History
The inaugural meeting of the Northern Ireland Women’s Football Association was held in the Post Office Youth Club, College Sq North, Belfast on the 26th November 1976.
Mary McVeigh was elected as the first Chair and the meeting discussed the formation of the league, it’s Constitution and rules as well as the recruitment of new teams, players etc. The Association agreed to play as a summer league under FA Rules with the only exception being that teams played 35 minutes each way instead of 45 minutes. This has since been amended to 45 minutes each way.
The 1977 season kicked off with 3 Divisions of 6 teams. However, it was considered more practical to reduce this to two divisions for the 1978 season.
From those early beginnings the NIWFA has now expanded to its present size of 55 teams with approximately 1200 players (over the age of 14) competing in 7 divisions during the months of April — September.
The NIWFA committee is keen to develop the women’s game in Northern Ireland and eager to assist clubs to improve their capacity. To this end we have held a number of information days for clubs and hope to organise a number of courses in the future.
The league also currently has a fixtures and referees secretary to ensure the smooth day to day running of league affairs — these posts are both filled on a voluntary basis and the work carried out by the post holders is invaluable to women’s football.
The NIWFA have their own dedicated website www.niwfa.org to provide details of fixtures, scores and League tables and for the 2009 season the Committee have commissioned a freelance Sports journalist and a sports photographer to ensure additional media coverage for women’s football and potential sponsors.
The NIWFA is a well-established sports organisation with member clubs from all over Northern Ireland.
The current committee recognises the need to further develop the product hence their decision to employ the sports journalist and photographer whose remit is to prepare match reports and features to be submitted in regional and local papers.
The league management committee currently holds all rights to the NIWFA website, to the various domestic leagues including the Championship, Division 1, Division 2, Division 3, Division 4 and Reserve League with the Premier division currently sponsored by Carnegie. In order to increase competition and interest and excitement in all divisions the committee introduced promotion and relegation into all leagues (except the Reserve league which is set up for Clubs with 2nd teams).
The Premiership winners represent Northern Ireland in the UEFA Club Championships each year.
In addition to the various divisional titles there are also divisional cups with the IFA also running an Irish Cup competition (currently sponsored by Coca Cola).
Junior Football
At Junior level there is a growing base of players and the majority of Senior Clubs playing Women’s Association football have a growing base of young players who they coach, develop and nurture.
In conjunction with the IFA there are summer leagues for young players as well as Schools Leagues. This allows young girls the opportunity to start playing football at a young age and provides a clear progression to a local Club and the opportunity to continue into the higher echelons of the game.
International Football
At international level the various teams have made enormous strides over the last few years.
The senior team, under manager Alfie Wylie, continues to improve its standing in World Football with some excellent performances and with the NIWFA organising ever more competitive divisions the signs for the future are very positive.
