Imagine going to a World Cup having never played a team outside of
your own continent. Imagine the chequered preparation for players whose
domestic league has been suspended for the past 18 months. Imagine that,
despite being the highest-ranked nation from your continent, you have
had only one unofficial friendly, on a training-ground pitch, as the sum
of your tournament preparation. Welcome to women’s football in Africa.
Although many ridiculed the Ivory Coast team that suffered a 10-0 humbling by Germany in their opening game, most will not have realised it was the nation’s first match against a non-African side. To add insult to injury, Clémentine Touré’s team arrived in Canada only 72 hours before the biggest game of their lives.
Ivory Coast went on to redeem themselves, just missing out on a draw against Thailand and posting a respectable 3-1 defeat by Norway – one of the powerhouses of the women’s game. Afterwards, an emotional Touré made a plea for the sport to be better supported in Africa. “I want to make an appeal to not only our federation but to all of Africa,” said Touré, one of only eight female coaches out of 24 teams at the World Cup. “We believe in our women. We have a good team. Today the Ivory Coast showed it deserves a place in the World Cup. But we also deserved to be better prepared. We didn’t deserve to be humiliated.”
“It’s setting teams up to fail,” says the journalist Kehinde Adeogun, who specialises in African women’s football. “African teams don’t have the opportunity to play international friendlies with teams from outside of the continent. Only when they’re able to do that on a consistent level will they be a force to be reckoned with at World Cups and Olympics.”
Nigeria are the perfect example. Perennial African champions, experienced at World Cups – albeit having only once progressed past the group stages, in 1999 – with a star striker and the BBC World Player of the Year in Liverpool’s Asisat Oshoala, and yet Edwin Okon’s side were given only one international friendly to prepare for the World Cup, against Canada. It took place on a training-ground pitch, one week before their first match. Meanwhile, since qualifying for the tournament last October, Cameroon and Ivory Coast played one friendly – against each other.
Little wonder then that Nigeria, the highest-ranked African team at 33rd in the world, sit below representatives from every other continent in world football bar Oceania. “The problem is money,” says Adeogun. “How do you get international experience when you’re ranked 53rd in the world, like Cameroon? Why would England want to play Cameroon? They wouldn’t. And then it’s a vicious circle. Until African teams begin to play teams from other continents their world rankings won’t improve.”
Adeogun believes invitational tournaments could provide the answer, calling on Fifa to stipulate the Algarve and Cyprus Cups include at least one nation from each continent to help grow the global game.
But while Ivory Coast go home without a point and Nigeria floundered in the so-called group of death, Cameroon – making their World Cup debut – are the unexpected good news story. Ngachu Enow’s side trounced Ecuador 6-0, courtesy of a hat-trick from the striker Gaëlle Enganamouit, who plays in Sweden, only narrowly lost to the World Cup holders, Japan, and then beat Switzerland to face China on Saturday in the round of 16.
It is an enormous achievement, all the more astonishing considering the state of the nation’s domestic football scene. “Enow told me the Cameroon league at home hadn’t played regular football for a year and a half,” says Adeogun. “It’s stop start. He’s hoping this World Cup and the exposure the team have had will encourage the federation to ensure the league at home runs properly. That’s the legacy he wants from this World Cup: sustainability.”
That’s the legacy that all women’s football in Africa craves. “Look at the grassroots,” says Janine Anthony, a Nigerian football journalist. “It has to be better structured. Only when we get that right can we say: ‘OK, we can do better at the World Cup’. Our baby has to suckle in order to walk, to grow, to run, before we can say it’s time to fly.” Anthony says although Nigeria’s national team players are finally on central contracts, albeit irregularly paid, the rest of the domestic scene is struggling – and it is not down to a lack of interest.
“Football is the No1 sport in Nigeria for girls. It’s a big thing, in schools and colleges and in the streets – girls love playing football. We have so much raw talent and passion. And people are interested. When we talk about women’s football on my show we get callers and tweets, people want to comment; it is a big misconception that people aren’t interested. But we need it to be more than enjoyment and entertainment, we need investment. When girls play on the streets it’s just for fun. But there’s no career for them. That’s the barrier.”
Adeogun and Anthony hope this summer’s World Cup will forge a legacy of greater investment. But without real commitment from the structures governing the game, will it ever happen? Whilethe rest of the world’s Under-17 sides will play in a centralised qualifying tournament for the U17 World Cup in Jordan next year, the African women’s format is made up of home and away legs that are expensive to finance and prone to last-minute cancellations. In 2010 five teams out of 10 withdrew from the competition. It is common too for nations to pull out of the African Women’s Championship and the continent’s Olympic qualifying matches.
A paucity of experience at youth and senior level then is holding African teams back just as the rest of the world move forward. “Across the board in Africa it’s the same thing,” says Anthony. “It’s only every four years that people care about women’s football and it shouldn’t be that way. It’s time for the federations to walk the walk and not just talk the talk. All we’re asking is just a little bit of what the men get. Because there’s so much catching up to do.”
Although many ridiculed the Ivory Coast team that suffered a 10-0 humbling by Germany in their opening game, most will not have realised it was the nation’s first match against a non-African side. To add insult to injury, Clémentine Touré’s team arrived in Canada only 72 hours before the biggest game of their lives.
Ivory Coast went on to redeem themselves, just missing out on a draw against Thailand and posting a respectable 3-1 defeat by Norway – one of the powerhouses of the women’s game. Afterwards, an emotional Touré made a plea for the sport to be better supported in Africa. “I want to make an appeal to not only our federation but to all of Africa,” said Touré, one of only eight female coaches out of 24 teams at the World Cup. “We believe in our women. We have a good team. Today the Ivory Coast showed it deserves a place in the World Cup. But we also deserved to be better prepared. We didn’t deserve to be humiliated.”
“It’s setting teams up to fail,” says the journalist Kehinde Adeogun, who specialises in African women’s football. “African teams don’t have the opportunity to play international friendlies with teams from outside of the continent. Only when they’re able to do that on a consistent level will they be a force to be reckoned with at World Cups and Olympics.”
Nigeria are the perfect example. Perennial African champions, experienced at World Cups – albeit having only once progressed past the group stages, in 1999 – with a star striker and the BBC World Player of the Year in Liverpool’s Asisat Oshoala, and yet Edwin Okon’s side were given only one international friendly to prepare for the World Cup, against Canada. It took place on a training-ground pitch, one week before their first match. Meanwhile, since qualifying for the tournament last October, Cameroon and Ivory Coast played one friendly – against each other.
Little wonder then that Nigeria, the highest-ranked African team at 33rd in the world, sit below representatives from every other continent in world football bar Oceania. “The problem is money,” says Adeogun. “How do you get international experience when you’re ranked 53rd in the world, like Cameroon? Why would England want to play Cameroon? They wouldn’t. And then it’s a vicious circle. Until African teams begin to play teams from other continents their world rankings won’t improve.”
Adeogun believes invitational tournaments could provide the answer, calling on Fifa to stipulate the Algarve and Cyprus Cups include at least one nation from each continent to help grow the global game.
But while Ivory Coast go home without a point and Nigeria floundered in the so-called group of death, Cameroon – making their World Cup debut – are the unexpected good news story. Ngachu Enow’s side trounced Ecuador 6-0, courtesy of a hat-trick from the striker Gaëlle Enganamouit, who plays in Sweden, only narrowly lost to the World Cup holders, Japan, and then beat Switzerland to face China on Saturday in the round of 16.
It is an enormous achievement, all the more astonishing considering the state of the nation’s domestic football scene. “Enow told me the Cameroon league at home hadn’t played regular football for a year and a half,” says Adeogun. “It’s stop start. He’s hoping this World Cup and the exposure the team have had will encourage the federation to ensure the league at home runs properly. That’s the legacy he wants from this World Cup: sustainability.”
That’s the legacy that all women’s football in Africa craves. “Look at the grassroots,” says Janine Anthony, a Nigerian football journalist. “It has to be better structured. Only when we get that right can we say: ‘OK, we can do better at the World Cup’. Our baby has to suckle in order to walk, to grow, to run, before we can say it’s time to fly.” Anthony says although Nigeria’s national team players are finally on central contracts, albeit irregularly paid, the rest of the domestic scene is struggling – and it is not down to a lack of interest.
“Football is the No1 sport in Nigeria for girls. It’s a big thing, in schools and colleges and in the streets – girls love playing football. We have so much raw talent and passion. And people are interested. When we talk about women’s football on my show we get callers and tweets, people want to comment; it is a big misconception that people aren’t interested. But we need it to be more than enjoyment and entertainment, we need investment. When girls play on the streets it’s just for fun. But there’s no career for them. That’s the barrier.”
Adeogun and Anthony hope this summer’s World Cup will forge a legacy of greater investment. But without real commitment from the structures governing the game, will it ever happen? Whilethe rest of the world’s Under-17 sides will play in a centralised qualifying tournament for the U17 World Cup in Jordan next year, the African women’s format is made up of home and away legs that are expensive to finance and prone to last-minute cancellations. In 2010 five teams out of 10 withdrew from the competition. It is common too for nations to pull out of the African Women’s Championship and the continent’s Olympic qualifying matches.
A paucity of experience at youth and senior level then is holding African teams back just as the rest of the world move forward. “Across the board in Africa it’s the same thing,” says Anthony. “It’s only every four years that people care about women’s football and it shouldn’t be that way. It’s time for the federations to walk the walk and not just talk the talk. All we’re asking is just a little bit of what the men get. Because there’s so much catching up to do.”
