The AFL has announced a new scholarship program which will support 50 young Indigenous and Multicultural footballers in their journey through the AFL Talent Pathway.
It comes as there are just 62 First Nations players on AFL club lists, well down from the record 87 in 2020.
The initiative will provide financial assistance to footballers within national or state-based talent programs from across Australia.
Players will share in $100,000 of funding which will assist with covering football and travel expenses, and support development opportunities for the game's future stars.
Nominations for the AAMI Indigenous and Multicultural Scholarship Program were submitted earlier this year, with successful applicants confirmed this week following an extensive selection process.
The successful applicants include 25 male and 25 females footballers aged between 16 to 19 years of age.
The scholarship program features three categories:
Tools of the Trade: Providing support for essential items that enable participation in football talent programs (eg: registration fees, private health, wellbeing support, uniforms)
Transport and Logistics: Support for travel costs that make it difficult to attend training or program commitments (eg: regional travel, taxi vouchers, family-related transport expenses)
Relocation: Supporting players who relocate to access additional structured football development
The announcement comes a day after Essendon forward Jade Gresham highlighted that better supporting First Nations players through the talent pathway was an important step.
"I think we need to do a lot of work to get that back up, there's a lot of talent out there, we just need to find it and get some of these programs back in for Indigenous boys and girls," he said at the MCG on Tuesday at the Dreamtime launch.
"I think we're only scratching the surface so I think we can do a lot more as an industry to get that back up...A lot of programs I did growing up as a 16-17-year-old aren't there anymore and that helped pave the way for me as a stepping stone into the AFL so getting those programs back would definitely help and is something to look into."
The AFL is considering introducing a Category B list spot dedicated to First Nations players to improve their representation within clubs which Gresham was broadly supportive of.
Earlier this month, the AFL has launched a First Nations Impact Fund, with about $300,000 to be invested annually in partnership with clubs.
