Matildas assistant coach Mel Andreatta says Australia's emerging women's footballers need more top-level games beyond what the W-League currently provides.
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The W-League regular season is just 12 rounds, with the four teams that make the finals playing one or two additional matches.
Socceroos head coach Graham Arnold has long been vocal about the need for Australia's young male footballers to play more minutes - and former Brisbane Roar W-League coach Andreatta believed their female counterparts faced the same issue.
"We need more games. I said it in my time as a W-League coach," Andreatta told reporters on Tuesday.
"On a personal level, I couldn't advocate for that more.
"A longer season for these players to compete in, in a high-performance environment is the way forward.
"How we get there is a challenge for us all, to seek the opportunities in achieving it and ways that we can do it probably differently to what we've done before.
"And whilst a lot of our local players are playing (NPLW), I think there could be more games there as well."
Beyond extending the W-League season, Andreatta said a women's FFA Cup equivalent was one potential way to add games - while citing the example of Brisbane playing a game against a NPLW-select team.
Andreatta ran a four-day talent identification camp last week and said there was clearly another level of players who could step up and push for senior selection.
While the majority of senior Matildas are now based in Europe, Andreatta compared the upcoming W-League season to those of about decade ago when the likes of Kate McShea, Joey Peters and Cheryl Salisbury retired but Sam Kerr, Caitlin Foord and Kyah Simon emerged.
"That's on us, as coaches and staff, W-League and national teams to provide that opportunity for these talents to rise and take the game further," Andreatta said.
"And if we've seen it in the past and in the men's game, why can't we see it again?"
Australian Associated Press
