#ASportingChance
We were discussing our first footballing memories in the pub. Gazza crying at the World Cup in 1990; missed penalties at Euro ’96. For me it was France ’98: eighteen-year-old Michael Owen bursting onto the scene and scoring that fantastic goal against Argentina. My sister had a crush on him; I wanted to be Michael Owen when I grew up. At eleven, it didn’t occur to me that, as a girl, growing up to be a professional footballer worshipped by millions wasn’t an option. I played with the boys in the school team, had a full West Ham kit and my own boots and posters from my Match magazines all over my claret and blue bedroom walls.
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| Me, circa 1996 |
Then puberty hit, and I wasn’t allowed to play with the boys anymore. My school didn’t have a girl’s football team – it was hockey or nothing. It was sort of ok for girls to support a football team, but wanting to play football was seriously weird. I changed my mind about wanting to become a footballer, opting instead for the security of becoming a writer (or, as my failsafe backup, a musician). But I still wanted to play football, as a hobby. At University, if you weren’t good enough to play for the Uni team, there were no opportunities for women. Every year I signed up for the intra-mural football teams, only to be told that as I was the only name on the list, there wouldn’t be a team this time around. Many of my male friends played in amateur leagues every weekend during the winter.
I haven’t played football for several years now. My football sits unloved and deflated under the stairs. For guys who want to play amateur football there are a wealth of local Sunday leagues, Saturday leagues, pub leagues, 5-a-side games – if you can scrape together enough friends who want to play, you’re in. I don’t know of any similar leagues, but even if they exist, I know I don’t have any female friends who would want to play.
Despite some improvements, women’s professional sport still takes a backseat to men’s. The prize money is less, the coverage minimal and the recognition barely existent. Women in sport have to face comments about their appearance and their sexuality that men do not. If this is the way professional sportswomen are treated, is it any wonder that the availability of grassroots and amateur sport for women is so limited? Competitiveness and physicality are not seen to be feminine. The women who have risen to the top of their sport need more recognition, to be treated on equal footing as men, to show those girls who are told they have to stop playing football, or rugby, or mountain biking, or underwater hockey with the boys, that they can keep on playing, just for fun. Sport is hugely beneficial for us –for our physical and mental health and for meeting and bonding with new friends.
I had a bit of trouble deciding on the women to include in this blog. There are so many – from ground-breakers to record-breakers, famous Olympians to lesser-known athletes. In the end I turned to the BBC Sport website for inspiration, picking the top six sports on their homepage – sports from which even the most disinterested person could probably name a male sportsman – and featuring the top women in them. Highlighting the achievements of the six women below is my small contribution to fighting the social stigma attached to women playing sport and may encourage more women to give traditionally male sports a go.
Stafanie Taylor
Cricket, West Indies
At 22-years-old, the West Indies’ all-rounder Stafanie Taylor has become the first player, male or female, to hold the batting, bowling and all-rounder number one spots in ODI cricket at the same time. Taylor made her debut for the West Indies at just 17 on their tour of Europe in 2008. Her impressive Twenty20 debut against Ireland saw her hit 90 off 49 balls. She has been named the ICC Women’s ODI Cricketer of the Year for the past two years and was also awarded the West Indies’ Women’s Cricketer of the Year. An explosive right-hand batter with a right-arm off-break, in 67 ODIs for the West Indies, Taylor has made 2626 runs at an average of 45.27, scoring 5 centuries and 16 half-centuries in the process, and taken 91 wickets at an average of 16.30. At only 22 and with some arguing that she would not be out of place in the men’s game, Taylor surely has many more years of success ahead of her.
Marta
Football, Brazil
Though it might not appear so in the British media, women’s football, or soccer, enjoys a lot of success abroad, particularly in the US and South America.
Marta Vieira da Silva, commonly known as Marta, has achieved celebrity status in her home country of Brazil. 27-year-old Marta is a forward for Tyresö FF of Damallsvenskan and the Brazil women's national football team. She was named FIFA World Player of the Year five consecutive times, from 2006-2010. She won a silver medal with the Brazil team in the 2004 and 2008 summer Olympics and is joint top of the all-time Women’s World Cup goal scorer list. Hailed as the Pele of the woman’s game, Marta is also a passionate advocate of female participation in football.
Emily Scarratt
Rugby Union, England
Emily Scarratt burst onto the International scene in 2008 with 12 tries in 12 games. Scarratt first played rugby at the age of five, but could easily have gone on to represent England at hockey, rounders or even basketball (she was offered a US Basketball Scholarship when she was 16). Wearing 13 or 15 on her back, Scarratt has scored 25 tries and 192 points for England, and at 23 is likely to score many more. She plays club rugby for Lichfield, represents England in Rugby Union and Sevens and was named the 2013 Women's Rugby Player of the Year. Oh, and she is also a PE Assistant in her spare time.
Susie Wolff
Formula One, Britain
Motorsports are a notoriously testosterone-driven arena. Scottish racing driver Susie Wolff has had to battle the ridiculous stereotype that women make terrible drivers, whether they’re in a Ford Fiesta or Formula One car to become a development driver for the Williams Formula One team in 2012. Women have competed alongside men in Formula One, but not for forty years, and Susie is determined to become the first British woman to drive in a Formula One race. The critics have been lining up to claim that women can’t compete at the pinnacle of the racing world, and Wolff has plenty of tales to tell of the sexism she faces. But she hopes that she will be able to inspire girls to get into the sport: “People tell me that their daughters didn’t realise that girls could even race until they had heard of me.”
Serena Williams
Tennis, US
Despite its popularity being troublingly tied up with the marketability of the women who play it, women’s tennis fares a little better than many other sports, with equal prize money handed out at all four Grand Slam tournaments since 2007. The Williams sisters can be credited with raising the profile of the women’s game and becoming household names in the process. Whilst Venus Williams has not sustained her initial level of success, her younger sister has been consistently at the top of the game since she won her first US Open in 1999, at the age of 18. Since then, Williams has notched up 16 more Grand Slam wins, across all surfaces, as well as an Olympic Gold. Now 32, in 2013 Williams has regained the WTA’s Number One ranking for the sixth time in her career, indicating that there may well be more titles to come.
Inbee Park
Golf, South Korea
25-year-old South Korean Inbee Park has been the number one ranked player in the Women's World Golf Rankings since 15 April 2013. Having started playing golf at the age of 10, Park turned professional at 18,as soon as she was allowed under the LPGA rules. Park has won four major championships in her career, including three consecutive major wins during the 2013 season, becoming only the fourth LPGA Tour player to win three majors in a calendar year. She is also the youngest player to win the U.S. Women's Open. Awarded the LPGA's Player of the Year, Park's successes in 2013 have brought a lot of publicity to women's golf.
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