ESSENDON
Zara Board lost three months of the season to a back injury. Her second match after returning was a cup quarter-final that went to penalties. Six weeks later she had a winners’ medal and a flag tied round her neck.
Goalkeepers do not get the good end of a 4-1.
Zara Board made a handful of saves on Saturday night, kept a clean sheet for eighty-nine minutes of a cup final and then conceded a stoppage-time penalty in a game that had been over for half an hour. In the highlights she will be a supporting character in other people’s goals.
What that misses is that six weeks earlier she was not certain of playing at all.
“I’d been out for three months of the season with a back injury,” she said. “That game against Alamein in the penalty shootout was my second game back.”
Sit with that for a second. Three months out. One game to shake off the rust. And then a cup quarter-final that went the distance and finished in a shootout.
“So to come back in and have a solid performance and bring back my spot,” she said, and then immediately gave the credit away. “Sophie made me work really hard for it.”
Sophie Dehne had kept the gloves warm while Board was out, started the semi-final against FC Bulleen Lions and was on the bench on Saturday. Board made a point of saying so, unprompted, with a trophy in the background.
The point to prove
The reason Saturday mattered to her is that it was the third attempt.
“Last two seasons we’ve made the semi-finals for the cup at the end, but unfortunately just gone out,” she said.
Twice to the last four, twice home. So the group started this season differently.
“We set out at the start of the season, obviously with a bit of a fire in our belly. We just came out with a point to prove. We want to succeed and we want to show that on the field.”
Ask her about the performance and she does the thing good goalkeepers do, which is to talk about the shape in front of her rather than the shots.
“We just came in with the mentality of it’s just another game. We play our style of football and that shows on the field by performing really well, playing our style and not letting the occasion get to us.”
This club had never played in a major final before. The obvious risk was that the occasion would swallow them. Instead, Royals were a goal up inside twenty minutes and three up inside an hour.
The under-13s
Board was also delighted to see the Under-13s she helps coach at the game in big numbers.
“Good to see all my Under 13’s girls coming and watching. Love seeing them here, and across the whole club.”
There is a version of a football club where the senior keeper does not know who the under-13s are. This is not that club, and Board’s answer makes clear it is not an accident.
“Royals is just such an amazing family club. Everyone gets down to support. Everyone’s been getting around us all week. It’s such a community. Everyone wants to see us succeed. The president, all the staff, the coaches, just fantastic at the club.”
The treble
The trophy had been in the club’s possession for approximately half an hour when she was asked whether it whets the appetite for what is left of the season.
She did not do the modest thing.
“It’s very exciting to get the Nike FC in the bag, but we want to go for the treble.”
There are four league games remaining and then finals. Royals sit second. It is, on the evidence of the last few months, not a ridiculous thing to say out loud.
She spent the celebrations with a flag tied round her shoulders like a cape and was entirely unbothered about how that looked.
“I think it’s pretty good fashion wear,” she said. “It was a great night, and so proud of the team and our girls.”
Three months on the sidelines, a shootout in her second game back, a winners’ medal and an unprompted call for two more trophies before September.