the flagrant injustice of women’s football competitions – Liberation

2023-07-19 21:04:18

Alexandra Schwartzbrod’s editorial

2023 Women’s Football World Cup dossierWhile the first kick-off is launched this Thursday in Australia and New Zealand, the event is still too invisible in France. Despite strong demand from supporters, female footballers remain the poor relation of global football.

Even before the competition is launched, the injustice is obvious. Who, apart from the aficionados, has heard of the Women’s Football World Cup which starts this Thursday morning? How many brasseries and cafés have installed a giant screen to broadcast the matches live? Take the test around you, the result is distressing, and football fans have nothing to do with it. Between Fifa (the international football body) which sold male and female competitions separately (to the detriment of the latter) and the broadcasters who negotiated lower prices, female footballers appear to be the poor relation of world football. .

Yet the appetite is there. According to the Audiovisual and Digital Communication Regulatory Authority, 64% of French people questioned would consume more women’s football competitions if the channels broadcast more of them. Basically, supply creates demand but many, in sports and media bodies, unfortunately still seem to consider sportswomen as negligible quantities, which seems absurd in 2023. Sportswomen who, by the way, do not have it easy since 66% of them had to take vacation or unpaid leave to be able to participate in this World Cup. We walk on the head when we think of the gold bridges offered to their male counterparts.

In this slump, Australia (one of the two host countries with New Zealand), is the exception that proves the rule. The atmosphere is boosted there if we are to believe our correspondent on the spot, and the Blue ones particularly awaited. One year from the Paris Olympics, the stakes for them are multiple: image, credibility, sporting level, the bar is high. And their trainer, Hervé Renard, called to the rescue to replace Corinne Deacon after the grotesque soap opera opposing her to several executive players, is on the job. All the more reason to encourage them, even at Sunday lunchtime, due to jet lag.