because so far there had been no women’s games played on Childers Road Reserve (No 1) pitch, even though the season was now four weeks old.

That was not acceptable for the city’s premier football ground.

“Every female footballer in Gisborne is saying, ‘Why can’t we play on our premier field?’,” Dr Dunn said.

Dr Dunn said local footballers had made repeated requests to Central Football to clarify the situation but had not been given a reason.

“There have been many approaches made over many years, with no legitimate reason given. That’s my understanding.

“If it is a time factor, and Childers Road isn’t in a state to cater for it, that’s good but we are four weeks into the football season this year and female footballers are saying, ‘What’s going on?’ If it was a wet start to the year and the grounds were crap, yeah sure. But we can do these things so much better and we should be looking after women’s football.”

GDC acting parks and community property manager Garrett Blair said scheduling of games for all sporting codes was the responsibility of individual sporting bodies — in this case, Central Football.

The council had no control over who played on which field, except to control the number of games and hours of use, to protect surfaces.

“At Childers Road No 1 there is no training allowed whatsoever because that’s the premier football ground. Childers Road No 1 can only handle about four to six hours of play, so that would give you a week in optimal conditions.”

Committee chairman Andy Cranston said the council could send a request for information to Central Football.