They’re ninth in the world league, yet the England women’s football team gets little of the pay, sponsorship and fame of the men. Stylist asks why such inequalities still exist.

Words: Laura Williamson Photography: Dean Freeman

Imagine waking up one day to find the Barclays Premier League had vanished into thin air. It would be both front and back page news, wouldn’t it? But that’s what happened in January, when two of England’s best female footballers, striker Kelly Smith MBE, 33, England’s leading goal-scorer, and defender Alex Scott, 27, received emails explaining the 2012 Women’s Professional Soccer League in the United States had been cancelled due to a legal dispute with a former club owner. Three other British players – England internationals Anita Asante, 26, and Karen Bardsley, 27, and Scotland defender Ifeoma Dieke, 31 – were also left without clubs. Yet it got barely a flicker of attention in the UK media, despite the fact England’s women are ranked ninth in the world (the men’s team are seventh) and beat the number one team, the USA, in April 2011.

Most of us have grown up with men’s football. The Premier League earned a staggering £1.8billion from TV rights for three seasons of matches in the UK alone. Football is part of our popular culture, and whether you’re a fan or not, you could probably name five current male England internationals. Our cover star Rachel Yankey has scored 17 goals for England, the same as David Beckham, but have you heard her name before? The women’s game has a lot of catching up to do.

But it’s not just recognition that’s the problem. When Lincoln Ladies defender Casey Stoney, 29, was at Arsenal Ladies (1999-2002), she recalls washing the men’s kit. “I have seen the ex-England captain, Faye White, lugging boxes around at Arsenal’s training base before the club’s manager, Arsène Wenger, gives his Friday lunchtime press conference.” This is a woman who has won 90 caps for her country. Money is a problem. Female England internationals only earn around £16,000 a year. It takes Yaya Toure, the male Manchester City and Ivory Coast midfielder, just over 13 hours to earn the same amount. “I earn enough to allow me to train and have a bit of freedom, and I do a bit of coaching as well, but it’s nothing compared to the men’s game,” says Arsenal Ladies’ defender, midfielder and forward Stephanie Houghton, who, at 24, has won 25 caps for England. “Not that it should be – ours is a different sport.”

Playing the Game

Houghton is right. Women’s football is a standalone sport, the third largest team sport across the board in the UK and the most popular for women, yet it is constantly compared to the men’s game. This drives people working in women’s football insane – particularly England and Team GB boss Hope Powell. Asking what level of men’s team would give England’s senior women’s side a run for their money is pointless: women play against women, not men.

Women’s football is generally slower and less aggressive than its male counterpart, but there is much more emphasis on agility and technical ability. The fact that most of these women play simply because they love it is also overlooked. They certainly don’t do it for the money or the prestige. In a sporting world saturated with sleaze and scandal, could there be better role models than our female footballers?

However, we rarely hear their voices. Just 2% of mainstream sports coverage is dedicated to women’s sport, so, this season, a representative of each of the eight FA Women’s Super League clubs will wear their Twitter names on their shirt sleeves to drive fans towards social media. Tennis – particularly events such as Wimbledon and the US Open – and Olympic sports such as athletics, swimming and cycling attract the most attention. But these events often see women competing at the same time as men. Would the reporters still be there if it was a women-only competition?

The simple truth is there’s less money in women’s sport. According to the Women’s Sport and Fitness Foundation (WSFF), just 0.5% of all sponsorship cash ploughed into sport in the UK goes to women. Men’s sport attracts 61.1% of the market, with team sports hoovering up the rest. Even though it costs more to secure sponsorship deals with most male athletes, the women are still lagging behind. Baroness Tanni Grey- Thompson, 11-time Paralympic gold medallist and chair of the Commission On The Future Of Women’s Sport, said, “It’s a depressing state of affairs. Research tells us men and women are keen to see more women’s sport on our screens, but governing bodies of many sports, potential sponsors and broadcasters seem to be missing the opportunity to secure the big deals.”

The question is this: is women’s football – and women’s sport generally – overlooked because of the physical disparities between the sexes, or because of something else? Perhaps it isn’t that women can’t jump further or run faster than men that’s the problem. Katherine Legge drives in the American IndyCar Series. The 31-year-old from Guildford in Surrey is convinced “there is absolutely no physical barrier” to a woman driving the most prestigious vehicle of them all, a Formula One car, and believes racing is “the only sport in the world where women can compete with men on an equal footing”. But no woman has ever even been given the chance in an F1 competitive car. So if there isn’t a physical barrier, what’s the problem?

Foul Play: Why is there sexism in sport?