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First female football commentator?

Sarah Walsh will make "Football history" according to FOX Sports. With apologies to Kelli Underwood.

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2016-08-02_1530

According to FOX Sports commentator Sarah Walsh will be become the first female expert to commentate a men’s football match in Australia.

She will make her debut commentating the FFA Cup Round of 32 showdown alongside Steve Allen, between Canberra Olympic and Surfers Paradise Apollo.

“I’ve been commentating for the W-League for a while, but calling the men’s game is very exciting for women’s sport. It’s a big step, and progressively the right one, and I think it’s excellent that FOX Sports have pushed for it to happen,” she said.

But the claim overlooks Kelli Underwood called AFL for TEN Sports back in 2009 which caused a bit of a ruckus amongst some AFL fans.

So why the claim by FOX Sports, seven years later?

A FOX Sports spokesperson told TV Tonight, “The distinction here is Football v AFL. We always refer to Soccer as Football – you’ll see this in all the releases we put out about the sport. Kel did call an AFL match, but this is a first for Football in Australia.”

Might be time to rename that FOX Footy channel. Apparently it’s not really Football.

Amended.

17 Responses

  1. Also a little bit disingenuous of Fox Sports to make the claim (not to take anything away from Sarah as don’t mind her W-League commentary) as game was not actually broadcast – only streamed and they didn’t even have her do the cross to the live game they were broadcasting at end of game.

  2. There are 211 countries that are members of FIFA … i.e. play Football. There is 1 country that plays AFL. Walshy is a true professional – whether male or female – and best of luck to her commentating with Foxtel on the truly international game of football. As a former international player (and AFL is not in any stretch of the imagination even if you select ‘All-Australian’ teams) she has more credibility than most male commentators of league, AFL, rugby, etc.

  3. Harsh i feel saying Fox Footy channel should change there name.Extending on that..Only just over the past 5 years or so all codes have decided to call themselves Footy.To me AFL is Footy and have held that for decades,now the rest of the codes now always say Footy.AFL is #1 but don’t try taking credit for what we have achieved.Why can’t they come up with there own term.That really does annoy me

  4. Then why is Australian men’s team called tge Socceroos and in USA their league is called Major League Soccer,if this commentator is same quality as the ones on Fox Sports calling the Womens Australian League..ooo.they are very pedestrian and have generate no excitement with their commentary

  5. To be fair the term ‘Soccer’ is being referred to as ‘Football’ a lot more commonly these days in Australia but it doesn’t excuse the disregard for the fact it’s already happened in AFL. Kelli Underwood wasn’t a great commentator though in my opinion.

      1. In a perfect world it could be argued that all codes are classed as Football. In AFL (Australian Football League) you kick a football. In Soccer (Football) you also kick a round ball and in NRL the same. What seems to happen nowadays is that we have become lazy and no longer call it for what it is. Soccer, Australian Rules and Rugby League

          1. Sorry I meant to say that NRL you kick a ball….not necessarily a round ball. Mind you if you play Rugby League in Victoria you could be mistaken as they will kick anything here lol

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