Broadmeadow will return to the Herald Women's Premier League in 2020 in a move applauded by Northern NSW Football.
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NNSWF are eyeing a transition to NPL standard for its women's top-flight competition by 2021 but to do so clubs will need to address a range of criteria including improved facilities.
NNSWF confirmed on Wednesday South Wallsend Junior Soccer Club's WPL program had moved to be a part of Broadmeadow Magic Football Club.
Broadmeadow were a foundation club when the WPL began with six teams in 2009. They were coached to the inaugural championship by Australian footballing legend Cheryl Salisbury before capturing back-to-back minor premierships in 2010 and 2011 with a side featuring Matilda Gema Simon. They have not played in the competition since.
Facilities, or the lack thereof, for female footballers was a topic of conversation at the Graham Jennings Medal at the NNSWF awards at Newcastle Exhibition and Convention Centre last Friday night. Even Jennings weighed in on the subject, saying more needed to be done to ensure our top players were catered to.
NNSWF operations manager Liam Bentley said a return to Magic Park for women was a promising one.
"It was really clear at the Jennings Medal night how much an issue access to quality facilities are for WPL," Bentley said.
"A lot of people mentioned it, and rightly so. Having South Wallsend's players getting to play at Magic Park is a massive benefit to the league, and not just for their players but everyone that is playing against them.
"It's a real positive for us."
NNSWF have established a women's NPL working group with a view to raising the standards surrounding the women's game by 2021.
"We've got a finite amount of premier grounds and volunteers and whilst we're working as hard as we can to try to get more better grounds, at the moment it just makes sense to align yourself with people who have what you need," Bentley said.
"This is a good fit. Broadmeadow Magic clearly have aspirations of where they want to be - that aspiration is to have a women's program - and South Wallsend need the expertise and the facilities.
"If it encourages other WPL clubs to start thinking outside the box, to start thinking about getting access to better grounds, then absolutely they should ... realistically, if we don't look at other options and other grounds and other partnerships then we're not going to improve."
WPL grounds came under constant criticism from players and coaches this season. South Wallsend, who joined the league in 2015 and featured in the past two finals series, and New Lambton relocated their semi-finals fixtures to improved playing surfaces.
The Wolves moved their home leg from Walker Fields to the artificial surface at the Lake Macquarie Regional Football Facility and the Eagles used Lisle Carr Oval.
South Wallsend committee members Angela Jordan and John Laws will join Magic to help manage the WPL program.
"We listened to the concerns from our players surrounding the playing environment and infrastructure and it motivated us to actively seek opportunities for them, which has fortuitously resulted in us working with Broadmeadow Magic," Jordan said.
"We are looking forward to working with Magic as they are a professional and well-organised club with structured programs who will be able to set new expectations and standards.
"This will also create greater opportunities and coverage for our sponsors to be recognised for their contributions to football as well as increase the support from the local community."
Magic president Steven Foteff said the club were excited to have a WPL program after a long absence.
"We, unfortunately, didn't have the resources to do everything properly to implement the women's league in between concentrating on developing the youth and SAP, however, we now believe the time is right to do it all properly," Foteff said.
"With the help of Tony Temelkovski and Dave Antcliff from our club joining with Angela and John and their team from South Wallsend, we have the resources now to do it all properly including having our training facility up and running as well as having been able to work with Northern in booking time to train on the synthetic pitches for the club.
"We are looking forward to welcoming back a number of girls to play in the Magic strip."
