The weekend of the 7th and 8th
September 2019 could be considered a giant leap for football – especially in
the women’s game. It was the opening weekend of the Women’s Super League (WSL).
Two games were played at Premiership stadiums and on Sunday 8th
24,564 fans watched Chelsea LFC beat Tottenham LFC at Stamford Bridge (last
year’s average WSL attendance was 833).
The FA Player App kicked in and games were live on the BBC’s website!
All is great… right?
Let’s unpick the good and the bad… oh, and
let’s not forget it was the Men’s 1st Qualifying Round in the FA Cup
(we’ve included a men’s afterthought section).
Sunday 8th
September
Let’s start with the game at Stanford Bridge…
although 24,000 fans turned up, it transpires that many tickets were given away
for free, and the expected number to attend was 40,000. So, 16,000 people who had tickets couldn’t be
bothered going!
On a plus side, attendances were up at all 6
WSL games and we are still moving in the right direction.
Let’s look at the FA Player app – I’ve read reports
that the FA Player function does not work well.
I’ve downloaded the App and it doesn’t appear to have a CAST function –
so I can watch games on my tiny phone, but don’t seem able to transfer that
onto my TV. I tried watching the Chelsea
game and the sound wouldn’t work – luckily the BBC were also showing it, and
everything worked fine.
In summary, the FA player app is still a work in
progress.
Saturday 7th
September
The GKA was faced with a quandary. This blog
began by following the Women’s FA Cup. Then we decided it would follow the
men’s as well (to compare). However, the reason I ‘got into’ women’s football was because I started following
Manchester United’s Women’s team in their inaugural 2018/19 season. Was I going
to miss their WSL season opener? Their first ever WSL game, against Manchester
City, at the Etihad? No chance!
This meant that the men’s 1st
Qualifying game that the GKA is following was pushed to an afterthought as we
focused on the women’s game for the weekend.
The women’s
game on 7th September 2019 – Manchester City LFC V Manchester Untied
LFC
I’ve mentioned before that the clubs need to
put more effort into supporting their women’s teams.
As a Man United Women’s fan, it has been
frustrating to see little things still need to improve. Fixture lists take ages
to update and the women’s squad list on the official app was only updated on
Saturday, despite many new signings coming in through the summer. Also, the men’s team went on a 7-match
pre-season tour and it appears that the women only played 2 pre-season games
(about 5 weeks ago). How can they be fully prepared for the WSL season? If I’m
wrong and more preseason games have been played, it has been hard to find any
information on them.
Enough whinging as on Saturday 32,213 fans
turned up to watch this Manchester derby and I, plus the GKA had a great day – despite a few setbacks.
The day’s blog guest was Tim Webster and we had
a 37-minute train journey planned to Manchester Piccadilly. Then it would be either a 30-minute walk or a 9-minute tram ride to the Etihad. We set off in plenty
of time, with plans to eat lunch in Manchester on our 13.24 arrival.
In the 80s I remember being told that ‘it was
the age of the train.’ It transpires that the guy that said that can’t be
trusted for many reasons. Our train turned up 8 minutes late and then got stuck
outside Manchester for 30 minutes due to a signal failure (does this sound
familiar?).
We were hungry – it was 14:04 and we’d gotten
off at Oxford Road to avoid any more train failures.
My question is this? Has anyone tried to speed eat a heavy
burrito, plus a beer, and then speed walk a 40-minute journey in 30 minutes?
That was our mission and I wouldn’t recommend it.
However, our mission was accomplished. There were lots of fans slowly ambling to the
stadium as we powered our heavy guts along, it seemed strange that nobody
was rushing. It was a 3pm kick-off and we only arrived at the stadium at
2.53pm.
It was packed, and there were more
people outside the stadium that could possibly be in it. I wanted a program but
all the kiosks (I walked passed) were closed and displayed ‘Sold Out’ signs…
The temperature was 17 degrees and the weather was mild - a sharp contrast to
last weekend’s game of driving rain, and the weekend before of unbearable heat!
The weather seems to be so interchangeable that I’m expecting snow for our next
match.
In summary, it was rush but we made it to our
seats before kick-off.
Meanwhile at
Dales Lane…
259 fans entered the stadium for the GKA
featured game. Rushall Olympic V
Sheffield FC. Their website states that it is £10 for a ticket and an extra £1
to park – Programs cost £2. A total of
232 teams did battle over the weekend.
Back at the
Etihad…
It was clear that the game had a large
attendance as more fans flooded in throughout the first half.
The atmosphere felt like the World Cup games
that I attended in Nice. There were more children and women than I would
normally see at a men’s game. Having
watched Manchester United Women last season, I am well versed in the songs that
the fans sing. Traditional Man United songs are usually sung, but the words are
changed to incorporate women players and the swearing is removed to avoid
offending families and children. However, no such courtesy was given to the
Etihad – it appears that bigger crowds = filthier mouths. I always thought that the crowds for women’s
matches were different. There are usually shouts of encouragement to the
players – I was wrong. As soon as the
crowd gets above a certain size, it reverts to a ‘normal’ football crowd
mentality of swearing, heckling and abuse!
As for the game… City had much of the
possession in the first half, but United had better chances. It was 0-0
at half time.
Meanwhile at
Dales Lane…
The men also had a goalless first
half and went in at 0-0…
I’m presuming the fans headed to Pic’s Pantry
for pies etc.
Back at the
Etihad…
The food stalls were packed with fans and lots of long queues – I saw men necking pints in wobbly glasses
because they couldn’t take them back to their seats. We sat down and after 3 minutes
Manchester City Scored to make it 1-0.
Meanwhile at
Dales Lane…
2 minutes later Rushall also went 1-0 up. 11 minutes after that their lead was doubled
to 2-0, before Sheffield grabbed one back to make it 2-1. Rushall got another goal with 5 minutes to go
and their 3-1 victory allows their GKA journey to continue.
I’d like to thank Sheffield FC for their hospitality
in the previous round.
Back at the
Etihad…
There were few chances in the 2nd half and Manchester City
were the better side. It was difficult
to see the far goal without opera glasses. Near the end of the game, United
hit the post. Most of the fans celebrated like they’d equalised – The
GKA wasn’t fooled because I was watching the big screen.
Manchester City deserved the victory and the game
ended 1-0.
We walked back to the station at a reasonable
speed, it didn’t take long to get a train and we ended up in a comfy seat with no
delays. A fine end to a great day.
Or was it…
The GKA’s bubble was burst as we read the game
report on the BBC website. I’ve been ‘banging on’ about the FA, the Clubs and
the Media needing to up their game. They need to change their attitude and invest more to
grow the women’s game. In my own little
progressive bubble, I was thinking that everyone wants the women’s game to
grow, right?
Not really if the comments section of the BBC
website has anything to go by. 446
comments were left, and they were mostly negative – see below the most popular
comments.
It will be difficult to grow the women’s game if
the most popular opinion of fans is as above.
I’m guessing that most people who commented, didn’t attend the
game. I’m guessing that they have a
negative bias and no matter what happens they’ll pick holes. I could be wrong,
but I’d like to know if this is the case.
Of course, the standard of the women’s game needs to
improve. When compared to Manchester City and Liverpool’s men’s teams the
women’s game is far behind. But that is an unfair comparison, as most of men’s
football is way behind that standard - because they have raised the bar so much.
Perhaps I’m unconsciously peddling my own feminist
agenda?
John Barnes was recently quoted as saying that
‘Racism happens in football, because racism is a societal problem, and football
reflects society.’ Perhaps the same can be said about equality?
Lets’ park that idea for the moment and move onto
our geeky stats…
Rushall Olympic wins £4500 in Prize Money
Route Men’s
Avro Fc 3
|
4 Litherland Remyca
|
Sheffield FC 2
|
1 Litherland Remyca
|
Rushall Olympic 3
|
1 Sheffield FC
|
Route Women’s
Mossley Hill
Ladies
|
Burnley Belvedere Ladies (No show)
|
Curzon Ashton Ladies 2
|
2 Mossley Hill
Ladies (2-4 Pens)
|
RIP Team and Stadium
Avro FC
|
Vestacare Stadium
|
Burnley Belvedere Ladies
|
Belvedere & Calder Vale Sports Club
|
Litherland Remyca
|
Litherland Sports Park
|
Curzon Ashton Ladies
|
Failsworth Sports Campus
|
Sheffield FC
|
Home of Football Stadium
|
Highest Number of Fans
Rushall Olympic
|
259 (1st Qualifying Round)
|
Sheffield FC
|
184 (Preliminary Round)
|
Avro FC
|
150 (Extra-Preliminary Round)
|
Curzon Ashton Ladies
|
44 (Preliminary Round)
|
Prize Money Leaders
Rushall Olympic
|
£4500 (1st Qualifying Round)
|
Sheffield FC
|
£2890 (Preliminary Round)
|
Litherland Remyca
|
£2250 (Extra-Preliminary Round)
|
Mossley Hill Ladies
|
£660 (Preliminary Round + Extra Preliminary
Round)
|
GKA League Table
Team
|
Won
|
Drawn
|
Goals F
|
Goals A
|
GD
|
Points
|
Mossley Hill Ladies
|
2
|
0
|
2
|
2
|
0
|
6
|
Rushall Olympic
|
1
|
0
|
3
|
1
|
2
|
3
|
Litherland Remyca
|
1
|
0
|
5
|
5
|
0
|
3
|
Sheffield FC
|
1
|
0
|
3
|
4
|
-1
|
3
|
Curzon Ashton Ladies
|
0
|
0
|
2
|
2
|
0
|
0
|
Avro FC
|
0
|
0
|
3
|
4
|
-1
|
0
|
Burnley Belvedere Ladies
|
N/A
|
N/A
|
N/A
|
N/A
|
N/A
|
N/A
|
Penalties and
Yellow Cards – Men v Women
Penalties - Men 1
|
0 Women
|
Yellow Cards – Men 11
|
0 Women
|
Next up in the GKA
In the men’s 2nd qualifying Round 160 teams will fight it out on 21st September 2019
Draw Number 23 – Rushall
Olympic V Banbury or Gainsborough Trinity FC
The GKA gets a second chance to visit Dales Lane.
Don’t forget the Women’s first Qualifying Round,
the next day, Sunday 22nd September 2019.
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