MAKING Vic Metro for the second consecutive year, named among Sandringham Dragons’ bests on multiple occasions and called up to play for Southern Saints in the VFL Women’s, the talented Eleanor Brown was not satisfied with her TAC Cup season.

She described her individual TAC Cup Girls season as “disappointing”, clearly showing that the onus of you are your own harshest critic rings true. Her performances were good enough to book a ticket to the Gold Coast for the AFL Women’s Under 18 Championships, and catch the eye of the Southern Saints talent scouts. Brown was pleased with how the Dragons went in the second TAC Cup Girls competition.

“We did pretty well the team I thought,” she said. “Especially in the second half of the season, we kept improving and finished third, so we were pretty happy.”

Brown named her endurance as her main strength, although many who have watched her know how strong she is in the air and her ability to win one-on-one contests is as good as anyone. Her focus right now is that of her disposal, an area that has been improving over time and one she is working hard on developing.

“(I want to improve) everything, but probably my kicking is a bit of a weakness,” she said. “I’m not very accurate so I work on that mostly and just everything.”

The Vic Metro representative played a key role for her state side at the championships, especially in the second game loss to Queensland where she did everything she could to rebound out of defence.

“It’s so fun I love it (Vic Metro experience),” Brown said. “It was a really good experience last year. I didn’t play very well, but it was just such good experience and I was really excited to get in the team.”

It is amazing to think how far Brown has come in the past few years, starting back at local football midway through high school.

“I think I started in Year 9 or 10, just at my local club Glen Iris because they were always short on players,” Brown said. “So I used to go down after netball training and play with them and then I started playing at Sandringham two years ago.”

Brown was not sure of the reason behind focusing more on football, but she admits she has become “more serious” with the sport and has had to cut back on netball. She is in her first year at university, studying physiotherapy, something she hopes to follow through on over the next few years.

Her dream on the field is to take her football as far as she can, something that was not possible when she was growing up, knowing there was no clear pathway to the elite level.

“When I was really young I loved footy,” she said. “I didn’t play and it wasn’t really an option to be professional but I always wanted to be a professional netballer in primary school. “Now for sure it’s a dream to play footy.”

The unselfish Brown credits everyone involved in the sports she has played with her development in football.

“Probably just all my coaches from every sport (are the biggest influences),” Brown said. They’ve all helped me in different ways, I think like I’ve had a lot of coaches, but they’ve all definitely helped so much. “My teammates as well, they’re always looking out for each other.”

Brown is already impressing with the Southern Saints, winning plenty of the ball and running hard along the wings, no doubt catching eyes with consistent performances that are building towards the end-of-year AFL Women’s draft.