Published June 5, 2023, 5:22 p.m. by Jerald Waisoki
The FT visits lewes, a small fan-owned football team in the south of england, which pays female players the same wages as the men’s team; and arsenal, which has a long-established women's team. As English Premier League clubs start to invest in the women's game, we examine whether women's football should replicate the structure and feel of the men's game or establish an identity of its own
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this is the story of opportunity
women's football depends on men's
football because it was never allowed to
develop on its own
[Music]
our foundations are fragile all women
support
it would be lovely to get the big
figures and
to get just enough money to live off at
times
[Music]
the world is designed by men for men
the top players don't have access to
basic and fundamental equipment
the battles that we fought to get onto
the field
are now being fought to get into the
boardroom and into the management team
you can't say you value something and
then
give it away for free
if we can continue to give the
opportunities to improve the product
that will awaken our companies to want a
piece of the sport
over the next few years we're going to
really see whether or not the women's
game can capture that opportunity
[Music]
the history of the women's game in
england goes back
over a century
[Music]
it was particularly popular towards the
late 19th century they were getting
crowd numbers that were in the tens of
thousands 53 000 was the famous record
from liverpool in 1920. but then in 1921
the english football association the
national governing body banned women's
football saying it wasn't suitable for
females when i began playing for the
national team there was no fifa
tournament there was no olympic
tournament we
weren't paid we once had to sew our own
national crest onto the track onto our
tracksuits
we wanted to train in a car park and
whether it was the kits that looked
amateur to the times of training which
were eight to ten twice a week you're
just trying to manage your working life
with your passion which is your
footballing life it took until the 1960s
for that band to be lifted for the
women's game to be more organized two or
three years ago you see players who are
playing the game but who are also
paramedics or teachers or nurses and who
are having to hold down two or three
jobs just to play some of the players
i've spoken to who were at the olympics
and at the world cup were homeless at
points and living out their cars because
they're just not making enough money
women's footballers had no choice but to
grow up within the structures and the
institutions that were created by men
to service the men's game they didn't
have access to fields or referees or
coaching courses broadcast revenues it's
taken a long time for governing bodies
to really understand that there's an
opportunity
the fa founded the women's super league
and now big broadcasters and sponsors
are coming on board now you give the
opportunity for players to play
professionally the standards obviously
have improved and that's very much
what's happened in this country with the
wsl
there has been football played here at
the dripping pan since 1885.
the club was the beating heart of a
community it's a small town lewis is
just 17 000 people
10 12 years ago the club nearly went
bust it was felt from a small group of
people that came together that it was
too important to fail they took the club
into community ownership in 2017 the
club took the decision to split revenue
equally between the men's side and the
women's side
the first club in the world to do it and
in fact still the only club to do it in
the world and it isn't just about pay
parity it's about equal decision making
across the club the women's team and the
men's team are level pegging and
considered the same we have the same
marketing budget we play in the same
ground
[Applause]
the women's team with that additional
support and investment and backing um
now sits in the second tier in england
we play in the same league as liverpool
and crystal palace punching above our
weight we are a club now that has two
revenue generating teams
on the women's side alone our attendance
is quadrupled within three seasons
we charge the same amount of money to
come to a men's game in a women's game
one of the most expensive women's teams
to to watch in the country
we had to put the prices up we had to go
out and tell people this is important
you can't do that if you're giving
tickets away for free and you can't do
that if you're giving them away for just
three pounds
rian cleverley center back number three
and louis fc club captain so i had a
really good year in the hack and lahar
france unfortunately got released a low
point in my career you can get released
from your contract and and it can mean
um obviously your job's gone at that
point my house was gone i was in france
so
i didn't really know where to live in
the men's game if you the equivalent and
you get released there's probably
another opportunity with the same sort
of money and and from from there that's
not always the case in women's football
you can get released and then you need
to find a full-time job
[Music]
[Applause]
if you speak to anyone in the women's
game they've been through something like
that or unfortunately they will at some
point we play more for the love of the
game
guys this this right here is our captain
as women we kind of just get used to it
being rubbish which is it sounds awful
and then you come to a place like louis
and they do things a little bit
differently they treat you a little bit
differently and you're like actually no
we should be treated a little bit better
maggie one of her friends has a women's
football boot they design boots
specifically for women given us free
boots and they've tried it out they're
great women tend to have narrow heels so
we've narrowed the heel cup women tend
to have a different toe box so different
width here so we've changed the shape of
that so you don't get black toes when
you're playing women tend to have hips
that are
slightly further apart so where we
pressure load is different and so we've
really focused on designing a boot that
really works for the different surfaces
and specifically for female biomechanics
i find it incredibly frustrating that
the top players don't have access to
basic and fundamental equipment for the
game we're still seeing a range of
injuries in the game that potentially
are preventable there's a long way to go
when people are running off to work
straight from training and are they
eating right are they recovering right
but um i think that's where we can
progress in the women's game and there's
not enough research on women yet the
world is designed by men for men the
drugs that we receive in hospital if we
have a heart attack they've been tested
on men there's very little medical
research that's done on women car design
and crash test dummies and seat belts
none of that is tested on women with the
balance 50 years behind there's a
there's a long there's a long way to go
that we need to catch up on to be even
close to equal to the to the men's game
we don't have a big men's club backing
us so
every pound we make we have to make
ourselves somehow so we have to do that
through sponsorship or through match day
attendances or other things we have a
license if we don't adhere to the
license requirements we won't be able to
play in the league regardless of how
good our results are that can be a
challenge in terms of we look good and
we're attracted sponsors it's very hard
for some of the small clubs to keep up
the women's game is completely
unrecognizable to what it was 20 years
ago
in fact it's unrecognizable to what it
was even five years ago
[Music]
arsenal have been pioneers in the game
it wasn't tokenism it was something they
genuinely believed was right to give
opportunities
clubs like arsenal have been relatively
early
in investing in their in their teams and
when you speak to their executives i
think they're pretty upfront with the
idea that the women's teams that they
run are essentially unprofitable i do
think we're some way off just because of
the rate of increase of the salaries the
intention yes is to be much more
sustainable than what we are being at
the moment
some of the top players could probably
earn in excess of 150 000 pounds a year
we could see salaries hitting half a
million within the next couple of years
which is quite frightening because the
issue is at the moment where are those
revenues coming from to offset the extra
cost the growing cost we don't want to
stop the spend if we can help it we want
to bring the revenues up to offset that
spend if you invest now
from a low base into the women's game as
it builds as it grows over time they
will get to reap the rewards they will
have profitable women's teams and they
will be amongst the biggest teams both
in england and in europe and that is the
opportunity for them the traditionally
strong men's clubs especially in
traditionally strong football markets
have enormous clout an enormous ability
to
leverage those synergies into the
women's game you can get off a plane
anywhere in the world and people have
heard of chelsea they've heard of
arsenal so you know a bit like hollywood
takes ghostbusters and takes out the
male characters and puts in female
characters creates a spin-off that's
worth a lot what we could find is that a
successful women's game with more and
more
money flowing to the top of the game
could actually be bad for small clubs
like lewis the danger is that it
ironically becomes necessary to be
attached to a men's club for women's
football to succeed we've got our own um
personal um sponsor for arsenal women in
mastercard so that was a first three
years ago the recent broadcast cycle by
bbc and sky sports he's brought some
revenue into the league this deal with
sky and bbc worth about 24 million
pounds for the women's super league
compare that to just the premier league
the top tier of men's football that's
worth over nine billion pounds and
that's not even take into account the
fact that most of these clubs have full
big stadiums
massive sponsorship deals as well
the case for the women's game really is
is it worth investing in so that over
years and decades it can grow to similar
levels if we can continue to give the
opportunities to improve the product
then i think that will awaken our
companies to want a piece of the sport
we're not about to become sustainable
anytime soon i don't think we just we
just need more commercial partners what
we've seen with sport and the interest
of sport around around the world that if
you really do power up that interest you
make the game exciting you improve
standards people will watch that you can
have
good businesses behind that if you look
at tennis or if you look at golf the top
top earners in those sports they are
millionaires they do earn wages akin to
the best male players in their sports so
that is where football will want to go
into the future
[Music]
this is a chance to invest in something
akin to a startup it's something that if
you
get in on at the ground level now you
can reap the rewards later
[Music]
we're in a world in a society that
understands professional football as
men's football
men's stadiums are quite forbidding
experiences to go through you go through
tight turn styles
very tribal
there's a debate at the moment about
whether women's football teams should
have a home and an away section
there's a different vibe at women's
games we don't need segregation in
crowds so far it's
not the kind of same aggression or
swearing or violence
i don't think women's football wants to
lose that because that is such a key
part of the the match day experience and
being part of this community that is
supportive and allows especially little
girls to dream bigger football in this
country has changed at the top level
so it used to be small community clubs
representing their local
areas and these have developed into
massive global businesses owned by
billionaires there's been a
disconnection from the community there
is a different journey that the women's
game is on compared to the men's
and i think that that can be maximized
through the engagement with the players
as well
you can get really close to the women's
players they spend a lot of time with
the fans they kind of get to know each
other
young girls can relate to them
the question for the women's game going
forward is whether or not it has to be
incubated into the structures that the
men's game have already produced what
we've seen in the women's game with the
clubs is is quite two different models
emerging one in the uk where the the
women's clubs are tied to the men's
clubs and one in the us where the
women's clubs are more standalone quite
a number of them are women-only clubs
they don't have a men's team of any sort
la city angels is owned by serena
williams natalie portman washington
spirit has chelsea clinton and jenna
bush as investors
there are a lot of challenges at the fa
with
the entire governance structure and
whether it's fit for purpose for
for women's football you see that in
decisions that i made around
allocation of fa cup prize money when we
went out in the fourth round to to
arsenal a couple years back arsenal won
three thousand pounds but if we were men
we'd have won
three hundred and sixty thousand pounds
i can do a lot with three hundred and
sixty thousand pounds but i can't do
that much with three 000 pounds equal up
their fa cup prize money allow us to
fight for it and allow us to win the
money so that we can invest it back in
it's the barriers that are put in place
they're kind of holding the game back at
the moment so
invest put the money in
equal prize money pay the players as
much as they should earn and then you'll
see the results
the bet that broadcasters like sky and
bbc are making is that if fans are much
more able to just watch these games
maybe they'll get hooked maybe they'll
get a team
this is a process that will take years
and decades
[Applause]
[Music]
in 10 years time i would like to think
that
we are turning away commercial partners
because there's too many
if you're a corporate and you have a
sports sponsorship budget and you're
spending nearly all of it on men's sport
you're going to have shareholders show
up at your annual general meeting
wanting to know whether giving 90 of
your sports sponsorship to male players
is in line with the corporate values
in recent years there's been such a push
to have a really glossy finished product
that looks good on tv and is ready to
sell because our foundations are fragile
all women's for it
it's really difficult to keep up with
the pace of change that sometimes feels
angled into short-term
glossiness to to sell as opposed to
longer-term investment into growing
attendances into medical support for
players into professionalisation into
staff into coaching staff
there's so many foundations that are
just not there we haven't had the
hundred plus years that men's sport has
had
just imagine how much easier it's gonna
get once commercialism and better
governance structures
take over but we're trying to leap and
jump very fast and
a club like guys can get swallowed up
you take the most popular game in the
world you take the half of the
population that's had so little access
to it over the years you put some good
focused management with expertise in the
women's game over the top of it and you
see it thrive
[Music]
you
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