The first time I went to the Women’s World Cup was in Canada, eight years ago. England, in the group stages, was based in a small town called Moncton in the beautiful maritime province of New Brunswick.
I went out there with a friend from the FA and as we were walking down the high street we saw some guys – Gil Scott and Tony Duggan – on the other side of the road. They waved happily. They seemed a little surprised to see anyone from the media at all. England lost in the semi-final.
Four years later, in France, the level of interest was very different. The tournament felt bigger and better and so did the infrastructure surrounding the England national team. England had a good team too, and a top level manager in Phil Neville.
It was one of the best tournaments I’ve ever covered, partly because of the level of football, partly the feeling that the women’s game was finally getting the attention it deserved and partly because of the optimism that pervades the sport. England lost in the semi-final.
From a professional standpoint, it looked like a sea change in the industry. The high level of interest in the women’s game gave many female football writers an opportunity to show how good they could be, an opportunity that until then had been largely denied to them.
The 2019 World Cup in France signaled a change in interest in women’s football
Jill Scott, Beth Mead and Leah Williamson are household names after England’s triumph at the Euros
The focus ahead of the 2023 World Cup is on how far Sarina Wiegmann’s England team can go
Perhaps you spent too much time writing about the important moment in the women’s game and not enough time writing about football itself. This was a failure of mine, and perhaps other male sportswriters like me.
But with New Zealand and Norway preparing for the first match of the 2023 World Cup at Eden Park in Auckland on Thursday and England waiting for their first match against Haiti in Brisbane on Saturday, the tone of coverage has matured.
It’s not about the trip anymore. It’s about sports. It’s about the players. It’s about England’s chances, how much damage their absence has done through injuries to important players like Beth Mead and Leah Williamson, how deep Sarina Wiegmann’s side can go into the tournament.
Some of the England players are now household names. Winning last summer’s European Championship, beating Germany in the final at Wembley, and becoming the first English team to win a major soccer tournament since 1966 would do it a favour.
Mead, who scored six goals at the European Championships, is the BBC’s Sports Personality of the Year and her autobiography has been a bestseller. Scott, my buddy in Moncton won I’m a Celebrity Get Me Out of Here last year and was named Queen of the Jungle.
So to the remaining skeptics who like to show their ignorance by responding to any mention of the ladies’ game with “no one cares”, I’m sorry but you’re clearly dead wrong.
Some preconceived notions about the women’s game are still worth challenging and the announcement recently made by the telecommunications company, Orange, partner of the France women’s team, does it very well.
Sorry spoiler, but the ad opens with shots of Antoine Griezmann, Kylian Mbappe and others producing moments of stunning individual skill against the backdrop of hyperbolic commentary.
England will be among the nations seeking to dethrone the reigning champions, the United States
The Lionesses open their World Cup campaign against Haiti in Brisbane on Saturday
Then it is revealed that the footage has been tampered with. The skills are real but the players are fake. The action is real but it came from matches involving the France women’s team. It was not Mbappe and Griezmann, but Sakina Karchaoui, Salma Pasha and Delphine Cascarino showed their brilliance. The quality is there. The skill is there. The capacity is there. You just have to open your eyes to it.
France is one of the teams that have a chance to win the tournament. The United States of America, the reigning champions, powerhouses of the sport, is another. Spain, Germany and Australia also fall into the mix. Then there is England, the European champions.
And although it was a high standard, it would be disappointing if England did not win. It’s going to look like an anti-climax if they don’t win. You may even feel like a failure. And if you think that’s harsh, that’s okay too. Because the sport is cruel, and we now judge women’s soccer by the same standards as other sports instead of caring about it.
This time, it’s not about liberating female footballers in England after half a century of being banned from playing. It’s not about the trip. This is not about trying to be an evangelist for the sport. He no longer needed missionaries. In Australia and New Zealand over the next few weeks, the sport will speak for itself.
Passionate Alcaraz is one for the future
Like many of us, I’ve become a victim of shrinking attention span, and more and more sports events are consumed in bite-sized clips on social media. But on Sunday afternoon, I sat in my seat on Center Court in Wimbledon for four hours and 42 minutes and didn’t wake up once.
Novak Djokovic is a living legend of course, but it was the first time I saw Carlos Alcaraz play live and it was intoxicating. One of the greatest thrills in sports is to witness the emergence of a remarkable young talent at the beginning of a journey of conquest, and even if you were late to the Alcaraz party after winning the US Open last year, it felt like it. If his victory over Djokovic at the All England Club marks a seismic shift in the game.
There is an energy and courage in Alcaraz that is impossible not to be thrilled with. A few months ago, before The Masters at Augusta, Rory McIlroy spoke about how much he loved reading transcripts of Alacáraz’s press conferences because of how they conveyed his simple, untainted joy at the game.
Carlos Alcaraz came from behind to beat Novak Djokovic like a turnaround in men’s tennis
Alcaraz’s joy was exuding during the men’s Wimbledon final with the future of the sport in safe hands
And that’s more of what happened on Sunday. Djokovic looked tired. Most players seem indifferent. But Alcaraz was radiating joy. Exude the joy of possibility. He had this sense of a dawning realization of just how far his talents could achieve.
Wayne Rooney had it too, when he terrorized France’s defense at Euro 2004 as an 18-year-old, Mike Tyson got it when he was 20 and won the world heavyweight title by crushing Trevor Berbick, Yashasvi Jaiswal, the 21-year-old Indian batsman The year-old who scored the fastest 50 in IPL history in May and hit 171 in his first innings in Test cricket, against the West Indies, in Dominica last week, is.
Men’s tennis used to worry about how it would get over losing Djokovic, Roger Federer and Rafa Nadal – the three greatest players of all time – but worry no more.
Maguire has to push forward to move forward
She admired Harry Maguire for staying at Manchester United and fighting for his place. I like the fact that he never throws his toys out of the stroller at the first sign of adversity. I think it reflected well on him that he backed himself up to beat Erik ten Hag and get back into the team. But this plan of action took its toll.
Last week, Ten Hag told him he was being stripped of the club’s captaincy, another sign that he has no intention of bringing him back into the first eleven. The writing on the wall is getting wider for Maguire.
For his and the team’s sake, the time seems right for him to continue his career elsewhere. He is a fine defender whose struggles with United in the past two years have tarnished his reputation.
There’s no reason why a move to a club as good as West Ham, for example, wouldn’t re-establish him as one of the best midfield-half in the Premier League and allow him to remain a mainstay of the England team heading into next year. European Championship.
It’s time for Harry Maguire to move on from Manchester United after losing the captaincy
