What It Meant to Watch England in a Women’s Football World Cup Final

When I was in primary school, the adults around me (seeking to ground my ambitions in reality, I imagine) informed me that I would not be able to play professional football for my country, as the women’s game was really just amateur. I could always keep it up as a hobby, they told me, I suppose to reassure me.

I remember feeling heartbroken and raging that boys could have this dream, but that I could not. It’s not to say that I was the best at the sport, who knows if I ever had enough ability to play at that level. It’s that I felt like I’d been written off, simply because I was a girl.

What was so frustrating was that had this been the dream of a boy, they’d have joined a local club and seen what happened from there. Whether their dream was realistic or not, the infrastructure to nurture their goal was there. For girls in England in the 90s, it just wasn’t.

I played a lot of sport as a child and teenager (a big shout out goes to my mum here for spending most of her weekends ferrying me to matches or competitions for various sports) and often it depended on where you lived as to whether there would be a girls’ team or not. For example, when I played rugby, it was for a team in a neighbouring county.

Astonishing

So, on Sunday 20th August 2023, when I sat down in my local community centre, full of people from my village, all there to watch England play in the Women’s World Cup Final, it felt somewhat surreal. For around a decade now, as often as they’ve been televised, I’ve watched the women’s England team compete against other international sides. Yet it still feels like such a novelty because of all the attention men’s football gets. It felt wonderful to see the final play out in a packed stadium with 75,784 people in the crowd. Something that I had long hoped would one day be reality, although it’s truly been something else to see that come to fruition.

I feel humbled by the women who – from being little girls – didn’t listen to all the adult noise around them about women’s football not being serious, because they’re the women we have to thank for the amazing Women’s World Cup that just took place. I cried when England lifted the trophy at the Euros and I cried when we succumbed to Spain in the World Cup Final just gone. Both times, some of those tears were for how grateful I feel for the players who have sacrificed so much to bring this sport closer to an even playing field with men.

A Dream for the Future

But what does it mean? It doesn’t mean every little girl now has to play football, or dream of playing the professional game. What it does mean is that whatever else little girls might want to be, now I hope they’ve seen that they can dream this dream too.

On those football pitches, little girls saw women – all kinds of women – being strong in the way only women can. If those little girls type the names of their favourite players from the tournament into Google, they’ll find out that some of these women have families, children, wives, husbands, degrees, speak multiple languages… And the dream gets bigger, because little girls have role models in these women. Women who are showing them the many ways they might too become a woman. Wonderful complex ways of becoming a woman that show how it’s possible for women to have a life that values the things they love. Whether that be football, or make-up, or gaming, or fashion, or business, or family, or any combination of passions.

I still feel sad for little girl me, I wish she hadn’t believed all the adults and had carried on to see where football could have taken her. Yet, beyond that tinge of sadness, I’m happier for all the little girls to come, because this footballing dream is firmly on the table now.