{"id":39301,"date":"2018-08-27T20:33:54","date_gmt":"2018-08-27T10:33:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.afldraftcentral.com.au\/?p=39301"},"modified":"2021-11-12T07:28:24","modified_gmt":"2021-11-11T21:28:24","slug":"bate-kicking-goals-at-all-levels","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/central.rookieme.com\/afl\/2018\/08\/27\/bate-kicking-goals-at-all-levels\/","title":{"rendered":"Bate kicking goals at all levels"},"content":{"rendered":"

HOLLY Bate<\/strong>\u00a0has never really listened to popular opinion. If she had, she might never have joined Prahran and kick-started a football career that would see her take out the TAC Cup Girls Leading Goalkicker Award in her top-age year. Looking back, Bate is glad she took the chance on running around with the boys.<\/p>\n

\u201cWell I have a twin brother and it was about Under 9s and he played his first game of footy at Prahran junior footy club,\u201d Bate said. \u201cI went to watch and I was like \u2018that\u2019s so cool, like \u2018I really want to play\u2019, but I was the only girl and would be the only girl on the team so I was like \u2018I can\u2019t really play\u2019. \u201cI didn\u2019t really think much of it, but everyone else was like \u2018it\u2019s a bit weird\u2019 and so I was like \u2018nup I want to play\u2019 so I just joined up and was playing with the boys and I got along really well with the boys so it was an easy transition to start playing.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Sandringham Dragons forward burst onto the scene in 2018 when she booted 12 goals in two games against Western Jets and Bendigo Pioneers and snatched the leading goalkicker award.<\/p>\n

\u201cI didn\u2019t really think much of it,\u201d Bate said. \u201cIt kinda just happened, I didn\u2019t really set out to try and win the goal kicking. \u201cI think those few games we played at Trevor Barker were pretty handy. \u201cI didn\u2019t really celebrate it, I must say.\u201d<\/p>\n

Bate believed it took until later in the season for her to rise up above the level she had admittedly been at for some time, but is glad she did, enjoying her football on the way to representing Vic Metro at the AFL Women\u2019s Under 18 Championships.<\/p>\n

\u201cI found that I came into it at a level I\u2019d been at for a while now at the end of the last season,\u201d Bate said. \u201cI felt I had stepped up a bit, had improved. \u201cI learned how to play forward at a more complex level. \u201cIt was quite enjoyable.\u201d<\/p>\n

Speaking of the championships, Bate was thrilled to run out representing her state alongside so many other talented players.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s pretty full on,\u201d she said. \u201cI\u2019ve never properly done this before. \u201cIt\u2019s more elite than anything I\u2019ve done, but it\u2019s really good. I love it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Like so many others, Bate has noticed a definite standard increase amongst the competition describing the TAC Cup Girls as having \u201cimproved out of sight\u201d. Now the Sandringham Dragons teenager hopes to keep playing at the highest possible level, following a newly found dream of playing AFL Women\u2019s.<\/p>\n

\u201c(It\u2019s) not always (been my dream to be drafted), because I never thought women\u2019s footy would be a thing in my career,\u201d Bate said. \u201cNow it\u2019s got going, I\u2019m definitely playing now.\u201d<\/p>\n

Undecided about what she wants to do in her career just yet, she hopes to go to university once her Year 12 studies are over, something she has learnt to balance.<\/p>\n

\u201cDoing Year 12 it\u2019s pretty busy at the moment, it\u2019s very full on, but I\u2019ve found ways to balance it all out,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Aside from the AFL Women\u2019s Under 18 Championships, Bate has also tasted senior football with the Southern Saints in the Victorian Football League (VFL) Women\u2019s competition, kicking a goal on debut and continuing her passion of playing as high as possible in the football pathway.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

HOLLY Bate\u00a0has never really listened to popular opinion. If she had, she might never have joined Prahran and kick-started a football career that would see her take out the TAC Cup Girls Leading Goalkicker Award in her top-age year. Looking back, Bate is glad she took the chance on running around with the boys. \u201cWell […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":64,"featured_media":34466,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[278,7950,8,11596,18223,137],"tags":[5423,3474,9539,42,138,2802,1880],"class_list":["post-39301","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-feature-articles","category-nab-league-girls","category-news","category-sandringham-dragons","category-sandringham-dragons-girls","category-womens","tag-aflw-under-18-championships","tag-holly-bate","tag-nab-league-girls-features","tag-sandringham-dragons","tag-tac-cup-girls","tag-vflw","tag-vic-metro"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/central.rookieme.com\/afl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39301","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/central.rookieme.com\/afl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/central.rookieme.com\/afl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/central.rookieme.com\/afl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/64"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/central.rookieme.com\/afl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=39301"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/central.rookieme.com\/afl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39301\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":87873,"href":"https:\/\/central.rookieme.com\/afl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39301\/revisions\/87873"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/central.rookieme.com\/afl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/34466"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/central.rookieme.com\/afl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=39301"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/central.rookieme.com\/afl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=39301"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/central.rookieme.com\/afl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=39301"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}