Add Category
The AFLW competition will feature 18 teams from the 2022/23 season, the AFL Commission has announced.
- From the 2022/23 season, every AFL club will have an AFLW team
- The 2021/22 season will remain a 14-team competition
- Hawthorn, Essendon, Port Adelaide and Sydney Swans all hailed an historic day
Essendon, Hawthorn, Port Adelaide and Sydney Swans will join the current 14 teams for the 2022/23 season.
The move means that every current AFL men's team will also have a women's team.
"Today is a pretty defining day, I think, in the history of Australian football," ," AFL boss Gillon McLachlan said.
"We have 18 AFLW clubs to send a message to every female playing footy they can play for any one of our AFLW teams."
The AFL Commission had previously committed to all clubs entering the competition by the 2023/24 season.
However, after meeting during the week to assess the readiness of all four clubs to enter the national competition, the Commission decided to admit them all a season ahead of schedule.
Hawthorn, whose president Jeff Kennett has been critical of the delay in offering the Hawks a licence, simply tweeted "finally".
Hawks chief executive Justin Reeves said "the growth of women's football is one of the most significant developments in the AFL's history".
Port Adelaide chairman David Koch said his club was "now complete".
"Wives, girlfriends, sisters, daughters and mothers have been driving our great club forward for more than a century. Now we get to bring this incredible legacy to life on the football field through our own AFLW team."
AAP: Richard Wainwright
)Essendon president Paul Brasher said it was a landmark day for the club, which currently competes in the VFLW.
"We are a football club with a proud, rich, diverse, inclusive and successful history, but today, the Essendon Football Club becomes whole. Today is a landmark day for the red and black," he told the Essendon website.
Sydney Swans chairman Andrew Pridham said the AFLW team would be "a significant part of our future story".
"As we introduce a second elite team, we are committed to a one club approach, providing the best, integrated environment we can for both our men's and women's teams," he said.
The upcoming 2021/22 season will remain at 14 teams to allow the new sides to prepare to enter the competition.
The AFLW started as an eight-team competition in 2017, increasing to 10 teams in 2019 and 14 in 2020.