Women’s World Cup full of lessons learned

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 20/06/2015 (3989 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

The flaming-red banners began to come down even faster than they were raised, as the 2015 FIFA Women’s World Cup in Winnipeg closed its final day.

The week before the soccer tournament was a whirlwind. The matches were the same: a churning storm of media, press conferences and games.

For me, the event was special in a way that’s still difficult to fully articulate. It was something not seen in the city before, not quite, though comparisons were drawn to the 1999 Pan American Games. Simply put, there was something powerful in the chance to be up close at the heart of a growing women’s game.

While Winnipeg processes the lessons — and crunches the numbers — here are some things I learned from the event:

 

1. The stadium looked like a million bucks

… Or is more like $200 million? Point is, Investors Group Field was an ideal model for FIFA’s “look and feel” accoutrements. The visual effect of those splashes of Women’s World Cup red was most powerful in the stadium, but the place looked vibrant on TV.

This was Winnipeg’s rare chance to show off one of its few shiny things to audiences from Japan to Germany, and the place looked great. Dare I say it even looked “world-class.” That bodes well for when Winnipeg seeks to pull in other major events.

 

2. Women are rising, all over the world

FIFA expanded the Women’s World Cup tournament by eight spots in 2015, to give more teams a chance to measure themselves against the big guns. Eight teams made their World Cup debut. On and off the pitch, this meant there was no shortage of stories about the global advancement of women, and our competitions.

Ecuador, in its first Women’s World Cup, battled bravely to hold Japan to one goal in Winnipeg. In its second appearance, Colombia upset heavily favoured France. Ecuadorian head coach Vanessa Arauz later said the growth of the developing Colombian program served as a “role model” for her side.

 

3. … But the work is far from over

In men’s sports, a nation’s success in international events sits at some intersection of population, cultural support for the sport and ability to invest in development. In women’s sports, there’s all of that… and then gender plays an enormous role.

Over and over, players and coaches testified to their hunger to raise the women’s game, and the challenges they faced along the way. Ecuador launched its first women’s soccer league, an amateur competition, just two years ago. Thailand still doesn’t have one. There are six nations from soccer-hungry South and Central America in the FIFA top-25 men’s rankings; on the women’s side there is only one: seventh-ranked Brazil.

According to the Globe and Mail’s Stephanie Nolen, Brazil’s largest newspaper didn’t cover superstar Marta’s historic 15th World Cup goal, while a men’s exhibition game was front-page news. The co-ordinator of Brazil’s women’s program frankly told her interest would grow because players were starting to wear makeup on the pitch.

Caring about this isn’t just caring about soccer. It’s never just about sports yet, with women. It’s about asserting the fullness of our lives as humans — that we are able and that our successes are worthy of attention. This is, in almost every corner of the world, very much a work in progress.

 

4. Americans like to buy things…

This part should come as no shock. (It should especially come as no shock to anyone who’s ever set foot in a gas station in the Black Hills, a Red Bull-soaked nightmare palace of bald eagles clutching assault rifles, $4.99 ceramic Lakota stereotypes and other wildly affordable souvenirs of colonization, but I digress.)

American tourists at games in Winnipeg went in hard on stuff. How much? On last week’s U.S. match days, some fans reported waiting in line for more than an hour to reach the FIFA merchandise booths, making buying a T-shirt an act of devotion usually reserved for holy pilgrimage.

By the time Tuesday rolled around, the main FIFA store on the north concourse was almost cleaned out. Only a handful of shirts and sweatshirts remained.

 

5. … But they know how to party

Oh, Americans, I only rib you because there are so very many of you, and you are so very demonstrative of your patriotic fervour. The American invasion during the first week was gloriously entertaining, and the hype wouldn’t have been the same without them. Salute to the red, white and blue: they turned out to support their women.

 

6. I resent FIFA, deeply

Not the local organizers, Winnipeggers who will soon be back on the job market, albeit with a nice boost to their resumés. Nor do I mean the vast number of good people working tirelessly to build the game and its events, who I’m going to guess aren’t too familiar with the inside of private jets.

That upper echelon, though — yeah, I’m bitter. This is the largest women’s tournament in FIFA history, both in terms of the number of teams and in terms of broadcast and media support. The FIFA scandal cast a pall on the proceedings.

The corruption scandal plaguing the organization has been long in the making. The thing needed (and still needs) to be cleaned out and fumigated. Better now than later, but it’s frustrating that at the very moment women’s soccer was about to take a big step forward, the FIFA pot finally boiled over.

These athletes deserve so much better.

 

7. Waraporn Boonsing is my new hero

Anyone who read my recent pieces probably picked up that I became a fan of Thailand goalkeeper Waraporn Boonsing — I wrote about her twice. (Make that three times.)

Throughout the tournament, the goalie was a model of good sportswomanship and tenacious play, fighting admirably through two largely hopeless causes (against Norway and Germany) and becoming an instant crowd favourite in Winnipeg, where she stopped 12 of 16 shots on goal; her own side didn’t manage one.

When we talk about role models, it’s not always the star names. It’s often those deepest in the trenches who exemplify what we mean by strength. Boonsing lived out her dream in Canada of making it to the Women’s World Cup, and although her team didn’t advance, nobody can say she didn’t make the most of the chance.

That is the best lesson we could ever hope to take away and share with the next generation.

 

melissa.martin@freepress.mb.ca