Knights set sights on women’s league entry
THE Gold Coast Knights have one eye on NPL Women’s entry as they continue their push to become the city’s premier football club.
Set to join Gold Coast United in the men’s NPL in 2019 and with plans to build a 3000- seat stadium at Croatian Sports Centre, the Knights are hopeful of adding an NPLW side in the coming years.
While plans for the Carrara club to field in a team in the Gold Coast Women’s League this season ultimately fell through, president Adrian Puljich said it had not scared him off the idea of a high-performance female side. “We would like for it to happen,” he said.
“Obviously the Women’s NPL is a big component to finish off the programs we’re running at the Knights.
“We have bigger ambitions to set ourselves up … but it’s baby steps. There’s no point having a women’s program that lasts two years and then it goes by the wayside. I’m conscious of finances and I’m conscious of growing too quickly.
“It is the Gold Coast and you just have to look at the national teams to understand how fickle support can be and how fickle administrations can be if it’s done too quickly. (But) we need to prove ourselves to Football Queensland that we can hold our NPL license first.”
The Knights’ NPL foray next season means they will step away from the Gold Coast Premier League but Puljich said the reigning premiers would not be lost to the Football Gold Coast community.
“We do want to still host Metro teams and women’s teams in the local league.”