The Victorian Women's Football League (VWFL) was the oldest and largest Australian rules football league for women in the world, consisting of 47 clubs from Victoria, Australia, across seven divisions and a total of over 1,000 players. The VWFL complied with the laws of Australian football. The official ball, a Sherrin, used by the VWFL, was a custom-made size 4.5 ball. History The Victorian Women's Football League was formed in 1981 with four teams competing at open level. In 1995, Sal Rees caused controversy when she nominated for the 1995 AFL Draft: the nomination was subsequently voided, with the AFL amending its Draft rules to prevent any repeat of this incident. The VWFL grew quickly, increasing dramatically the number of players and participating teams with a Division 3 added in 2001. In 2002 VWFL player Debbie Lee made headlines for pushing to play against men in the made-for-television team the Hammerheads. She has commented, "My whole idea with the Hammerheads was to promote women's football. At no point in time did I really think I was going to play against the men, and frankly it wouldn't really have been smart for me to do that. My whole idea was to cause a bit of activity." An U17 Youth Girls Competition was established by Football Victoria in 2004, primarily to provide a pathway to the VWFL. This was following legal action having been taken against them in the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal (following a complaint to the Equal Opportunity Commission) by junior players Penny Cula-Reid, Emily Stayner, and Helen Taylor. In May 2004, the first VWFL game was played at the Melbourne Cricket Ground (MCG) with the Melbourne Uni MUGARS defeating St Albans SPURS on Mother's Day. A second game was played at the MCG later in the same year featuring Melbourne Uni MUGARS against the St Kilda SHARKS reserves teams. In 2005, the VWFL celebrated its 25th season, and created a reserves competition for Division 1. In 2006, the league posted a $6000 loss, however this was turned around in 2007 with a $19000 profit being posted at the end of 2007. 2007 saw five divisions (Premier seniors & reserves, North West, South East & Country) and 27 teams (from 20 clubs), and culminated in an Australian crowd record for women's Australian rules football at the 2007 Grand Final held on 19 August at the Preston City Oval in