BAKER’S DOZEN

By Arian Odza

When you think Women’s football in the Eastern suburbs it’s hard to go past The Basin’s Julia Baker, who for years has been the marquee forward of the competition.

Baker’s ability to score find the goals with ease has been – and still is – astonishing and is a testament to both her skill level and the overall development of the women’s grassroots game.

Baker was able to boot 43 goals within 14 games in 2019, where her side went down to South Croydon in a nail-biting Grand Final and is on form to smash that this year with 23 goals in 6 games so far in 2021(at time of writing).

It’s no surprise that her Bears outfit sitting second on the Division One ladder, suffering just the one loss thus far, coming last weekend against South Belgrave Lysterfield.

With a record of 76 goals across the 2018 and 2019 seasons, Baker is showing no signs of slowing down, with added motivation coming from not only the heartbreak of the 2019 Division One Grand Final, but also the lay-off induced by the worldwide pandemic in 2020.

“It was simply due to coming off of a loss in the 2019 season, where we lost the game we should of probably won and we didn’t get the job done, so you sort of spend 18 months getting fit in the hope you can get back to where you were,” Baker explained, when asked about the driving force behind her form so far in 2021.

Despite her prowess as a forward, Baker is looking to transition into the midfield in the not to distant future.

“For me it’s how do I continue to keep fit so I can be an on baller and when I get lucky enough to float to the forward line, if I can kick a goal that’s a bonus.”

Baker has of course had experience at higher level, having spent some time in the VFLW before coming back to play at the local level.

“I came from playing in the VFL to just playing local footy because I wanted to play with mates and just love it again and what changed between 2018 and 2019 was the team improving, the skills that you have around you the more opportunity you have to kick goals and score goals, so that is all that changed, we just got better as a team.”

And whilst the break in 2020 was frustrating and ultimately a driving force behind her and The Basin’s red-hot form this season, Baker can see the silver lining in that gloomy 2020 cloud.

“For me it was a really good time to rest and realign and stop to refocus and go again, so the break was great.”