I do not like football. However, here I am, in the middle of August, accompanied by four young people, watching and cheering on the women’s soccer team in the World Cup final. Some young people who until a few years ago did not give a penny for the girls who played, all of them being players of much inferior federated teams. But this summer they have followed the entire World Cup, the names of all the players that make up the Spanish team and many other teams are known. This description, by itself, is the success of these women who, preceded by many other players who tried to make their passion for soccer their profession, have managed to make many people today, even those outside the sport, pay attention to the final. A success… even if they had lost.
These days the sports programs of different stations, with their announcers at the helm, have sung the many virtues of the Spanish team. They have not spared criticism of some of their players either. Few I have heard, however, regarding his controversial coach. In any case, they have become the great spokespersons for the leap to success of the women of the Red when, for years, they themselves or their teammates have made invisible, or have been accomplices in making them invisible, the football played by young women, attacking their lack of technique, discipline, professionalism, etc. They have done little to change this situation, sponsoring these teams in a big way, with hard and hard money.
Beyond the purely football, the women of this team, from previous line-ups and from teams from other countries stand out for a whole series of virtues that we should not ignore when we see them play. Women in soccer, and in other sports, face gender stereotypes every day. As happens to girls in the schoolyard, every day they hear that football, good football, is a man’s sport, from which it follows that if you play regularly, even professionally, or you are meddling in a space that does not touch you, or you are tomboyish, when not, a machirulo. Despite everything, they continue, even in the most adverse conditions. Smart, strong, hardworking, beautiful and… brave. We have seen athletes from countries where doing sports has become contrary to the imposed law. A courage that they show when they live, for example, their homosexuality without complexes. Yes, they are also leaders in the fight for LGTBI rights, without making their sexual condition public becoming a hashtag global. Not to mention how they stand up to racism or ageism, without stopping parties or starting campaigns. They have even dared to show themselves vulnerable to extreme pressure and sacrifice.
Ladies, thank you and congratulations.
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