JULY 4 — Judging from some of the excitable media coverage and social media pronouncements as England’s Lionesses roared all the way to the Women’s World Cup semi-final — something their male counterparts have failed to achieve since 1990 — you’d almost think that Premier League attendances are poised to plummet as fans switch in droves to the fairer sex.
For a few days, players such as Lucy Bronze and Jill Scott became household names as otherwise football-deprived fans — whose hopes of cheering on England’s under 21s were dashed by a group stage exit in the European Championships — fervently followed the girls on their Canadian odyssey.
It ended with heartache as Laura Bassett’s injury time own goal sent Japan through to the final, but the general consensus was one of great pride at the team’s performances, a view echoed most prominently by the Duke of Cambridge, Prince William.
There have now been confident predictions that this tournament, which will see Japan play against the United States in tomorrow’s final, will be the turning point in the development of women’s football in the UK, with hopes of significantly increased participation at grassroots level and attendance at Women’s Super League, which until now has been played in front of hundreds rather than thousands of spectators.
Sorry to throw a wet blanket over all this enthusiasm, but I can’t see it happening.
Before going any further, I must state that I am not an old-fashioned chauvinist who believes women should be kept in the kitchen rather than allowed to play a “man’s game” like football. I have given some basic coaching to my daughter, who has shown interest in the sport, and would be perfectly happy if she chooses to play for competitively when she is older.
But I don’t think women’s football will ever become anything than a relatively irrelevant minority sport at the highest level in the UK, for two reasons.
Firstly, there just isn’t any room for more football. With modern technology, fans of the sport can already devote many hours of each passing day by watching their favourite team’s games and following the latest news and gossip.
It is a time-demanding business, especially — as most people do — if you follow a high-profile team where every tiny incident is subjected to relentless scrutiny on chat shows and in chat rooms. Hardcore Chelsea fans are currently spending many hours debating the rights and wrongs of signing Radamel Falcao, for example, and they only have so many hours in the day.
Then, of course, there is international football, and although English fans haven’t been given anything to cheer about for a very long time there is still a well-established national debate about how and who the England team should play in the brief gaps which occasionally punctuate the club calendar.
And for the die-hards who find that saturation coverage of their club and national teams’ latest exploits still isn’t enough, there is also now equally easy access to major European football leagues.
Virtually every Barcelona and Real Madrid game is shown live on Sky Sports, while BT Sport, the other main broadcaster, has the rights to the Champions League and the Europe League, as well as domestic competitions such as the German Bundesliga and Italy’s Serie A.
If anyone still has some time left over to watch women’s football after gorging themselves on that lot, I don’t know how they do it.
Of course, it is always possible that some viewers will actually choose to follow the women’s game instead of men’s football, and decide to watch the local talents of Bronze and Scott on a weekly basis instead of the more geographically distant Messi and Ronaldo.
But, taking me onto my second point, I don’t think that will ever happen to a meaningful extent in Britain because the mentality of the average fan is utterly unsuited to the style of the female game.
In the UK, I am afraid to say, the bulk of fandom is still guided by a heavily physical bish-bosh-bang old-school get-stuck-in mentality, whereby “passion” and “commitment” are favoured over namby pamby qualities such as technique and tactical awareness, which remain the domain of fancy foreigners.
This explains, I believe, the ongoing failure of the national team and the generally poor quality of English players, and it also means that women’s football — which is by necessity a more measured and less physical version of the sport — will not be naturally appealing to many British fans.
There is, of course, also a fair degree of mocking misogyny, decrying the quality of football played by women — and Bassett’s ungainly own goal in England’s loss to Japan will have played right into their hands.
The traditional and ritualistic aspects of following football are also important. Supporting a team is a fundamental part of a fan’s heritage and identity, and transferring those attachments onto the women’s game cannot happen overnight.
And so I’m afraid, however much admiration the Lionesses might have evoked in the last couple of weeks, when they return to normal club business with the start of the new season later this month, very few people will care.
*This is the personal opinion of the columnist.
