IT has been quite a decorated journey for Kara Antonio. She represented Melbourne in the historic AFL Women’s exhibition matches, worked for the club, represented Victoria and Western Australia, before being drafted as a marquee player for the Fremantle Dockers. She hopes there are many more career landmarks to come.

Antonio is the eldest of three children, juggling multiple sports in her earlier years before making her decision to play football and winning several premierships. She has been living in Perth for over nine years and in reflection of her journey says she loves the state, where she is currently a teacher at SEDA College.

“It got to the point I was playing junior footy, netball, little athletics, you name it,” Antonio said. “My mum said ‘you’re going to have to pick a sport, I can’t keep doing this, running around your siblings’. I chose footy, I played junior footy with the boys and moved up through the ranks to the Under 18 girls and into the women’s league.

“I was born and raised in Victoria. I played a lot of my football in South East Melbourne. I then moved over to the western suburbs and I won a premierships with the St Albans Spurs, now known as the VU Western Spurs, which was pretty special.

“The year after we won the flag, I decided that I needed a big of a sea change and made the move over to Perth. I was meant to come here for a year but I’ve been here for nine years, which has flown by. I love it over here in Perth. I love the lifestyle here, I’m happily married.

“Right now, I’m just really enjoying playing and being down at the Fremantle Football Club and I’m really proud to pull on that jumper every week.”

Antonio has faced a number of injuries along the way, but is grateful for the support networks, her teammates and club that have kept her driven and striving for success.

“I’ve had a knee reconstruction, I’ve had a shoulder reconstruction and a couple of ongoing knee issues across my career,” she said.

“Sometimes, you can go into situations thinking that you are mentally headstrong and that you can conquer the world. If anything, injuries, it can teach you a different story and it can allow you to grow and develop your mind and body.

“The setbacks have been the injuries and you learn how to deal with them. There’s no other choice then to push through and see light at the other end of the tunnel, but you have to go through good days and bad days. The support networks that I’ve had in the past has really got me through some of the darkest days of trying to overcome injuries, for sure.”

Playing with wife, Ebony Antonio has been special from WAFLW to AFLW. Kara Antonio shared how important that connection has been, given the pair have won flags together at Swan Districts and hope a flag at Fremantle is ticked off shortly.

“We love being able to spend time together at footy and share the incredible journey that we’ve been on over the last six years at the Dockers,” Antonio said. “It’s nice to have some downtime in the offseason and not speak or think about it. We tend to go on a few holidays which is nice and something we look forward to. We’re both obviously driven, committed and determined individuals that want success and when we push and drive each other, it makes the journey more enjoyable and worthwhile.”

Whilst shining on the football field, Antonio is currently juggling life as a SEDA teacher, where she is teaching in the Fremantle Dockers Football program. Whilst there were challenges, including being in the hub in Melbourne during Covid times, Antonio is grateful for the college being supportive as a athlete.

“I love it,” she said. “I love my job and I feel like I’ve got the best job in the world. It has its days, don’t get me wrong but I love the college, I love our school and what we’re about. We’re about developing really strong individuals and walking the journey of education together. We’re a Year 11 and 12 school and the exciting thing is that you get a year 11 group and you take them through all the way through year 12, so you get your kids for two years.

“As teachers, we’re mentoring that next group of young people through their journey in life and we absolutely love what we do there. The kids that we interact with every day are rippers and make our job a little more enjoyable and easier.

“In terms of challenges, there were a couple of challenges but I’ve got an incredible boss and principal that supported me through that entire process. We’re really flexible. We did a bit of online teaching, which was hard and difficult from both a teacher and student point of view but we made it as interactive as possible and I had some pretty cool people around me in the hub that I utilised and got speaking to our students, which they really enjoyed. I can’t obviously thank the principal and college enough for the support that they gave and showed me through that whole process.”

Whilst Antonio has been a star of the competition for a number of seasons, she believes consistency is key to be on top of your game in a tightly, contested competition every week. There are three key components that she focuses on each week.

“If you’re working full-time, we’re on our feet constantly,” she said. “Depending on what work you’re doing, it can be mentally draining. You rock up to training and you train for a couple of hours on the field. Sometimes, consistency goes in ebbs and flows.

“For me personally, it’s focusing on my strengths and weapons and I’m in the team and for me, that’s my leadership and knowledge of the game and my work rate. If I can have an impact in those three areas, I feel like I’ve done my job.”

Whilst Antonio doesn’t have any specific game day rituals, other than getting on the ground with bare feet, staying calm and being in the moment, she has embraced playing in a team sport, being in a fun team environment and what motivates or inspires her to give her best on the training track. That includes family and wanting to make them proud, as well as the fans.

“I want to make the purple army, purple faithful really proud and bring them home the premiership that they’ve been waiting for a very long time,” she said. “Those are kind of the things that motivate me.

“The other thing is that discipline element to it. Things like ‘what’s your opponent doing?’. If I’m up early going to the gym, I’m getting an edge on them. It’s a mental game for me, knowing that I’m taking all those extra boxes and getting myself mentally and physically right for game day and training to be the best that I can be for the team.

“The banter, the camaraderie, the jokes and laughs are the best thing being in a team environment. If you’re not having fun in what you’re doing, there’s no point doing it.

“That’s what we’ve created down at Freo over the last six season is finding that really good balance between banter and fun, then getting the work done and knuckling down. I love rocking up to training and seeing the girls, they put a smile on my face and they make it all worthwhile.”

Whilst the sport of footy has meant everything to her since the age of eight in the fields of working, playing and coaching, Antonio loves the game in how it brings together people from different backgrounds, ages, gender, skills and abilities.

Since playing at the top level, two players that Antonio has found challenging are her teammate, Kiara Bowers and Melbourne legend, Daisy Pearce.”

“I used to go head to head with Kiara Bowers, which was quite interesting and we’ve had some very good battles over the years,” she said. “Turbo was my hardest opponent to be honest.

“Second to that, I used to love lining up against Daisy Pearce, from Melbourne. I’ve had a lot of footy against her in Melbourne. Coming up against her when we take on is always an interesting battle and arm wrestle.”

Antonio has had many heroes and role models she looks up to.

“For me, my mum, my grandma, my sister,” she said. “Other ones are people like Debbie Lee and what she’s had to overcome in her career, both on and off the field. She’s driven the AFLW space in more what than one and definitely that group of really strong women have my inspiration and who I look up to.”

Lastly, Antonio shares her words of wisdom to those out there wanting to improve their game.

“It takes hard work, dedication and commitment,” she said. “You’ve got to keep working on your weaknesses and work on your strength. Don’t let anyone tell you that you can’t do something. If you’ve got a dream or an aspiration, do everything that you can do to put yourself in the best position to achieve that. Life is too short to be sitting back and how to get in and get your hands dirty and make things happen.”