Narrogin defender Matilda Dyke the fourth generation in her family to play State football

Narrogin footballer Matilda Dyke became the fourth generation in her family to represent her State after playing for the WA Under-19 AFLW team earlier this year. Dyke followed in the footsteps of her great-grandfather, grandfathers and uncle when she pulled on the WA jumper at the NAB AFLW Under-19 Championships in Adelaide and Melbourne in March-April. The 19-year-old attended St Matthew’s School in Narrogin before moving to Perth for boarding school, and kickstarted her football career in 2019. Dyke’s great-grandfather Leo Graham represented WA in 1937 and played 99 games for East Perth, and her grandfather Stuart Graham pulled on the black-and-gold jumper in the State schoolboys’ carnival in 1955. Most recently, her uncle Richard Graham played for the WA 16-and-under State school boys’ team in 1984 and under-18 Teal Cup in 1985-86, while also playing 143 league games for South Fremantle and East Perth. Dyke said she was proud to represent her State. “It’s great to continue the legacy of playing State football in the family,” she said. “I think it’s really important to keep maintaining that sporting background,” she said. She said it was good women’s football was taking off as “the boys have had their footy moments”. “I think it’s cool and shows where women’s footy is going,” she said. WA lost their first game to South Australia by six points before notching their first win of the championships over Allies, 9.7 (61) to 4.4 (28) and Dyke was named among the best. Unfortunately, WA went down by four points to Victoria Metro in their final game, with a kick on the siren by WA’s Chloe Reilly falling just short. Dyke played as a key defender and was also used through the ruck during the championships. “Our last game was a bit sad we lost it to Victoria Metro and it was literally by a goal on the siren so that wasn’t the best but it was a really cool experience,” she said. “Me personally I thought it went OK, as a whole I was relatively happy but definitely heaps of room for improvement. “My dream is definitely to play AFLW, this is my draft year this year, I’m not sure how I’ll go but definitely that’s the ultimate goal. “Women’s football is such an amazing atmosphere and environment, a lot of female sports don’t have quite that same atmosphere around it and I just love it because it suits me so well like the competitiveness of it, the athleticism of it, I feel like that’s where I’m meant to be in terms of sport.” Dyke’s boarding school encouraged a group of interested girls to head to Claremont Football Club and that led to her being selected in their Rogers Cup team. The rising star was selected in the WA under-18s academy last year but due to COVID the team could not travel or compete in the cancelled national carnival and this was replaced by an Under-18s v WAFLW All Stars game. Dyke was promoted to Claremont’s reserves team and played in the winning grand final last year before making her league debut in round one this season and has played 10 games. “Claremont is an amazing club and they have done so much for my development,” Dyke said. “I’m really grateful for all the people that have helped me get to this point.”