To all those who have enjoyed England’s European championship win, and who have found it inspiring, now is the time to seek out your local women’s team and go along in support as we embark upon a new season. We have just witnessed a great tournament, with immense skill and commitment on display. Great achievements such as this don’t come from nowhere. Behind the glory lies the grit, years of it. Now is the hour to support women's football, from the local grassroots level up to the national team. That’s precisely the route that everyone of the Lionesses took to this triumph. I am looking forward to following Llandudno Ladies this season. Find your local team and go on down. Watch, support, and, if you have an inkling, play! Give it a go! You never know. You could be one of tomorrow’s players. And you will more than likely enjoy yourself.
This was a fantastic victory over a very good Germany, a team who are placed higher in the international rankings than England. This triumph should really be a game-changer when it comes to women’s football.* Most of all, it should change attitudes. There isn’t an awful lot about women’s football on the pitch that needs to be changed, the standards of coaching and playing are high. It is support, resources, and coverage off the pitch that needs to be improved. That will come with success, seeping down from the top level to grassroots and, from there, back up with a new generation of players, the players of tomorrow who, some day, one day, will have their day. Those players are out there now. Go and find them and offer your support and encouragement.
*[see below a note on this term 'women’s football' - I use it a lot here, for the simple reason that it makes clear what we are talking about. I see other women involved in football using precisely the same term, not least the Lionesses themselves. But some have taken the opportunity to criticise those who use the term. I explain at the bottom.]
There are only twelve teams in the Women's Super League (WSL), the highest football league for women in England. Four of these clubs are in London, with two apiece Manchester, Birmingham and Liverpool. Women’s football doesn’t end with the WSL. There are another 6 tiers of football in any one of which you can watch, support, sponsor players, enjoy thrilling football, and indulge your passions and enthusiasms. I’m in Wales, which is where I do these things. Everyone has their own local team. Support your local team! Think global, act local! You can do the same wherever you are. Go and support your local club! It’s the same game, the same thrills, the same skills. Instead of hankering after the ‘big’ clubs in the ‘big’ league, acknowledge and honour the fact that the greatest teams and greatest players all have their roots and origins in the grassroots. These are the roots that bear the fruits we all enjoy in the big games. So go and support your local team, spend your time and money there, put your football heart and soul into your actual local club, watch the games, sponsor the players, spread the word.
It is quite a happy feeling to have some good news these days. There have been those who have sought to controversialize over the England team, like a virus fearing a healthy unifying potential. People gave them short-shrift. This was a wonderful victory and joyous celebration, the one as thoroughly professional as the other was .. unvarnished. I’m seeing arguments and controversies attempting to break out in the aftermath. Give them short-shrift, too, they are a waste of time and energy. (I notice how most of the words are being spilled by people who normally pay zero attention to football, other than to pour scorn and derision. When the snake is busy eating it’s own tail, I say leave it alone and let it get on with the job).
A phenomenal achievement of this scale doesn’t happen overnight, but draws on the effort, talent, and hard-work of many people over a long period of time. Most of these people work unpaid behind the scenes, putting a lot of time in. They do this out of the sheer love of the game. These people aren’t household names and never will be, but they are the ones who deserve respect and recognition for fighting so long and hard to bring women’s football into public view. The England victory was their victory too. They won’t get the headlines and the honours, but they have their hands on the trophy along with the actual players. It is the hard boards that people tread year in, year out, that plays such a crucial role in triumphs such as this. These are the ‘little hands’ hands that turn the big world. On Sunday they worked their magic on the biggest stage of all.
I wasn’t alone in enjoying the fun the players exhibited in celebrating their victory. There was no contrived PR here, just pure unvarnished, unadulterated joy. The world needs more of it.
The sheer spontaneity of the celebrations contrasted markedly with the performance of the team on the pitch. In technical terms, the team played exceptionally well. The players were on their mettle. Psychologically, too. England were up against a very strong German team, a team that is higher than England in the rankings, and who are favourites to win the World Cup next year. After the break Germany took control and put the pressure on. England did well to hold their nerve and their shape. The victory was hard fought but was attributable to phenomenal skill levels as well as true grit.
The newspapers will no doubt be describing England’s triumph a game-changer, but it needs to be understood that it is not the women’s game as such that needs changing but attitudes towards it. We have learned to ignore the criticism, sniping, and the put-downs that can still be heard. Focus on the positive and lead by example. When I first started watching ladies football I noticed that the game was not quite as quick as the men’s game, and that the footballers were not as fast and not as powerful as the men. There was still speed and power in abundance, though, with many of the challenges making me wince. Although it is becoming thankfully less common, it is still possible to hear the odd person make the claim that “football is a man’s game,” on the utterly fallacious reasoning that physicality is the property of the one sex. Oh really? Not from what I see. But reactionary mentalities die hard. Even if we switch the focus to the degree of physicality, it is still true to say that a “more physical game” doesn't equate with “a man's game.” These sexual stereotypes are now being exploded. Physicality exists in sport and is a property of both sexes.
Most of all, though, I noticed that there seemed to be a greater emphasis on using the ball intelligently, in making the ball do the work, in actually playing football. I’ve heard it said a few times now that there is more skill in the women’s game than the men’s. As a massive Liverpool fan, this claim always annoyed me immensely – there is huge skill in the men’s game. I think this is another claim that is based on a misunderstanding, very probably the result of gender stereotypues still lurking as an unconscious background assumption - that is, the equation of men with pace and power, women with more guile and craft. The same point made previously applies here: there is enormous skill in the men’s game, just as there is pace and power in the women’s game. This really is a non-issue. I would state the point slightly differently to say that there is a greater emphasis on footballing skill in the women’s game as against bare athleticism. Which isn’t to say that there isn’t athleticism – there is, a lot of it. I have to say, watching the ladies game at pitch level has been wonderful for an old football romantic like me, seeing the superb array of skills on display, watching the moves and passing movements. The game is played at a wonderful pace. We are talking different bodies here, showing different aspects of the game; it is the same high footballing skill, exhibited in different ways. Football is football, a game of sport that is played by both men and women. The fact that there are differences doesn’t make one better than the other, just different. Same but different. Those who persist in pitting one against the other merely waste time and enery that is better spent elsewhere.
This was England’s first senior trophy in football since 1966, when England’s men defeated West Germany, also after extra time. It is worth adapting Kenneth Wolstenholme’s famous commentary closing the ’66 final:
‘They think it’s all over …’ It’s only just begun.
Today is the glory, what comes next is more of the grit and determination that brought us to this triumph. This is not the end of the story, but the beginning. It is vitally important that the momentum continues and the feel-good factor spills over into the women’s game up and down the country at all levels in all places.
The new season is about to begin. It’s a fact that many women’s teams play in grounds that are not the main stadium but are in hard to find locations. It’s often hard to find your local women’s team. This secondary status has to end.
There is a need to continue the momentum in order to expand the women’s game, from grassroots upwards. The enthusiasm is there, the ‘natural enthusiasm’ that the great Bill Shankly spoke of. That enthusiasm needs to be channelled. That requires that people put the time and effort in. It is one thing cheering an event on on screen, it is another actually getting down to watch the games. The people who talk the talk need themselves to walk the walk. The growth of the women’s game is predicated on men and women, boys and girls, actually going along to matches to support their local teams, or watching on TV if you can’t get to the game, supporting in whatever way they can. There are people who talk about sexism and prejudice here, the patronising put-downs of women’s football. It’s a nonsense that seems to be dying. As I said earlier, game-changing involves the changing of attitudes. But there is also basic economics at work here. More people watching and supporting the women’s game will bring in the resources that will lead to women being paid more money. Arguments over equality between men and women footballers here risk missing the point. Wages are based on pulling power. You’ve seen how good women’s football is, now the onus is upon you to support, watch, and put your time and money where your mouths are! That’s what I do. If everyone did this, the women would be paid what they are worth. But that is entirely dependent on people putting a shift in when it comes to support in terms of time and money. The reality is this: women’s football needs spectators, viewers, and sponsors. With these things comes greater coverage in the newspapers, more reporting and more interest. When these things come together we are on a roll, each element feeding into and feeding off the other, effecting the shift which draws increasing numbers in, expanding the game.
This victory has the potential to catapult women’s football into the big time, but only if we capitalise on the interest it has generated. Expansion won’t happen by itself, but requires that everyone involved in the game understanding what needs to be done and doing it. It also requires that everyone who has enjoyed the tournament and been inspired by it sustains their level of interest and take it further to support in whatever ways they can, wherever they can - .find your local team and get down there in support!
To the – minority – of people who have used England Lionesses’ triumph in the European Championship as the occasion to settle accounts with the past – histories as to what girls and women were not allowed to do footballing wise – I simply say let the dead bury their dead – the future is here and now and is in your hands. Wrongs have been righted or are being righted - there is a world to win! Girls and women can now play football. There are ladies teams up and down the country offering football at all levels. I would encourage girls and women to find their nearest team and come and play a bit of football. Just four years ago, in 2018, Ella Toone and Chloe Kelly, the scorers in the UEFA Women’s Euro 2022 final, played and scored at the Dripping Pan a little football stadium which is home to Lewes F.C. They were once the players of tomorrow and are now the players of today. Come on down and take a look at who will be the next in line. Come on down and actually be one of the next in line.
Come on down and play a bit of football! There is nothing and no-one stopping you. There are teams, there are training camps, there are footballing days, there are trials, there’s football for all levels and abilities: there are ample opportunities for girls and women to play football, or even, like me, just watch and support the ladies game. Come on down! Dreams are now, they are there for you to seize. ‘You’re free to do what you want to do, you’ve got to live your lives’ as the song went at the England ladies’ homecoming party. Remember the past, honour the sacrifices of those who came before, but, rather than re-ignite past grievances, see the door that the past has opened for you and walk through it!
A tweet from a Kevin Windsor has been shared widely as a meme: “This is why it matters. Representation. My daughter doesn’t have to have an interest in football. She just has to know that it’s an option. That she can become anything she sets her little heart on. From a princess to a lioness. And everything in between.”
I agree but would add a whole lot more. I’m not keen on the idea of football or anything being presented as an option in a market place, to be passively chosen according to personal preference. This just doesn’t seem to be the right way of putting the point at all. This meme seems to appeal to those who have never liked football and who have happily dismissed it as the sport of those odious white working class males (that's me, then). They now see the popularity of football across the community and they want to be in on it. No interest in football is required, football just has to be available for selection, like everything else. I may be wrong here (it has been known). But I saw the meme being shared by people who, to the best of my knowledge, have never shown an interest in football and who, for sure, have never shown the slightest interest in my many posts on football, whether they have been on Liverpool men or Llandudno ladies.
I don’t care for this idea of selecting options from a range of choices. I see the point, but it’s not the point to be made in the aftermath of the victory of England ladies in the European final. We need to look at this from the other direction. It’s the hard graft, the time, and the commitment of flesh and blood people who make that option available in the first place, it isn’t for the asking. If they don’t do it, then the option won’t be there. So it's massive praise for all those people, often unseen and usually unheralded, whose talent, devotion, and determination lay the foundations for the glory. As the FAW Grassroots put it: "Recognition of someone’s commitment, big or small, positively demonstrates to them that you appreciate and value the time and effort they put into the club." That’s where the options come from. To repeat: Ella Toone and Chloe Kelly were once the players of tomorrow and are now the players of today. Come on down, people, and take a look at who will be the next in line. And, maybe, come on down and see if you could be one of the next in line. Or just come on down and enjoy yourself.
It takes some commitment to turn up. I’ve let the applause ring round the ground to let the ladies know their talents and efforts are appreciated. I want to see some active enthusiasm on the ground and in the ground now. I hope to see more girls and women at the games, as well as more men and boys, just more people. A lot of ladies teams don’t play in the main stadiums but out in the sticks. This can change. We can lean on the clubs and authorities. But if people turned up we will get the shift that is needed.
I won’t insist and make it obligatory - there is nothing less likely to appeal than insistence - but you only get a wide range of choices if people turn up and put a shift in to make those options available. People are doing that, nearly all of them unpaid. Success doesn’t come out of nothing. I have huge admiration for Llandudno Ladies, footballers with great skill and commitment, unpaid, with jobs, families, and responsibilities, playing for the sheer love of the game. Football isn’t just an option to be selected off the shelf by people who want to choose the good as they see fit – it’s a good that exists because people – girls and women – have a passion for it and put their time, effort, and skill into it. Come and play! OK I won’t insist. But it takes nothing to put girls off sport and everything to get them back in. And the choice to play football is only there on account of the devotion and commitment of people on the ground, from the grassroots upwards: I know them, I have seen them at work, and I salute them!
Football isn’t just for Christmas, it’s for life! Which is to say that there is more to the game than holiday events. The real test for women’s football is going to be from November to February, when it’s cold, dark, and wet and no amount of big coats and waterproofs can keep you warm and dry. These are the times that separate the football fan from glory-hunters and fair-weather supporters who flit from one big thing to the next according to their comfort. These are the long, hard months that test the depths of our footballing souls. The summertime flag-waver and sunshine seeker retreats with the climate, the enthusiasm of the football fan endures. It is those who continue to show up and give their support who are the true football patriots and who deserve the thanks and praise of those who play for the sheer love of the game.A phenomenal achievement of this scale doesn’t happen overnight, but draws on the effort, talent, and hard-work of many people over a long period of time. Most of these people work behind the scenes, putting a lot of time in, unpaid, out of the sheer love of the game.
To all those who have enjoyed England’s European championship win, and who have found it inspiring, now is the time to seek out your local women’s team and go along in support as we are about enter a new season. We have just witnessed a great tournament, with immense skill and commitment on display. Great achievements such as this don’t come from nowhere. Behind the glory lies the grit, and years of it. Now is the hour to support women's football, from the local grassroots level up to the national team. That’s precisely the route that everyone of the Lionesses took to this triumph.
I am a passionate lover of football and would love nothing more than to see the ladies game go into the stratosphere. I am very much looking forward to following Llandudno Ladies this season, having enjoyed watching last season immensely. I want to see people down at the grounds and I want to the girls and women get the recognition and resources their effort, skill, and commitment deserve. But it needs people to turn up. It’s high skill and high thrill entertainment, trust me! Come on down people!
I’ll end by saying that I enjoyed the Euro tournament so much that I was moved to poetry:
Football is for anyone, football is for all;
Football is for everyone, just keep your eye on the ball.
It's not quite Dante but as the title to one of my favourite Queen songs goes, ‘everybody play the game.’
And beware those seeking to hijack the event to peddle their pet peeves. They are no friends of football. And they won’t turn up and put a shift in when it comes to the hard groundwork for future glory.
*A note on the phrase ‘women’s football.’
I have added a note on ‘women’s football’ for the reason that it is a term that can attract hostile criticism. I have used the term several times in this piece, knowing fine well that it has its critics. ‘Football is football,’ critics say. This is true, but trite – it says nothing when there is very definitely a need to say something.
I shall take my stand, then, on the statement issued by the 2022 UEFA Women’s EURO England Squad, which says something very definite and very significant, with a clarity and a vigour that cannot be ignored.
Dear Rishi Sunak and Liz Truss,
On Sunday evening history was made. The dreams of 23 women came true. England became European champions for the first time in history.
Throughout the Euros, we as a team spoke about our legacy and goal to inspire a nation. Many will think that this has already been achieved, but we see this as only the beginning. We are looking to the future. We want to create real change in this country and we are asking you, if you were to become Prime Minister on 5 September, to help us achieve that change.
We want every young girl in the nation to be able to play football at school.
Currently only 63% of girls can play football in PE lessons. The reality is we are inspiring young girls to play football, only for many to end up going to school and not being able to play.
This is something that we all experienced growing up. We were often stopped from playing. So we made our own teams, we travelled across the country and despite the odds, we just kept playing football.
Women’s football has come a long way. But it still has a long way to go.
We ask you and your government to ensure that all girls have access to a minimum of 2hrs a week PE. Not only should we be offering football to all girls, we also need to invest in and support female PE teachers too. Their role is crucial and we need to give them the resources to provide girls’ football sessions. They are key role models from which so many young girls can flourish.
We have made incredible strides in the women’s game, but this generation of school girls deserve more. They deserve to play football at lunchtime, they deserve to play football in PE lessons, and they deserve to believe they can one day play for England. We want their dreams to also come true.
This is an opportunity to make a huge difference. A change that will impact millions of young girls’ lives. We – the 23 members of the England Senior Women’s EURO squad – ask you to make it a priority to invest into girls’ football in schools, so that every girl has the choice.
Regards
The 2022 UEFA Women’s EURO England Squad.
The statement refers explicitly to ‘women’s football’ in precisely the same way I refer to it in this article. How could it not? ‘Women’s football has come a long way,’ the statement reads. ‘But it still has a long way to go.’ What’s good enough for the all-conquering Lionesses is good enough for me. Energies now need to be positively channelled, not wasted in sterile controversy. There is a long road ahead, but the momentum is with us.
There is a need to take care not to conflate universals and particulars and, as a result, scotomize the very specificity that characterises or incarnates the ideal in the real. Football is the universal, the ideal we love; the different ways in which football is played is the real we love in the flesh. There is a need to demarcate and delimit the difference. We do it by geography, we do it by age, we do it by sex. It’s the same game, whether it is played by Liverpool, under-15s, or men. To say that ‘football is football’ is to say no more than ‘all lives matter.’ Of course they do. But those lives are expressed in different ways in reality, and it is the difference that needs to be appreciated. To collapse the particulars into the universal risks burying the very asymmetries and iniquities that need to be removed if ‘women’s football’ is to be appreciated, recognised, and rewarded as the one ‘football.’ To write ‘women’s football’ is not to identify a separate game or substrata within the greater game, it is simply to write of the women who play football. How else do you propose to do it? Females? Fine. But to lose the distinction risks burying the female within the still dominant male game.
Football is a universal language spoken by all, just in different dialects. We can refer to ‘men’s football’ or ‘women’s football’ to identify particulars within the universal. There are people who are already pitting ‘women’s football’ against ‘men’s football,’ the former standing for all good and pure things, the latter for cheating, swearing, and gamesmanship. This is just sexism, and of the kind that confines women within an impossibly straight-laced, stiff-necked identity. (The day after the final, the German press were claiming that the England Lionesses were stretching the rules a little …) I don’t charge women with having to live up to such ideal ought-to-bes. The people who do this tend to have zero interest in ‘women’s football’ but are merely using the England ladies’ success and popularity to belittle a game they loathe. There is no love of the game here. They are false friends of ladies’ football and won’t be around for the long haul. Give them a wide berth. These people are no different from those men who have spoken in such disparaging terms of ‘women’s football’ over the years. Such people are still around. Today I saw several insisting that ‘women’s football’ is an ‘inferior product’ the men’s game. This is all nonsense. Football is neither the ‘men’s game’ nor the woman’s, it is the universal game that is open to all and is played by all. Or it ought to be. Football is football, a game that unites people the world over, without any divisive implication. That's one reason of many why football is the beautiful game. I therefore affirm the unifying potential of the universal language of football, whilst also
Football is a universal language which is spoken in different dialects by different voices. Some people are getting aeriated by references to ‘women’s football,’ insisting that we just refer to football. I think this is overly sensitive and seems to presume that the prefix ‘women’ implies a devaluation. Not so. We need to throw off that inferiority complex. I also note that some of the people who make the biggest noise about the term ‘women’s football’ have no problem in referring to women’s’ and girls’ leagues and teams. I don’t see how they couldn’t refer to these things without leaving us guessing as to what they are actually referring to.
I’d be careful of eliding the different dialects – women’s sports, like women’s spaces, need to be protected from being dissolved into the one homogeneous identity. We should argue for a unity with diversity as against a uniformity that buries female distinctiveness within an ideal, but empty, universal. We are more than capable of understanding the same language spoken in the different voice. That’s the beauty of life, that’s the beauty of football. And I’m not going to start caning people who are doing their best to promote the women’s game. To dampen that enthusiasm over semantics risks losing the momentum which is the greatest force in favour of expansion at the moment.
I can see why some people get tetchy over the phrase ‘women’s football,’ as if it refers to a different, inferior, game. We can rightly reject all such implication. But for clarity in communication and publicity, the phrase is simple, direct, and comprehensible. To simply refer to ‘football,’ as some demand, would leave people perplexed as to why we are urging people to go and support their local football team. ‘Football’ as such doesn’t lack recognition and resources. The day may well come when the women’s game has the same coverage as the men’s game, when we can celebrate football as the great universal. At the moment, there is a need to take care of the particulars.
I shall end with a quote from Cheryl Foster, former football player for Conwy, Bangor, and Liverpool Ladies and now a referee, taking charge of the WEURO semi-final between France and Germany:
“It was an amazing experience being part of WEURO 2022. It has been an incredible privilege representing in a major tournament but more importantly to work alongside dedicated and passionate women who proved to be a powerful force- not only in women’s football but in inspiring future generations of women to not accept boundaries and to see no limits to their accomplishments.”
That’s clear. Let's take care of the particulars.
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