The idea that women’s football is bigger in the United States of America than almost anywhere else in the world is nothing new. Likewise, it is never a surprise that the women’s game in England is under-funded and under-appreciated, and certainly on a completely different level to men’s football - or, as we call it in the UK, football. Andrei Markovits and Steven Hellerman wrote at length in Offside: Soccer and American Exceptionalism about soccer’s struggle to translate from participatory activity into cultural concern in the United States, and the same can be argued of women’s football in England. Except, of course, for the part about it being a participatory activity in the first place.
Markovits and Hellerman’s meticulous work reinforced two commonly held English assumptions about the American game: in the States, the game is played by children of both sexes, and only makes a dent in the nation’s sporting culture (defined in the book along the lines of football as the subject of support, conversation and coverage within the overall sports-following population) when played by the United States Women’s National Team.
Although the latter assumption has become more and more under threat in the years since the book was published, the factors behind this inversion of global football’s traditional strata remain worthy of discussion. The arguments are various and complex, but one that is particularly compelling (along with the fact that the American sporting exceptionalism at the core of the study tends to drive young male athletes into other sports) is that Americans love a winner, and the USWNT certainly fits into that category.
And while the men’s national team in the USA do now earn recognition for their success, it’s been intriguing watching the difference in the attention afforded the recent Women’s World Cup between England and the USA.
Anecdotally, the community of people I follow on Twitter has grown based on their interest (or rather the interest in me that is addressed by them) in men’s football. It’s largely UK and US-based, with particular biases towards Major League Soccer, non-league, the Premier League, Serie A and the Bundesliga, with a few observers of other foreign leagues thrown in. Of all the people I follow, I can count on the fingers of one hand the number that focus primarily on the women’s game, and none of these has been followed because of that specialism.
Having kept a reasonably close eye on my Twitter ‘friends’ this summer, a hypothesis: American fans of men’s football were more engaged by the Women’s World Cup than their English equivalents. More to the point, their English equivalents really couldn’t have cared less.
Incredibly, the USA’s love for its women’s national team resulted in a Twitter record. The records for the most tweets per second were broken at the end of the final between the USA and Japan, with the rate reaching 7,196 (Paraguay v Brazil reached 7,166, and I’m unsure as to whether that destroys the point I’m making here), far more than the 5,000-odd reached when Osama bin Laden was found. Even accounting for growth and fluctuations in Twitter’s overall population size, that’s pretty spectacular.
Really, none of this should come as a shock. Gary Hopkins’ Star-Spangled Soccer: The Selling, Marketing and Management of Soccer in the USA - while it could do with a proof-read - provides a thought-provoking breakdown of factors that help soccer to engage American sports fans. They include, crucially, a love of the big event, pride in the red, white and blue, and the esteem in which winners are held. The USWNT ticks all these boxes, and World Cup wins in 1991 and 1999 cemented the affection for the women over the men in the hearts of the average, non-soccer supporting American sports nut.
However, the observation that grabbed me during the tournament was that the people tweeting about, writing about, discussing and celebrating the achievements of the USMNT - even in defeat to Japan at the last - were in many cases the same people with whom I discuss the men’s game every single day.
Take the readers (and indeed the massively well-respected proprietor) of Soccer By Ives. The fact that Ives’ post and poll comparing Abby Wambach’s last-ditch equaliser against Brazil to Landon Donovan’s viral-inspiring goal against Algeria last summer even exists is impressive enough, but for Wambach’s goal to achieve 35% of the vote on which was more dramatic, with 26% unable to choose between the two, surely says something about the way fans of men’s football in the US are actually fans of football in general and are genuinely interested and fiercely partisan when it comes to the USWNT.
This will never be the case in England. It doesn’t matter if the England ladies’ team wins the World Cup, or if the competition is hosted in England - the bottom line is that regardless of the growth of the women’s game in England. the vast majority of those who follow the men’s game will barely bat an eyelid other than to give an appreciating nod in the direction of the victorious lionesses. Within the English footballing psyche there remains a divide between men’s football and women’s football, a fault line that marks the point at which - irrespective of the levels of respect, attention or appreciation afforded women’s football - many English fans simply see the two games as different sports altogether. To my untrained eye, that doesn’t seem to be true of American fans.
The separation between men’s and women’s football does not bode well for the FA WSL, England’s new women’s league, and the marketing possibilities available to it are subject to some quite vital questions. WSL’s tone to date has been one of inclusion, suggesting that the strategy that underlies its promotional activity relies in part upon attracting the average football supporter to games.
I’m not convinced that this approach (albeit one that might exist only in my erroneous assumption) will succeed to such an extent that it will prop up WSL; for me, it’s actually the number of supporters created independently of the men’s game that will make or break women’s football in England, notwithstanding the obvious fact that there will be some fans who follow both. In much the same way as some football fans also follow rugby, or cricket, or golf, some will be keen supporters of women’s football. And while many will have come to the women’s game through their love of the men’s, I believe women’s football in England will grow - if indeed it does grow in England - on the back of its own virtues.
Tags: Women's World Cup
I was absolutely shocked to see tweets from uk based fans discussing the apprentice durring knockout stage matches of the womens world cup. It really illuminated the difference.
Your last paragraph hits in on the nose.
Girls footie will have to sink or swim on its own.
Our team has had amateur teams go to the national’s on the women’s side the past few decades and I am well versed in the differnces (i helped train the girl keepers sometimes) and getting long time fans to give the women a chance is a losing battle unless there is nothing on. And even then.
The two games will ALWAYS be compared consciously or not and when put side by side it is a weaker, slower game. Comparisons to the men’s game will always hurt it and I think that it should NOT be marketed together but as a separated product-brand-game.
Throw in the costs of playing in a continent like the US and the US womens league will go from team closings to closings, to leagues shutting and reopening.
And lets’ be honest, half the MLS could disappear tomorrow. Its a teetering on the edge and a good amount of the players in the league get the minimum which is not enough in most cases for the player to live without roommates.
I have no idea how the women get paid or even survive if not living at home.
(dont look at the two 10 salaries in the league since these skew the stats)
Im not even try to make a joke but Blatter is right about the baggy unis and yoyo shorts and getting more publicity. Women’s volleyball and ESPECIALLY beach volley are HUGE sports for one reason only with the non-volleyball affficionados. Heck, women’s pingpong has bigger ratings because of these kinds of changes. And you cant even call me a pig since one of the Willams sisters (brothers?) tweeted how the women would look sexier in tennis skirts and shed love to design some. Netball players wear those unis by the way… just Google it.
Like many teams sports, football suffers from the ‘our lesbians are better than your lesbians’ connotation that were popular about 20yrs ago and that the WNBA still has to deal with (you can just avoid the topic like most do because its not comfortable).
If I were to ask you about THE defining moment of women’s football, youd realize that while we trying to avoid some topics…. Brandi Chastain taking off her shirt an wearing a sports bra after some goal is THE image of women’s soccer. It wasnt her technical savoir faire which is remembered but the fact that she took her shirt off and the world saw a sports bra (yawn!). Sex sells.
Womens tennis (i know, its not a team sport, different context) does well because the men and womens game are different and no one harps on the fact that the serves arent as hard or the players as strong. And sex sells.
Btw, Women’s basketball in the US has been kept artificially alive for a long time now and its a failure that will sink as soon as the NBA pulls the plug (the NBA is a business not a sports federation, if they see no money, they will fold eventually).
It is not just a football problem but a women’s team sports problem. (individual women’s sports dont).
Women and mens football should be marketed differently as if you were trying to sell two different sports. The fans who like to watch Barcelona or Arsenal can not be marketed the same as the fans who like Stoke so why do it for the men and womens game?
Create an image which emphasizes the differences between both games rather than say “here is the weaker, slower and less sophisticataed version of the game you love. You have to support it because you love it.”