DOWN’S Clara Fitzpatrick has said that the door is open for her to return to the AFLW next season with the Braynsford player stating that she is assessing all options.

The St Kilda player saw her promising start to the new season cut short by the coronavirus outbreak, and Down managers Caoibhe Sloan and Peter Lynch would no doubt have been tracking the situation of the former Mourne county player.

With the ladies’ GAA season also up in the air currently, Fitzpatrick said that she was going to take her time before rushing into any decision.

“It was very unfortunate how it all unfolded,” said the 29-year-old.

“Our last two games were cancelled and I had been hoping to stay over for another month or so after those games.

“With this corona stuff I just decided to book a flight home with my sister, a friend and a couple of the other Irish AFL players. We all jumped on board together.

“We had our exit interviews, I had mine just before I left. They have offered me a contract for next year.

“It was all pretty positive and they seemed pretty happy, which was nice. They were happy with how we did as a team in our first year in the division.

“It’s hard to know what the plans are at the minute. I was hemming and hawing about whether I should go back over or should I just do what some of the Irish girls did and go over for the length of the season.

“I’m hoping to play next season as it stands. Their season only goes from November to April time.

“They are making the plans behind the scenes and they said that they are including me in those plans, so I’ll just talk to them over the next couple of months and see what happens.”

It’s not a major surprise that the Melbourne-based club is keen to retain Fitzpatrick’s services.

The former Glenn and Kilcoo physio had made a big impression since signing a rookie contract last year.

The respect goes both ways though with Fitzpatrick left more than impressed by the club’s attempts to integrate both the men’s and the ladies’ teams.

“It’s an unbelievable club,” she said. “They are very focused on integration whereas a lot of other clubs maybe wouldn’t be as strongly into that.

“We’ve had open training with the men and they have come down to our sessions. They’re very good that way.

“Maybe it’s because I’m coming from a GAA background and an amateur sport, but for me it was an incredible experience.

“We had top notch facilities and we had access to all of the facilities that the men had.

“We were using the same gym, we had access to the physios, the strength and conditioning coaches, the dieticians. I couldn’t really fault it.

“There is still a bit of a difference between the men and women, still a way to go, but I was very impressed overall.”

The AFL Ireland Women Twitter account has proven to be a great source of information for those wanting to follow the exploits of those who were playing on the other side of the world.

Eighteen Irish players were signed by AFLW teams for the 2020 season and the account last week ranked their top five over the shortened campaign. Fitzpatrick was named fifth behind Mayo trio Aileen Gilroy, Cora Staunton and Sarah Rowe and Tipperary’s Aisling McCarthy.

The interest in the sport is growing rapidly, and that was evident in St Kilda’s opening fixture against Western Bulldogs, which was a ‘lockout’ as they say in Australia. Or sold out, as we prefer to say back here.

“That was pretty impressive,” Fitzpatrick continued.

“I had been playing Gaelic for years and I was still playing it over in Australia for the first few years, but coming into professional sport was brilliant.

“To have a lockout, a crowd of just over 8,000, was pretty amazing.

“For a lot of our team it was our first time playing AFLW so it was a pretty big day for us all. Nerve-wrecking for the first few minutes but just an unbelievable experience.”

And with the possibility of GAA games being played behind closed doors still very much on the table later this year, Fitzpatrick said that it’s something that players will quickly get over.

The coronavirus situation meant that she played for St Kilda in front of no crowd, but it was a short-term distraction.

“Initially it was a bit bizarre,” she said. “You had over 8,000 at the first game, major support, and that continued over the next couple of games.

“Then that changed and nobody could come in.

“It was strange, it was quiet but once the whistle blows you zone all that out and just get on with it.”

n.mccoy@gaeliclife.com