Should the women's game have smaller stuff in it?

Scarecrow

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I think it’d make the game better, for sure.

Also, how fecking sexist are you cnuts to tell me I can’t even discuss this because I’m not the right gender? Piss off.
 

BeltUp

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Or we could just make all the men's football stuff bigger. Just think how many goals we'd see with bigger nets!
 

Dave Smith

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Biology. In no sport are women better than men (as far as I know). And I don’t mean this as a criticism of women; merely an observation.

The Australia women’s national team (ranked in the top 5 in the world) lost 7-0 to an u15s team. I think United women played Salford u18s a couple of years ago and lost 10-0.

There is a huge gap between male and female footballing ability. I wouldn’t imagine Salford u18s get a huge amount of great facilities either, so we can’t look at funding.

I cannot see into the future so I can’t say for sure, though it’s highly unlikely that women’s football will ever get anywhere close to the standard of the men’s.
I think give it a few years/decades and women will start to beat men in sports such as horse racing and motorsports. However, that is generally because they're at an advantage in regards to weight.
 

SAFMUTD

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Why couldn’t it be as good? I don’t watch women’s football so I don’t know how good/bad it is but football is not very popular among girls so it makes sense that fewer girls play football when they are young and therefore fewer big talents are found in the gilrs’ teams. I think when it will become more popular more talented girls will play and become successful.
Because women are physically inferior to men, its not an oppinion just a fact and in sports phyisicallity is a huge part of the game.
 

Lay

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I dont remember that, are you sure that isn't your suggestion? :lol:
No he actually did say it.

“During a discussion on ways to improve the popularity of women’s football, Blatter said “Let the women play in more feminine clothes like they do in volleyball. They could, for example, have tighter shorts.” He went on to say “Female players are pretty, if you excuse me for saying so, and they already have some different rules to men, such as playing with a lighter ball. That decision was taken to create a more female aesthetic, so why not do it in fashion?”
 

FreddieTheReddie

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Because women are physically inferior to men, its not an oppinion just a fact and in sports phyisicallity is a huge part of the game.
But football is not only about strength and pace, skills are more important. Is it less enjoyable just because the female wingers are not as quick as the male wingers? But even if I watch swimming or running I don’t care how fast women swim compared to the men who swam 10 minutes earlier.
 

SAFMUTD

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But football is not only about strength and pace, skills are more important. Is it less enjoyable just because the female wingers are not as quick as the male wingers? But even if I watch swimming or running I don’t care how fast women swim compared to the men who swam 10 minutes earlier.
Sure skills are important but the different in phyisicallity is so big that its like watching an amateur sport. Like asking 13 year olds to be as entertaining as full professionals, just wont happen.
 

hobbers

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The goalkeeping situation will always stick out with women's football. A 5ft7 keeper can't cover more than about half of a full size goal. And the absence of talent among female keepers means that even at the highest level so many goals come down to comical goalkeeping howlers. Making the goals smaller is a pretty obvious and easy way to improve the game as a spectacle. And quite a few female footballers seem to like the idea.

But of course you get air heads like Solo who ignore what their fellow professionals think about it and just declare the very suggestion to be sexism.
 

tomaldinho1

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Should women's football play games just before men's games to get more crowds?
It would only be a matter of time before someone complained about the pitches being cut up or something stupid if they were right after. You also don't want to grow the sport by seeing it as an additive to the men's game, it should stand alone.

Women's football doesn't need smaller stuff, it just needs more and more help with participation, marketing and it will keep growing. It is well placed to benefit from seeing the issues men's football has had and put some rules in places early to avoid running into the same issues. It's also potentially early enough in it's life cycle that you could even create a University/Academy draft system which I think will eventually come to the men's game.

I did just see that French rugby is allowing transgender women to play rugby now - a different discussion but I wonder if that could take place with women's football in the UK.
 

Spaghetti

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Should women's football play games just before men's games to get more crowds?
To allow the men time to warm up, that would mean kicking off about 3 hours before the men. And that’s with them sharing a changing room. Who’s leaving the pub 3 hours early to watch the women? It’s difficult enough as it is!

Another issue is that football is pretty boring unless you have a passionate interest in one of the teams.
 

redrobed

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Let’s address the pay gap 1st. Top earners in WSL earn upto around £35k a year. Conversely the likes of Liverpool and City are paying their mens players insane sums, upwards of £500k a week. So WSL players are earning less than 10% and that’s comparing a year to a week.

The size of stuff I’m not so bothered about as it’s the same for everyone playing - larger players will have advantages in terms of things like power, etc. Just as is the case in men’s football.
 

Dargonk

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Personally I don't think changing the pitch size would make any difference. Clubs can already vary the size of their pitch fairly substantially as it is, and they regularly do game to game depending on tactics. If a smaller pitch benefited their women's team, then they can already make that change within the current rules.

In terms of ball size and goals, I wouldn't like to see that implemented as well, purely due to added complications at the grass root level. Local clubs generally are run on very tight budgets, and look to reuse equipment across all teams. So having to buy an extra set 20cm smaller would be a massive pain and a waste of money that could be spent in far better locations (though most will likely just use the male ones anyway).
 

FreddieTheReddie

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Let’s address the pay gap 1st. Top earners in WSL earn upto around £35k a year. Conversely the likes of Liverpool and City are paying their mens players insane sums, upwards of £500k a week. So WSL players are earning less than 10% and that’s comparing a year to a week.

The size of stuff I’m not so bothered about as it’s the same for everyone playing - larger players will have advantages in terms of things like power, etc. Just as is the case in men’s football.
That’s because they generate most of the profit for the club. This is how entertainment industry works, more popular people will always earn more money. If you want to address the pay gap, make women’s football more popular.
 

TrustInJanuzaj

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Let’s address the pay gap 1st. Top earners in WSL earn upto around £35k a year. Conversely the likes of Liverpool and City are paying their mens players insane sums, upwards of £500k a week. So WSL players are earning less than 10% and that’s comparing a year to a week.

The size of stuff I’m not so bothered about as it’s the same for everyone playing - larger players will have advantages in terms of things like power, etc. Just as is the case in men’s football.
Silly post, the wages are directly related to the income generated. Since the men's game is much much bigger of course they should earn more.
 

redshaw

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The goalkeeping situation will always stick out with women's football. A 5ft7 keeper can't cover more than about half of a full size goal. And the absence of talent among female keepers means that even at the highest level so many goals come down to comical goalkeeping howlers. Making the goals smaller is a pretty obvious and easy way to improve the game as a spectacle. And quite a few female footballers seem to like the idea.

But of course you get air heads like Solo who ignore what their fellow professionals think about it and just declare the very suggestion to be sexism.
Problem is there's some taller and more able keepers that will have it too easy with smaller goals and create another imbalance. When I watch a high level womens games, nothing about the dimensions seems wrong. As the game grows it will draw in more taller keepers, there's still many tall women out there or tall enough and able to improve to use the same goals.

Lower down I think smaller goals could help in the short term. Changing height would be easy but width means extra holes in the ground that need to be temporarily covered.
 

meamth

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What they need is mini skirt or hot pants like volleyball. Then people will watch.. :drool:
 

Ludens the Red

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The goalkeeping situation will always stick out with women's football. A 5ft7 keeper can't cover more than about half of a full size goal. And the absence of talent among female keepers means that even at the highest level so many goals come down to comical goalkeeping howlers. Making the goals smaller is a pretty obvious and easy way to improve the game as a spectacle. And quite a few female footballers seem to like the idea.

But of course you get air heads like Solo who ignore what their fellow professionals think about it and just declare the very suggestion to be sexism.
Never more evident than 30 seconds into the Champions League final played on Sunday

 

Ludens the Red

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Chelsea's goalie is 5'11" and is taller than Jorge Campos, Rene Higuita and Peter Bonetti.

Her height isn't a problem at all.
I was focusing on the “comical goalkeeping howlers” part to be fair. Couldn’t believe that goal.
 

Stacks

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Despite finding him far too defensive i accept where @Stacks is coming from. He seems to be saying that if majority of women are happy to accept that there will be more goals due to height discrepancy between keepers then it should just be accepted as part of the game that's different. I disagree that a man querying this is inherently ignorant or worse.

Personally, i think women's football standard has clearly improved from the little I watch and it will continue to. The officiating and goalkeeping is not up to scratch though, not in comparison to the mens game, but simply for the women on the pitch. In my opinion it makes the game appear to be of a far poorer standard than it probably is overall
'twas my imposter
 

Zehner

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Think this could be really difficult regarding grass roots football and actually might make life harder for female amateur footballers. If a club has to purchase new gear in order to provide a women's or girls' team, then this will be a huge obstacle. And then there's also the organizational aspect of it (switch goals, adjust line drawings etc. probably every weekend). You'd definitely would have to think about how it can be implemented in the lower leagues before putting regulation in place.
 
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Think this could be really difficult regarding grass roots football and actually might make life harder for female amateur footballers. If a club has to purchase new gear in order to provide a women's or girls' team, then this will be a huge obstacle. And then there's also the organizational aspect of it (switch goals, adjust line drawings etc. probably every weekend). You'd definitely would have to think about how it can be implemented in the lower leagues before putting regulation in place.
don’t you have smaller goals and smaller pitches for junior football?

aren’t most pitches at grass roots level smaller than professional pitches?

i don’t think it’s a big obstacle if it’s something that’s needed.
 

Zehner

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don’t you have smaller goals and smaller pitches for junior football?

aren’t most pitches at grass roots level smaller than professional pitches?

i don’t think it’s a big obstacle if it’s something that’s needed.
Not really sure if I understand you correctly but youth goals, footballs etc. are far too small for adult women, at least here in Germany. Children play on smaller goals and smaller pitches (usually half of the actual pitch) until they turn 12 over here. Women would probably need something inbetween.

Or are you suggesting women should play on smaller goals only in the higher leagues? That could be possible but you'd exclude grass roots football, then.
 
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Not really sure if I understand you correctly but youth goals, footballs etc. are far too small for adult women, at least here in Germany. Children play on smaller goals and smaller pitches (usually half of the actual pitch) until they turn 12 over here. Women would probably need something inbetween.

Or are you suggesting women should play on smaller goals only in the higher leagues? That could be possible but you'd exclude grass roots football, then.
im Just saying that there are already different sized pitches and goals. So if there was a need to have some slight differences, I don’t see it is a barrier.

i would have though pitches at grass roots level would tend to be on the smaller side of the regulations in any case - this negating the problem at that level?

obviously there is a range of how big/ small pitches need to be - it doesn’t seem hard to think that women’s pitches can be on the smaller side. I’m sure if they did want smaller pitches, it’s going to be a matter of a few yards, nothing seismic.
 

Zehner

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im Just saying that there are already different sized pitches and goals. So if there was a need to have some slight differences, I don’t see it is a barrier.

i would have though pitches at grass roots level would tend to be on the smaller side of the regulations in any case - this negating the problem at that level?

obviously there is a range of how big/ small pitches need to be - it doesn’t seem hard to think that women’s pitches can be on the smaller side. I’m sure if they did want smaller pitches, it’s going to be a matter of a few yards, nothing seismic.
I don't know how exactly the situation in England looks like but amateur clubs in Germany are usually in very strained financial situations. Depending on the region, the best they can afford is a synthetic turf. Here in NRW, many clubs still have "cinder pitches" (if that is the correct wording). Goals, nets and utensils were often bought decades ago. From what I have experienced, they won't just buy a new set of goals for their women's team. And regarding pitch size, I believe people would just go with restricting the pitch with pylons or something like that.

Maybe English grassroot clubs aren't as poor as German ones but I really don't see that going down well over here.mI believe that if they introduce new sizes for women's football, then they have to exclude the amateur level from it.
 

MU655

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Changing it makes sense. It almost like having a person who is 5 ft 5 trying to wear clothes made for someone who is 6ft.