Peta Searle

Peta Searle is an Australian Rules football coach. The Port Melbourne assistant coach to Gary Ayers during the team’s 2012 VFL title defence, she was subsequently named head coach for the Western Bulldogs Women’s team.

Searle’s football coaching pathway is filled with firsts. She was the first Victorian Women’s Football League (VWFL) coach to coach a team (Darebin Falcons) to five consecutive Premier Final wins; the first female coach in the TAC with the Western Jets; the first head coach of the AFL Victoria VWFL Academy Coach/Mentor and the first female to coach in the VFL.

She has put on hold her assistant principal role at a Melbourne based secondary college (as a PE teacher majoring in Biomechanics) to focus on her two young children – as well as to give coaching at the highest level her full attention.