Women's World Cup: what still needs to be done to improve the lot of elite female footballers

• After the success of the 2019 WWC in France, the women’s competition has progressed to new heights for 2023 in Australia and New Zealand.
• Alongside other researchers, I have written about the gender gap in professional and elite-level women’s football in the last few years.
• Fifa has also ensured that standards across staffing, base camps, accommodation and travel are delivered to the same level as the men’s competition.

Facilities and healthcare

• A total of 362 women across teams attempting to qualify for this World Cup were surveyed, with 70% reporting poor gym facilities, 66% reporting poor or non-existent recovery facilities, and 54% saying they were not provided with a pre-tournament medical.
• In addition 66% players had to take unpaid leave or vacation from work and almost 33% did not receive any compensation.

Injuries

Given the findings from Fifpro on facilities, pitches and payment, it comes as no surprise that injury has become a hot topic of interest within women’s football. According to sports medicine specialists, women are six times more likely to rupture their anterior cruciate ligament (ACL), and for this World Cup, nine of the top players are absent with the injury.

Gendered environment

• A powerful piece published in the British Journal of Sports Medicine highlights a gendered environment approach to understanding ACL injuries.
• This work describes how the social construction of gender affects the ACL injury cycle across the whole life of the athlete.
• This includes how boys and girls learn to move (often differently) alongside inadequate training and competition environments for girls, and gendered cultural body norms.

Proper football kit

• Menstruation, menopause and female hormone profiles across puberty, have been thought to have some impact on sports performance and injury.
• This is part of a broader shift in sportswear manufacturers finally creating women-specific kit instead of the “hand-me-down men’s kit” culture many ex-players experienced.

Women’s bodies and experiences

• Despite the increasing number of professional women footballers, their employment rights as mothers have often been overlooked.
• Fifa regulations launched at the end of 2020 provided players with paid maternity leave for the first time.
• Would their bodies recover to their pre-pregnancy form?