All nine umpires, three field, four boundary and two goal, will be female in the under-18.5 hit-out between East Point and Redan - showing that it is not only the playing female numbers on the rapid rise.

Attending the BFL’s luncheon for women in football, visiting South African umpire Nosipho Khuzwayo will be one of those umpires.

Khuzwayo landed in the country two weeks ago along with fellow umpire Sibusiso Nqunqeka and both have received great insight into how Australian Rules is umpired in its home land. Khuzwayo has been umpiring Australian Rules in South Africa since 2007, but she admits she is still learning given Australian Rules is a “secondary sport” in her country.

The South African duo have attended BFUA training and also visited AFL House to watch the top-level umpires train.

“We just tried to pick up a little bit we could use when we go back home to South Africa,” Khuzwayo said.

Khuzwayo said she was excited to umpire her first match in Australia, but also a little nervous. Her time in Ballarat has provided plenty of development on the field ahead of August’s International Cup. While she said one of the key takeaways has been creating a seperate body for the umpires – as seen with the BFUA.

“I’m looking forward to it and it’s going to be historic – the first time an all-women-panel umpires a game.

“It’s the whole system. They take their umpires very seriously here. They have a system going for the umpires and not just for the players, that’s what we are going to implement back home.”

BFUA development coach Paul Clark said Saturday’s umpiring feat would be a “significant achievement” and said the increase in female umpires, particularly in the junior ranks, over the last three years had been huge.

“It has grown significantly across the last three years,” Clark said.

“It goes hand-in-hand (with the AFLW expansion).”

For fellow umpire Holly McEldrew, umpiring was never something at the forefront of her mind, it just became “something to do on weekends.”

After starting as a boundary umpire, McEldrew has spent the last two years as a central umpire in the Ballarat Football League women’s competition.She says she has noticed a spike within the female umpiring ranks in the BFL.

“This year I’ve seen a big increase in women umpiring - I think it’s to do with AFLW. When I first started there were three or four girls, now we have between 20-30 girls. There’s definitely more interest, it’s now considered okay to do, not taboo,” she said.

McEldrew said it was fantastic to see initiatives like international umpires coming to Australia to ply their trade.

“It’s really great to see other countries taking an interest in AFL to start with, but then for women to be able to come across and umpire is fantastic.”