Every member of the inaugural Crows women’s team helped break new ground on Saturday, but some secured their own slice of history.
Almost 26 years after Adelaide’s men’s team downed Hawthorn at Football Park in their first-ever premiership match, the AFLW Crows also tasted victory on their maiden attempt.
Adelaide defeated the Hawks by 86 points on March 22 back in 1991, while the Crows women downed Greater Western Sydney by 36 points in Saturday’s wet-weather contest at Thebarton Oval.
In both performances, there were ‘firsts’ that will never be forgotten.
Rhiannon Metcalfe won the Crows’ first-ever ruck tap decisively, placing it perfectly for the running Chelsea Randall to swoop on in the centre circle. The 185cm Metcalfe asserted her dominance in the ruck all afternoon, winning a game-high 17 hit-outs for the match.
Inaugural Crow Romano Negri claimed the first tap for the men’s team in the Club’s maiden AFL season, belting it to a charging John Klug who then registered the first Crow handball.
Gritty defender Heather Anderson registered the women’s team’s first spoil, while joint vice-captain Sally Riley earned the side’s first kick after copping a high hit in the soggy conditions.
Simon Tregenza notched the AFL team’s first (and second!) kick against the Hawks back in 1991.
Ebony Marinoff, who finished with a game-high 20 disposals, fired off the first handball by a Crows women’s player, while Anne Hatchard claimed the team’s first mark with a strong intercept at centre half-back moments later.
Speedster Dayna Cox laid the AFLW Crows’ first effective tackle with a goal-saving chase on Greater Western Sydney’s Rebecca Beeson inside defensive 50m.
Marquee player Kellie Gibson slotted the side’s first-ever goal in emphatic fashion, slotting a 50-metre major following a coast-to-coast team play. Gibson followed in the footsteps of former Crows men’s captain Tony McGuinness, who will always be remembered for booting the Club’s maiden AFL goal.
While these individual moments will be forever etched in the record books, it was the brilliance of the team as a collective which left the biggest impression.
