Australia was champion of the world three years ago, but now softball teams are struggling to find players

Players tossed their gloves in the air in celebration as they ran towards a huddle in the middle of the softball field. Australian flags waved in the stands and the team shouted with joy.

With a throw to first base to run the final Canadian batter out, the Australian men's softball team — the Aussie Steelers — were crowned world champions in 2022.

It was just the second time the Steelers had been world champions and appeared to be a sign the sport, a popular inclusion in Australian schools for years, was reaching new heights.

But less than three years after watching his idols take home the trophy, Canberra softballer Harry Saisell is battling to find enough players to fill a team sheet each week.

"It's a hard sport, and it's really fun, but people don't see that."

A once-thriving sport

Softball is a variation of baseball invented in the late 1800s and uses a larger ball and smaller field.

The sport is predominantly played by female participants and will be included in the 2028 Los Angeles Olympic Games as a women's only sport, however, the men's game has a strong presence around the world.

But in Australia, players and the sport's peak bodies are concerned softball is no longer able to compete with the popularity of other sports.

It means remaining junior players like Harry regularly play up for older divisions and fill in for multiple teams each season.

"A lot of people in my teams miss out on most games due to basketball grand final, cricket grand finals, [and] baseball."

Since the pandemic, juniors numbers in the ACT have shrunk to the point where the territory's competitions had to be consolidated into one association with just four or five teams in each division.

Of the 23,000 softball members across Australia, there are 1,200 based in the ACT, according to Softball Australia.

No young blood

Softball ACT operations manager Shaun Carroll remembers a time when softball was second to only cricket in its popularity.

"But like everything else, things come and go and there seem to be a lot more things coming for kids to select and go play."

Five years ago, Mr Carroll remembers a vibrant scene of softballers at the long-running Australia Day Carnival in Canberra.

It has not run since 2023 due to a lack of young participants.

"We had hundreds of kids floating around," he said.

Mr Carroll knows that with fewer young players coming up the ranks, softball competitions could be on their last legs.

"I'd love to say that softball's going to be around for 15 or 20 years," he said.

"The way it's heading at the moment, it's not looking great.

"But you never know what's around the corner."

Though Mr Carroll admits the Australian Masters Games — which will be hosted in Canberra in October 2025 — tell a different story.

With almost 700 players, softball is the third most popular sport in the bi-annual competition.

Olympic dreams

State-representative softballer Laura Pardoe first played as a young child and said she was sad to see opportunities to learn softball in school disappear despite it being an Olympic sport.

"The opportunities for those players have just become smaller and smaller, especially for the women and girls," she said.

"This is a sport that's back in the Olympics for 2028, and we're not on that trajectory of opportunities to get to that higher level."

In the 2025 season, the ACT women's competition has just four teams, while the men's grades have seven.

Although the Australian Sports Commission has given an additional $1.96 million to fund high-performance programs for women's softball ahead of the Olympics, this money can not be used at the local level.

Hopes to become 'the next Matildas'

But Softball Australia chief executive Sarah Loh is hopeful Australia's successful bid to host the next Women's Softball World Cup will solve the sport's lack of exposure problem.

"This is why our investment into kids is paramount."

Ms Loh said the World Cup announcement had already started to create growth within the sport, particularly in Queensland.

"Winning that bid, it's literally changed our fortunes now," she said.

"We have producers putting their hand up saying we want to make you the next Matildas."

The World Cup will be held in Brisbane in April 2027 and is the qualifying event for the 2028 Los Angeles Olympic Games.

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