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She's Holding Her Own in a Boys' Sport

She's Holding Her Own in a Boys' Sport
By: Kate Scott

POPLAR BLUFF, MO -- When you think about high school wrestling, you probably don't think of ponytails. But that just means you haven't met Fatma Haiderzad, the Poplar Bluff High School junior who's bringing a fresh face to a sport dominated by men.

The small seventeen year old is the first girl to make it on the school's varsity wrestling team. But Fatma didn't join the team to make a statement. "I just wanted to stay in shape and just wanted a challenge," she tells Heartland News. "And it looked like fun. I just wanted to see how hard it was and see if I could take it."

She soon learned that wrestling is hard work. Even for the boys. Three other girls who started the season with her have since dropped out. But Head Coach Dave Williams says Fatma is holding her own. "She does a lot more than the guys sometimes," he smiles. "She never cries. She never whines. You never hardly hear anything out of her. From a male's point of view, you don't want the girl to outdo you. So in theory, she kind of pushes the guys."

Senior wrestler Shawn Wrinkle agrees with his coach. While he admires Fatma, he also says, "You don't want to get beat by a girl. You don't want her to work harder. So usually the guys pick it up more, because they just don't want to get beat." Not only does Fatma inspire the boys on her own team to work harder, she knows she's giving her competitors extra incentive to win. "When we meet other guys, I'm sure they're like, "Okay, I'll take her down real fast," she laughs. And while she says that happens a lot, it wasn't the case at one junior varsity tournament in Sikeston. That's where Fatma pinned her male competitor in the 112 weight class for her first real victory of the season. It was a proud moment for both her and her coaches. "She does a good job," says Coach Williams. "She gets out there and she's tough. She's had the busted lips and bloody noses, and sore body parts, and strains and sprains and everything else. But it doesn't hold her down. She gets back up and goes right back at it again."

But Fatma is quick to point out that she never could've "gone at it" in the first place, if her coaches hadn't given girls a chance. "My coaches are the best," she claims. "Coach (Brian) Wisdom and Coach Williams, from day one, they were just encouraging me to be here and pushing me. I've had other girls come up to me at wrestling matches. They're usually the stat keepers and managers, and they're like, 'My coach wouldn't even let me come out the first day. He said I didn't have enough stamina.'" Fatma says she tells those girls, "That's really sad, because not only did my coaches let me, but they encouraged me and wanted me here. They make me feel like I belong."

For Coach Williams, the decision to include girls on the team was a no-brainer. "I welcome everybody," he says. "And I have a daughter of my own that wants to wrestle. She is wanting to follow in Fatma's footsteps. Fatma is on a pedestal right now with my daughter Darcy." Williams says he'd like to see more girls on his team, and in the sport as a whole.

Fatma tells Heartland News that she plans to work on her wrestling moves over the summer, and try out for the team again next year. She's also a cross country runner, and is thinking about taking up soccer.