They just silenced a sell-out crowd with their 3-1 victory against Australia and became the first England football team since 1966 to reach a senior final on the world stage. The rapid groundswell of support for women's football has reached fever pitch, as The Lionesses prepare to take on Spain in Sunday's final...
But this sort of success doesn't happen overnight and it's not just the result of one skilled squad tearing up the pitch. With exclusive access before the team flew out to Australia, Felicia Pennant went behind the scenes with the current team, former players and industry experts to find out how we (finally) got here...
The crowd is truly buzzing when the Lionesses finally stride onto the training field. Acclimatising quickly to the chilly morning sunshine, the UEFA Women’s Euro 2022 champions and 2023 Arnold Clark Cup winners switch from being positively giddy at being reunited, to fiercely competitive as they run through their drills. Alex Greenwood, Jess Carter, Lauren Hemp and the other outfield players thwack balls across the perfectly manicured grass and smash in goals, while Mary Earps and the other goalkeepers practise their reflexes between inflatable posts. Ponytails swing furiously and the rallying shouts escalate under the watchful eye of head coach Sarina Wiegman and her staff.
It’s surreal watching the trophy-winning Lionesses train live at St George’s Park – the home of English football – and I get goosebumps revelling in the history I know I’m witnessing. But all this recent success and progress isn’t a coincidence.
If Wiegman hadn’t insisted that the Lionesses use the same facilities as their male contemporaries, or the Barclays Women’s Super League (WSL) - the men’s Premier League equivalent - hadn’t gone fully professional in 2018, would this talented team have gone on the same incredible 30-game unbeaten run and secured the Lionesses’ first major trophy? Would they be this close to winning the World Cup?
This year, 2023, feels like a tipping point for women in football. But the big question is what does this mean not just for football, but for women full stop?
Past generations are finally getting their flowers
‘When [the Lionesses] won the Euros, they fulfilled my dream. You feel part of it, and you obviously want them to do even better at the World Cup,’ legendary Arsenal defender Faye White MBE tells me. White captained England for 15 years and reached the UEFA Women’s Euro 2009 final. ‘I dreamed that England would regularly play at Wembley: we're starting to see that now and it's regularly sold out.’
During a training break, I watch on as over 60 Legacy Lionesses, including White, Anita Asante, and Jill Scott MBE, are presented with a commemorative cap embroidered with their unique legacy number, acknowledging their contribution to the women's game in this country. ‘We had testing times. We didn't [used to] have the backing and investment from the Federation, or FIFA for prize money, that maybe would have driven the sport forward much quicker and much sooner,’ notes Lioness-turned-broadcaster Asante, who got 71 England caps between 2004 and 2018.
Keen to uncover and spread forgotten stories about the women's game from when it was reinstated after 50 years, The FA traced all 227 players who have represented England since 1972, with the help of consultant performance coach Owen Eastwood. Past generations are finally getting their flowers for the challenges they endured so that the current crop of household names can stand, inspired, on their shoulders, be taken seriously, and utterly transcend their fields.
‘[Former squads have] been paving the way for us for years. But now, because we've won something, we're good enough to be invited to movie showings or the theatre.’ I’m sat with Lionesses Alex Greenwood, Jess Carter, and Lauren Hemp, fresh from a full-on day of World Cup preparation. Greenwood hints at the increased scrutiny in the aftermath of the team’s Euros win, too: ‘It's almost going the other way a bit now. We'll try and sign as many things as possible, but sometimes we'll get messages saying, “I don’t know who you think you are when you don’t sign my daughter's pictures.” We are still human, and we can't do everything all the time.’
It requires immense talent, hard work, access, opportunity, luck, time (I could go on) to be a trophy-winning professional footballer. Carter admits that the relentless game schedule can be tiring – Chelsea are fighting for another title and reached the latter stages of the FA Women's League Cup, Women's Champions League, and Women's FA Cup.
‘We have speed days back at Manchester City where we'll go into the 3G pitch for 15-20 minutes to go over hurdles and practice how best to use your force,’ explains Hemp, a rapid left footed winger who was surprised that Jamaican track superstar Usain Bolt wanted a signed shirt from her when they met recently. ‘I know I've got a lot of force, especially in my hamstring, and I'm working on my technique so I can improve and be even quicker. I use my speed to get myself out of situations quite a lot: a drop of the shoulder and then a sprint the other way.’
The next generation
The Lionesses brought football home for the first time since the England men's team of 1966. But what they did next to cement their formidable legacy and dismantle more sexist stereotypes, was personal and powerful. Following a conversation led by Lotte Wubben-Moy and captain Leah Williamson on the bus after the post Euro 2022 celebrations at Trafalgar Square, the jubilant squad posted a signed open letter on social media urging the future prime minister to ‘ensure that all girls have access to a minimum of 2 hrs a week PE.’
‘I fell in love with football when I was four or five because I had the opportunity to play at school,’ recalls Jill Scott earnestly. ‘Making sure that everyone's got equal access no matter where you're from or how much money you have is most important,’ Carter adds when we talk after training.
On International Women’s Day in 2023, Sunak announced the government's commitment to make the same sports available for all, provide £600m over two years to improve PE and sports in primary schools, and over £50m to keep more school sports facilities open after hours. But there's still a gap between playing in school and playing for grassroots teams. Manchester City defender Alex Greenwood, who has partnered with Greene King to help normalise women's sports fixtures being shown in pubs, is bridging it with her new AG5 Academy in East Manchester. ‘It's a full female-run business and I want to give opportunities for girls good enough to be seen, for girls to get away from their troubles, a place where they can go and feel comfortable,’ she says.
Now, more young women than ever believe that they can succeed as a professional footballer. Brighton & Hove Albion fan and Miss Kick ambassador Tia certainly does, and the 13-year-old plays at a girls-only football school club on Mondays, and trains with Hailsham United Girls every Wednesday evening. ‘The Euros helped women's football massively. So many of my friends that are girls became interested especially as England kept winning. Soon after, I went to an Eastbourne Soccer School where there were so many girls that we didn't have to mix with the boys, and we got our own coaching session. I really wish there were more girls-only soccer schools,’ Tia shares.
Carter, Greenwood and Hemp all recall that the only times that they've really experienced sexism in the game is playing with boys growing up. Sadly, Tia recalls how, after that initial post-Euros buzz that saw Soccer School sessions packed out, things fizzled. ‘A few weeks later at the same event, there were only three of us, which shows that after the World Cup this year, there will be a very short space of time to keep up the excitement for girls. My perspective is don't give up. We just have to keep encouraging more girls to get into football — whether it's playing, watching, coaching or promoting.’
The FA's current Women's Technical Director, Kay Cossington, played for West Ham before holding multiple coaching roles at the Millwall Lionesses and the FA. Now, she's spearheading impressive progress and widening the talent pool by establishing up to 60 Emerging Talent Centres for eight to 16-year-olds ‘I feel very passionately that any young girl that has ability or potential in England should have the opportunity and accessibility to fulfil her dreams and ambition,’ she says. ‘What's right for somebody like Lauren Hemp that lives in Norfolk is different for someone like Lauren James that lives in London, and we're working hard on affording the opportunity to all.’
I know anecdotally, from speaking to female grassroots players, that better facilities and more fit-for-purpose pitches are desperately needed but it's unclear how and when these issues will be resolved. Should the FA or brands step in, or does this fall under the local council's remit? Thankfully, Cossington’s most famous success stories navigated the system to compete on the biggest stage. ‘I remember going to scout Georgia Stanway in Blackburn and I first saw Chloe Kelly when she was 10. These players are really good human beings and exceptional footballers, so standing there at Wembley was a really proud moment for me.’
An un-equal playing field
As an inner-city Black woman who has been writing about and platforming the women's game since founding SEASON zine, a football and fashion platform countering the male, pale (and sometimes stale) state of football culture, in 2016, I've noted positive changes, but I've also seen deflating regression. The FA's ‘Discover My Talent’ programme that launched in 2021 directly addresses criticisms about accessibility and the lack of diversity in England Women teams that have been levelled at the organisation. An all-white starting eleven essentially won the Euros, with mixed heritage players Carter and Nikita Parris only making substitute appearances and Demi Stokes didn't play at all.
‘Representation matters. It's not just about the talent on the pitch, it's in the boardroom where decision-making is happening — all of that can facilitate the change we want to see,’ adds Asante. Asante, who was part of a more diverse England Women team alongside Eni Aluko, Alex Scott, Rachel Yankey, and Lianne Sanderson under former England manager Hope Powell CBE.
Education charity Football Beyond Borders' new report ‘Inspiring a Generation: Has the Lionesses' win led to inner-city teenage girls becoming more engaged in the women's game?’ backs this up. Of the 1280 teenage girls, non-binary and trans young people that they got insights from, 63% still can't name any of the Lionesses – often because they feel like they can’t relate to the players — and 25% never watch women's football. Official figures reveal that the number of Black, Asian and Ethnic Minority players that joined England women youth teams has actually increased from 7% to 17% since the 2017-18 season, so change is in motion, but perhaps not visible yet.
Sky Sport News' first ever diversity and inclusion reporter Miriam Walker-Khan is focused on revealing these hidden truths, telling intersectional stories, and championing marginalised communities in women's football. ‘The amount of media attention has probably quadrupled, if not more, in the past few years, but there aren't the resources (like press officers) to make it the same as men's football. Everyone is learning, and it's not going to happen overnight.’
Walker-Khan's team is currently working on a docs-series about the inequalities in kit and equipment between women's and men's sport. ‘I've also covered the issue of diversity in women's football a lot, and the first time I covered it, I got anonymous DMs saying, “I wouldn't let my daughter play football, because of everything that happened with Eni Aluko and Mark Sampson”’, she remembers. In 2017, the then-Lionesses manager Sampson made comments to players Aluko and Drew Spence, which were eventually ruled to be ‘discriminatory on the grounds of race’ by The FA. ‘A senior figure once told me I couldn’t cover diversity in women's football because I'm not white and too biased. She made me cry. The thing that's helped me the most is having mentors that come from similar backgrounds.’
An injury during her degree at Manchester University meant that Walker-Khan pivoted away from competitive athletics to do a broadcast MA in Sheffield, and she then joined the BBC journalism Trainee Scheme in 2017. BBC 1's Football Focus, MOTDX, and the Question of Sport Podcast are among her credits, and her brilliant 2022 documentary Bend It Like Beckham: 20 Years On explored the film's unique legacy in sport and beyond.
‘I don't take for granted the fact that I am a journalist,’ Walker-Khan declares, having just launched Brown Girl Sport – an online space to celebrate South Asian women in sport (like her) and increase representation. ‘People trust me and that's a person's life that you could be changing. I ponder every tiny editorial decision and make sure that we're getting it right because we really could change the world.’
The wider picture
A 2018 Women In Sport research report revealed that women's sports only receives around four to 10 percent of all sports media coverage. But there are signs of hope when it comes to change. ‘This is the busiest it's ever been for the Lionesses,’ echoes around St George's Park before and after the training session, with the general consensus that there's been a marked increase in journalists like myself making the pilgrimage to middle-England to cover this special team live.
In 2023, club and country matches are finally now readily accessible on free and paywalled channels, women's football now leads sports bulletins, and media outlets are extending their coverage and specialist teams to drive up demand. ‘When the BBC got the [broadcast TV] rights to the WSL in 2021, it was absolutely massive and gave me the opportunity to become a TV reporter in the WSL,’ freelance sports presenter and reporter Betty Glover tells me.
‘The growth of the women's game helped bring through journalists that are female and feel comfortable talking about women's sport,’ she continues. The 28-year-old's career began at Bournemouth University when she worked at BBC local radio in Kent and BBC Radio Solent alongside her multimedia journalism degree. After getting as much experience as possible at local radio stations around the country post-graduation, she got a job at BBC Sports and worked her way up. She cites Gabby Logan, Clare Balding, and Hazel Irvine among the women she looks up to. ‘When I was the sports reporter for Radio One Extra, I was a one-woman band. I really tried to push the women's game, because it was really important to 15–21-year-olds. But it was frustrating because some clubs wouldn't give us player interviews when we were trying to get players on to get their personalities out and engage this younger audience.’
Glover, who now freelances for the likes of the BBC and F1, is meticulous in her work. ‘I always do my research, write pages of notes, and work out the narrative. I just want to be as authentic as possible.’ Because, while ‘sport is basically fun’, the reporter notes that women in the industry really endeavour not to make mistakes – remember the Alex Scott accent row during the Olympics? ‘If you're a woman and you say something slightly wrong, you get jumped on, it doesn't matter what role you're in. I think female footballers are so conscious of making the headlines for the wrong reason.’
With sell-out matches increasing, and media coverage widening, sustainability and inclusivity are what's important now for women's football. I’ve had same of the most authentic conversations in my career as a football journalist while putting this piece together, hearing about the stark realities and shared experiences of women playing and working in the game. What I've realised, is that multiple views can be true at once and that stakeholders have different priorities.
‘If we want more women in leadership positions, we need to tackle some of these areas that are so natural in a woman's life,’ points out Cossington, a mother of two. And she is absolutely right. Periods, menopause, miscarriage, and childbirth are just some of the many things many female-identifying players contend with - things that affect you physically and mentally, and can take you out of the workplace for an extended period.
Nike switching the Lionesses’ new shorts from white to blue and adding leak protection is one long-requested innovation that was unanimously applauded. So, how else can we improve conditions in the game, not just for women of colour, but for non-binary and trans women, too? Can we maintain and build upon the progress made in terms of trophies, player development, and media coverage going forward? While women's football really has gone from strength to strength since the Lionesses' win last summer, success doesn't look or feel the same for everybody. And when we realise and celebrate that complexity, that'll be a true win.
The FIFA Women’s World Cup final takes place on Sunday at 11am. Broadcast rights will be shared between BBC and ITV.
