IT is understandable that England’s women players are casting envious eyes in the direction of Brazil, where the football tournament got the Olympic Games under way on Wednesday. Having beaten Germany to take third place at last summer’s World Cup, the English would, under different circumstances, have been the top European qualifiers for Rio.
On that level they are entitled to feel aggrieved – but politically there was never a chance the UK would send a team.
Fifa granted special dispensation for women’s and men’s GB teams to be fielded at the London Olympics, but it was made clear it was a one-off. In any case, Scotland, Northern Ireland and Wales would be unlikely to endorse such a move again.
The reason is obvious. It’s only an accident of history which allows all four countries to compete under their own flags at World Cups and Euro competitions; demanding a Team GB every four years would be an act of provocation.
With England omitted, Germany, France and Sweden are Uefa’s representatives in Brazil. The Swedes had the honour of kicking off the Games against South Africa – if such a term could be applied to what was an underwhelming occasion. There were no more than a couple of hundred spectators inside the 60,000-seater Olympic Stadium in Rio when the game got under way.
That changed by the time Brazil played China later in the evening, but there were still plenty of empty seats. Any notion that the host nation’s fixation on football encompasses the women’s game could not be more wrong.
Brazilian law made it illegal for women to play football, among other sports, in 1941. The ban lasted until 1985 and even now, but even so the usual slurs continued. multiple Fifa women’s player of the year Marta, pictured, receives little of the adulation heaped upon the men’s stars.
Brazil are eighth in the Fifa women’s rankings, and in England’s absence seventh among the Olympic nations. They began with a 3-0 win over China and played Sweden in the early hours this morning in Group E. World Cup holders USA are hot favourites to retain their title, but Brazil’s women would be the more sentimental pick.
BACK at the ranch it’s Scottish Cup day. The pick of the eight ties is Rangers against holders Glasgow City. The other all-SWPL1 game is between Celtic and Forfar Farmington, while Hearts and Hamilton Accies, second and third respectively in SWPL2, also meet. Dundee United, in only their first season, face their toughest test at home to SWPL1 club Stirling Uni.
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