Thorn immediately feels part of the Swans family

Family brought Tayla Thorn to Western Australia in the first place and she already feels right at home at Swan Districts continuing her family's history with the club.

Thorn might only be 25 years of age herself, but already she feels like her experience of having been playing the game since she was 14, having lived in the Northern Territory, Queensland, South Australia and Victoria, and playing at two AFLW clubs means she has a lot to pass on.

She might still laugh when she thinks about the experience she brings to a Swan Districts team full of teenagers, but that's the reality of the situation and she already feels right at home.

Thorn initially came to Perth to have the support of her family while undergoing her rehabilitation after rupturing her ACL and having a knee reconstruction, but she enjoyed the lifestyle too much to leave and it was always going to be Swan Districts she played at.

"It was always on the table to come back and I did want to try and come back given I've been playing since I was 14 in different leagues all over Australia," Thorn said.

"It was actually very refreshing to have that time off to be able to reassess everything even though it would have been better not to have done my ACL.

"It has helped me, though, now that I'm back into it I've got that passion to play again and it's good to be back out there and playing again. Also playing in a different environment again has been good and it's made all the challenges worth it so far."

Coming to live closer to her father Thomas, who played with Swan Districts in his younger days including 14 league games across 1978-79, and a lot of her family members that includes a newly arrived one-year-old sister was something Thorn wanted to experience.

"My family are here and with my dad I have 18 siblings including my little one-year-old sister so I made the move over here so basically my family could help me and I could be around them during my ACL rehab," Thorn said.

"I've just stuck here ever since really and I'm enjoying living here, and really enjoying playing WAFL and the lifestyle of living over here.

"My dad has come to almost all our games so far and he has been up in the club house for the home games, and he knows a few of the other players up there at the bar so he's been having a great time.

"It does feel like a very family club and I've also had my partner playing at Swans as well so having them all around the club and supporting women's footy as well is huge."

Coming back from an ACL injury is never easy and having to go through the 12-month rehabilitation process can be a grind, but Thorn couldn’t have asked for more in terms of her return to be playing than the support she's received from Swan Districts and how welcome they have made her feel.

"It has been challenging coming back from an ACL injury, however, it's just good to find that fire again to play. I couldn’t have thought of a better bunch of girls to be playing with or a better club to be doing it with than Swan Districts," she said.

"Obviously it has its challenges and barriers when you're trying to come back, but it's nothing that the team and staff haven’t helped me overcome.

"It's definitely very sentimental for me to be playing at Swans because I dad has played there and so has my brother, and my uncle as well. It sort of feels like a family club for us all at this point."

Having spent much of her younger days growing up in a small town outside Darwin, Humpty Doo, a lot of Thorn's football journey has been in the Northern Territory which has included plenty of representative football and standout performances with St Mary's.

She also briefly moved to Melbourne for her accounting studies at university, but has been on quite the fascinating journey since that has included a stint at the Adelaide Crows where she played five AFLW games and then later at the Gold Coast Suns where she played three matches.

It's that experience that Thorn has tried to pass on to her younger teammates now at Swan Districts even if she is new to the club.

"I've just tried to bring that experience into the group I guess being one of the oldest players at the Swans," Thorn said.

"So I bring that experience for the girls and I'm very quickly doing that full circle around because it wasn’t that long ago I was one of the younger players.

"We do have aspiring players on our team who are looking at getting drafted so it's probably good having someone with the knowledge of what it's like to play in the AFLW.

"Because we have such a young team, I think it's good having someone with that experience so I've tried to add as much as I can."

While in the real world Thorn is still a young woman, at age 25 and having spent time at two AFLW clubs makes her an experienced member of this Swan Districts team and she's happy to help the younger players in any way she can.

"It is a bit of imposter syndrome in one way but it's so real too that I am one of the older players on our team so unfortunately that's the truth," Thorn said.

"But I guess having that leadership and having come from that footy background that I do, and having that experience, it does bring an advantage to have me there into the club even if it such a young team and I still don't feel like I'm really that old."