YELLOW and black are colours that suit new Glenelg coach Lexia Edwards, with the former Yeronga South Brisbane mentor returning to the Bay where she played 15 games from 2018-19. Heading up to Queensland for a stint with the Devils where she would ultimately end up coaching, Edwards returned to Adelaide to go back to where it all began, replacing 2021 premiership coach, Jason Fairall.

“It’s awesome, obviously I got to start my SANFLW playing career at Glenelg so for me it’s kind of a full circle moment,” Edwards said. “But for me, I’m really loving being back with the girls, and preseason has just about finished now with Round 1 on Saturday.”

The cobwebs have been dusted off last year’s preliminary finalists, with Edwards and her Bays ready to make their mark on the 2023 season. Coming into a program that might be familiar, but with so few familiar faces, Edwards was determined to get up to speed in regards to the way her playing group went about their business. She utilised the trial matches as just that, taking the opportunity to trial a few things for the season ahead.

“Obviously coming in from when I played, there’s not a lot of players that I’ve seen play down in Adelaide so it was a good chance to see people down in different positions,” Edwards said. “But I think the general consensus from across the league is that the bridge between the top and bottom of the ladder is going to be a lot less, and that probably shows in the trials.”

Glenelg went down in both its trial games to West Adelaide and Norwood, but Edwards is excited about what the future could bring for the Bays, describing her position as “really fortunate” considering the Bays are coming off a premiership and then preliminary final loss the past two seasons.

“With the list that I’ve inherited, they played in a prelim last year, it’s not like we have to go through a rebuilding stage,” Edwards said. “We’ve put a lot of focus on our bringing some youth in especially through our Development League just to expose them to the higher level.

“In terms of how we want to play, it will be like most teams, we want a high pressure game where we can capitalise on turnovers so we can score quickly. Our language is always fun to watch, but also fun to play.”

Edwards will be hoping to turn the loss to West Adelaide around, when Glenelg heads over to Hisense Stadium to take on the Bloods in both side’s official first match of the 2023 season. West Adelaide is currently on an 11-game losing streak having not won since Round 1 last year, but new coach Bruce Dawes oversaw two trial match wins and Edwards is not underestimating them.

“They’ve got a new coach, they’ve recruited really heavily from experienced players in the league which they have been missing and they’ve got Lauren Young back and Keeley Kustermann will come back from the Crows,” Edwards said.

“It’s just making sure we’re accountable to those players, but also we don’t really want to steer too far away from how we want to play footy and how we want to move the ball, so it’s more just capitalising on opportunities when they come.”

Glenelg is fortunate enough to have two AFL Women’s Academy members in Matilda Scholz and Piper Window. The former is the number one ruck at the club, while the latter makes an impression playing both as a midfielder and forward.

Edwards earmarked Window for a hybrid role this season, while Scholz – who has had an injury interrupted preseason due to a wrist injury – is a maybe for Saturday’s match.

“Her wrist is actually okay, it’s her hamstring now,” Edwards said. “She’s been doing nothing but running since doing her wrist injury. We still not sure, she’s a test for this week so she’ll be pushing it fine. She’s so important to our team, we won’t take any hesitation in not rushing her back and making sure she’s ready to go.”

Glenelg will be without star midfielder Jessica Bates who has headed to Collingwood’s VFL Women’s side, but Edwards said they were going to provide other untried midfielders with her role in 2023.

“It is a huge loss to lose Batesy, but understand why she left and she’s got our full support to do that,” Edwards said. ‘To cover that, it gives other people an opportunity, people who haven’t had as many midfield minutes to come through, so it’s more rotational through the team and countering how we look around the outside of that.”

Given Glenelg reached the preliminary final last season, many would expect the Bays to be thereabouts again. Having lost Bates and brought in a number of young players to the squad, Edwards hoped that the squad would be able to remain “connected” on-field to go as far as they can in 2023.

“I mean obviously a premiership would be the main answer,” Edwards said. “I think for our girls, to try and keep them connected to each other and cohesive for the years to come, it’s about bringing back a bit of a balance in terms of work, life and footy. We’re all busy people and we probably found that there’s a bit of burnout, particularly from those girls who do go back and play local league.

“That’s one aspect that I’d love for them to have at the end of the day, but really learning and growing how to play together as a team and keeping that connection on-field is really important. They’re a great group of girls, it shouldn’t be too hard of my job, but it’s just about adding that.”