Bella Jarratt, 16, from Yass has already had some career highlights as the ACT’s youngest female rugby referee, but meeting Brumbies legend Stephen Larkham at an event in Yass was certainly up there. Photo: Supplied.
When she was in Year 8 at Daramalan College, one of Bella Jarratt’s best friends played rugby – and encouraged her to also take it up.
The young Yass woman loved playing the game, but the injuries that inevitably came with it, not so much.
“I started playing when I was 14,” Bella said. “I should have started when I was younger,” she laughed. “I could have wrapped my head around being tackled better. I wasn’t the best … I loved it, but I kept getting injured.
“Then my Mum saw this thing on Facebook about how to become a referee, and I haven’t looked back since.”
This young woman, now 16, from Bowning near Yass, last week won the JS Walters Whistle Award as the most deserving referee under 18 with the ACT Rugby Referees Association (ACTRRA).
Of the ACT association’s 140 referees, only seven are women – “and I’m the only one under 18,” Bella said.
She had “reffed” her first game as an accredited junior referee the day before and went from the Eagles game to assist the senior ref in a game at Canberra Grammar, where her cousin Oscar was in the winning Marist team.
How did that make you feel? “Very proud,” she said. “It really makes me feel very proud.
“I love being a ref,” she said. “I want to continue doing this – in Super Rugby, the Rugby World Cup, even the Olympics.”
Bella said despite some cases of players, parents and others taking on the referee at games, she had pretty much always been respected on the field.
“To be a good ref,” she said, “you have got to have confidence in your decision-making and not second guess yourself, have a good understanding of the rules and be able to communicate well with players on the field, coaches, the public, senior refs … I know I still have a lot to learn though,” adding that she would love to see more young women take to the field in a refereeing role.
She’s also a familar face after her games are over, often seen running the sidelines for senior and club games after doing her Saturday morning stint in the middle with the juniors.
Bella Jarratt, 16, takes to the field as a junior rugby referee. Photo: Supplied.
Bella would also be the first to tell you she would not have made it to where she is today without the support of her family, from whom she inherits her passion for the game, especially the Brumbies and the Yass Rams.
Now as a member of the ACTRRA, she could find herself anywhere from Canberra to Yass on a Saturday to ref a game.
In between, she still manages to help out on the family farm, do as much homework as she can as a Year 11 student on the daily hour-plus bus commute to and from school – and keep up with her other passion, horses.
“It can be a lot, but I love it,” she said. “I can do a lot of homework on the bus to and from school, can ref on Saturday mornings and help with farmwork at the weekends too. During winter, I love to ride and during daylight saving I can come home from school, ride and then do my homework after that.”
Bella Jarratt with her cousin Oscar at his game with Marist 3rds last weekend just after she received the Whistle Award. Photo: Supplied.
One of the highlights of her career so far was to meet Brumbies legend Stephen Larkham in 2022.
“It was amazing to meet him,” she said. “He was interested in speaking to a girl who was involved in rugby from Daramalan because it’s such a well-known rugby school.”
But it turned out the family connection went even further back.
“My mum told me that she used to catch the Barton Highway bus with him years ago. He was a few years older, but they caught the same bus.”
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