‘Yeah the girls’ probably deserve uniforms that fit

I had honestly never considered the role of socks in an elite athlete’s performance until I spoke to Young Matilda, Emma Ilijoski. They’re pivotal, apparently. In a recent game, she told me, her socks were so loose she spent half the time focused on them rather than defending against the opposing team. 

“It’s one of those things that we don’t want to have to focus on anymore as a barrier to performance,” says the A-League defender. “You have to be 100 percent in the game.” 

At a time when Australia and New Zealand are hosting the FIFA Women’s World Cup and Sam Kerr’s calf is the most Googled body part in the world, Canberra United defender Ilijoski is raising awareness about the fact that ‘almost all’ women footballers play in uniforms that don’t fit them properly. Which includes nine teams in this year’s Women’s World Cup.

Young Matilda, Emma Ilijoski is joining forces with PARK to make ill-fitting uniforms a thing of the past

PARK, the football brand driving the campaign alongside Ilijoski, embraces the radical idea that a group making up half of Australia’s population should have uniforms that actually fit them. Their female-first design ‘implements feedback from professional athletes at the highest level’.

“I remember having to wear boys’ shorts one season as a self conscious teenage girl that had developed quads,” Ilijoski’s teammate Grace Maher says. “I had to roll them up so they didn’t touch my knees but then it would bunch at the crotch. I hated how I felt about myself. The change can’t come soon enough.”

A recent survey by Professional Footballers Australia found that 96 per cent of women and gender diverse footballers play in men’s kits while national teams have only recently started ditching white shorts to reduce the risk of visible period leakage during play. 

“Not all women want things to be short and tight,” Ilijoski laughs. “I think that’s a really important part. Some girls prefer things to fit differently, maybe a bit looser. And we know women obviously have wider hips too.”

“This is something that we can really rectify… It’s just a matter of talking to your club about it, talking to your teammates about it.” 

From an early age Ilijoski accepted that in order to play football she would have to wear a uniform that was not made to fit her body, both in size – one that does not consider breasts or hips – and in colour – white, not at all period friendly.

So grateful were they to be selected for the representative team, she and the other players had an attitude of ‘okay, we’ll just deal with it’. For the next generation, she envisions a brave new world where young girls have the courage to speak up – or better yet, not have to think about it at all. 

Right now, Australia is gripped with a kind of football fervour I haven’t seen since my mates and I watched Bend It Like Beckham when we were eight. In fact, the Matildas have now sold double the amount of official jerseys than the Socceroos since the Men’s World Cup last year. 

“The World Cup is all we’ve been talking about,” Ilijoski tells me, which is admittedly not surprising given most of her friends are professional footballers. “[I’ve been] speaking with young girls but also young boys who are loving the World Cup and now have idols they never thought they’d have.” 

Ilijoski and PARK believe national change starts at the grassroots level, which makes sense since each local club is largely responsible for the change they are campaigning for. The Young Matilda hopes that coaches, parents and community leaders who have joined this weeks-long national celebration will embrace the novel idea that player uniforms should fit their girls at least as well as Matildas’ merchandise. 

“This is something that we can really rectify,” she says. “It’s an actual, achievable goal to have. And I think it’s just a matter of talking to your club about it, talking to your teammates about it.” 

It wasn’t that long ago when Ilijoski was growing up. She and her teammates would receive their ‘ugly, baggy men’s clothes’, throw up their hands, share a communal ‘far out’ and laugh it off. But, today, she’s done laughing. It’s time, she says, for Australia to pull up its socks.

MAIN IMAGE: Jun Endo of Japan during the FIFA Women’s World Cup 2023 is seen with her shorts folded over. All Women’s World Cup images Getty Images.

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