Women’s football

[toptoon]

No doubt a bit contentious but I think the women’s game is being made more prominent by the press than it deserves to be.
I see Holland won 12-0 tonight and England 10-0 which gives you an idea of the quality of the spectacle as a sporting event.
When you go on the BBC football results page these games are second on the list behind our game. The women’s club games’ results are listed ahead of the league one results. While it’s amusing that they are seen as more important than the mackems, I think it’s wrong.
I’m not ***ist but I don’t like issues being artificially made more important than they are for social reasons. Very happy for the woman’s game to get the correct recognition but only so much as that which its popularity deserves.

[trinitoon]

My daughter is trying hard to get into a major club in the UK so I feel particularly strongly about this.

The women's game is unjustifiably sh'it because it is underinvested and under-supported in the media; from grassroots level to the top.

In Spain, she was a beast playing for the women's arm of a La Liga team banging in 10+ goals in one season after doing 20+ goals in previous clubs. She's determined to make it in the UK instead. And has even bagged a double hattrick in one lower league match. And a hattrick in her last. The structure in the UK is a total fu'cking mess after the FA blocked her from playing for over a year (UK born and passport holder).

There is a weird and hard-to-understand element in the UK women's game that doesn't accelerate talent - there is a tinge of racism and elitism that is hard to pin down but it is there. It is largely unconscious but it is undeniable. Just look at the race split versus the mens game and it is perplexing.

You have to rage against the machine to progress. The facilities, pitches, scouting, pay, sponsorship, grassroots encouragement, diversity, coaching, feeds through to a massive disparity vs the mens game.

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The massive score lines are easy to explain. They are a reflection of two factors:

1) how seriously each side takes more aspects of the game - funding, training, etc
2) standard of goalkeeping vs the strikers on the pitch that day. Once the keeper is not fit for purpose that day (many are atrocious) and the strikers are on it, it's a cricket score.

[MidsMagpie]

The BBC seem obsessed with women's football.

[toptoon]

My daughter is trying hard to get into a major club in the UK so I feel particularly strongly about this.

The women's game is unjustifiably sh'it because it is underinvested and under-supported in the media; from grassroots level to the top.

In Spain, she was a beast playing for the women's arm of a La Liga team banging in 10+ goals in one season after doing 20+ goals in previous clubs. She's determined to make it in the UK instead. And has even bagged a double hattrick in one lower league match. And a hattrick in her last. The structure in the UK is a total fu'cking mess after the FA blocked her from playing for over a year (UK born and passport holder).

There is a weird and hard-to-understand element in the UK women's game that doesn't accelerate talent - there is a tinge of racism and elitism that is hard to pin down but it is there. It is largely unconscious but it is undeniable. Just look at the race split versus the mens game and it is perplexing.

You have to rage against the machine to progress. The facilities, pitches, scouting, pay, sponsorship, grassroots encouragement, diversity, coaching, feeds through to a massive disparity vs the mens game.

--

The massive score lines are easy to explain. They are a reflection of two factors:

1) how seriously each side takes more aspects of the game - funding, training, etc
2) standard of goalkeeping vs the strikers on the pitch that day. Once the keeper is not fit for purpose that day (many are atrocious) and the strikers are on it, it's a cricket score.

Mids : they are.

Trini: brilliant to hear about your daughter - she’s obviously a real talent and she’ll get there in the end. IMO the standard of women’s football has improved a lot in the last decade but you still get the odd gulf in class as yesterday’s results showed. If there are games with large mismatches in player quality, as you say, then that is a structural problem - better teams need to be in higher leagues and poorer ones in lower ones. Maybe there is a lack of women’s clubs just now to allow this to happen properly?
You clearly know a lot about the women’s game (and more than me) and your comments on funding sound right. However, I would say there is certainly not a lack of support from the media and it’s more a case of the woman’s game being forced on us and given more prominence than it currently deserves. TBH it’s the same with cricket. You see a headline of ‘England thrash India in first ODI’ and then you get disappointed when you see it was the women and not the men.