WHEN Greater Western Sydney travels interstate, airport lounges turn into makeshift playgrounds as the Giants' growing band of babies takes over.

From impromptu games of chasey to shared snack boxes and pre-flight naps, the club's travelling "kids' club" is the most visible sign of an approach that has reshaped travel, match-day and working arrangements to help players and staff balance family and football.

At the front of the pack are veteran forward Alicia Eva’s 18-month-old son, Patrick, and head AFLW physiotherapist Gemma Vale’s two-year-old son, Murphy.

Once the group reaches the airport lounge, media and public relations lead Tilly Werner barely sees her eight-month-old daughter, Joni.

"We'll take Joni into the lounge, and then I won't see her again until we have to board the plane because she gets passed around and adored by all the players," Werner told AFL.com.au.

The crew also includes coach Cam Bernasconi's son, Leon, who was born in May and is set to join future trips.

It's all part of the Giants' approach to helping parents balance the demands of family, travel and match-day football.

“To borrow a very old cliché, it really is a ‘family club’ internally, because a lot of people who make up the Giants aren't necessarily in their home state, and therefore people help when help is needed,” Eva said.

“It's made my journey a lot easier and probably made starting a family possible because of the support the club has provided.”

The foundations of the women’s program’s approach were laid last year when Vale began planning her return to work with AFLW and football operations manager Alison Zell.

Zell said the process challenged some of her own assumptions about what a high-performance environment needed to look like.

"I think fundamentally, and I've had to learn this, you can create a high-performance environment with really high standards that also has flex in it to suit people, both players and staff," she said.​‌

Rather than applying a single model to every parent, the club has worked through individual circumstances and needs.

For Vale, becoming a parent changed her perspective on her long-standing career in high performance. 

Before Murphy's birth, she wondered whether parenthood would force her to leave elite sport, given the weekend and interstate travel required by her role.

"I spent a lot of my pregnancy, mostly internally, thinking, 'This is the end of my career,'" Vale said.​‌

Having previously worked as the physio for both Giants Netball and the club’s AFLW program, she first resumed travelling with the netball side. As the football season approached, she met with Zell, who asked: "What do you need to make this work?"

The AFL Players Association (AFLPA) guidelines support parents, including breastfeeding mothers, in travelling with their child and a partner or carer until the child reaches three years of age.

Vale asked the Giants for similar support during Murphy's first two years, allowing her to continue in her role while keeping her son close and continuing to breastfeed.​‌

It was the first time Zell had worked through the return of a female high-performance staff member in those circumstances. Her response was simple: "Whatever you need, we'll make it work."

But unlike players, Vale wasn’t covered by the AFLPA provisions, meaning her travel arrangements had to be negotiated separately as part of her staff contract. She initially returned to work part-time.

Travelling with Murphy and her partner, Rhys, who acts as their son’s primary caregiver on the road, has since become normal for the family. Vale's experience has also helped shape an approach now supporting other parents at the club.

As Murphy has grown older, the family sometimes takes separate flights from the team, with the club arranging travel around his nap times. A hire car fitted with a baby seat awaits them on arrival, while the family stays together at the team hotel.

During Murphy's first year, when he was feeding frequently, Rhys was accredited as a staff member so he could enter the change rooms and Vale could breastfeed around her match-day duties.

"Breastfeeding is pretty much three- or four-hourly, so I'd breastfeed around the timing of the game," Vale explained.

"Occasionally, I'd be pumping milk at half-time in the change rooms, in medical rooms, hand-delivering milk over the fence to my husband to bottle feed. And then pumping in the hotel room and all those fun things."

Werner navigates a similar routine. Joni stays with her during flights and pre-game activities before her partner, Mat, looks after her during the match.

Eva's partner Claudia and Patrick join the travelling party, with all three riding together on the team bus.

The families join players for meals and spend time in team spaces, with almost 30 footballers ready to act as built-in babysitters.

While the children rarely stay for team meetings, Patrick has attended several post-match sessions, giving Eva a welcome sense of perspective after difficult results.

“It provides a moment of lightness for me,” Eva said.

“It's still a developing phase for the Giants as a squad this year, and there's been some tough losses. I'm the kind of player that really wears losses heavily; that's just how I've been my whole career, I've been like that. But having Patty there post-game gives me a new perspective.

"He hasn't even watched the game. He doesn't know kicks, marks, handballs; he doesn't know how you've gone, and he doesn't really care. He just cares and loves you, and that's all he wants.

“So, it's a good reminder to me that football is one thing, but family is another, and family is the most important. So, it's been really good for me to have my family around this season in particular.”

That shift towards accommodating families has mirrored the broader evolution of the club itself.

"In the early days, we had 18-year-old male players, and that was the entire demographic," Zell said.

"But they're all growing up and having kids now. Our AFLW team came in almost 10 years ago and transformed the landscape of the club and how it operates.

“Now we've got Alicia becoming a mum, and we've had parents on the AFLW football floor.”​‌

For Eva, having children around the group offers something beyond the practical help players can provide.

“It's not just about babysitting,” she said.

“After so many years as captain of the footy club, where I would go out for coffee and try to help console players or talk them through challenging times, sometimes it's actually nice for them to just hang out with Patrick and not talk about footy, development or anything else, but just come and goof around with a baby.

“That's been really special to see.”

Returning to work also helped Vale regain a sense of identity outside parenthood.

“It proves your value outside of being a mother and a parent as well, which can sometimes get a little bit lost during parental leave, where you question who you are and your own identity,” she said.

“Work gives you a sense of purpose outside of that too.”

The flexibility hasn't been limited to mothers. Earlier this season, Bernasconi took three weeks of parental leave after Leon was born.

"Can your head coach step out to have a baby? I felt like we did it really successfully," Zell said of Bernasconi’s parental leave.

“We might not have in previous years when we didn't have the right structures or resources, but it shows really clearly where your program is at and whether you can cope in those situations.”

An added bonus for Werner is that her daughter is growing up around professional female athletes and women working in elite sport.

“She's still a baby, but I hope she recognises, and that we get to talk to her one day about how special it is that she's growing and learning in a workplace of professional sporting women, which didn't exist 10 years ago, let alone 30 years ago when I was born,” Werner said.

“For her to have a frontline experience of that and interact with incredibly strong female leaders, as well as supportive male staff members, is pretty astonishing. If she was born 10 years ago, she simply wouldn't have had this opportunity.”

Vale hopes seeing mothers continue to work in high-performance sport can help others weighing up whether they can combine a career in the industry with a family.

"It is okay to have a family, and you can be supported by the club and the environment," she said.

"You can't be what you can't see. If you can see mums working in high-performance sport, then hey, I could do it too."

For the Giants, making that possible has required practical changes rather than a one-size-fits-all approach.

As Murphy, Patrick, Joni and Leon become familiar faces around the team, having families along for the ride is becoming part of everyday life in the Giants' AFLW program.