Professional Women's Soccer Essay

Part A:
Research Question
The intended outcome of my research is to demonstrate that Professional Woman’s Soccer is not afforded the same opportunities or prestige as Professional Men’s Soccer. I intend to demonstrate this by researching the following key areas; the comparative success of each team, difference in pay, difference in how the games are played, a comparison of how many games are played each season and an insight into how the two sports are portrayed and covered by the media. The two team being researched throughout are the Liverpool Football Club, the men’s team, and the Liverpool Ladies Football Club, the woman’s team.

Success of the Teams
It is necessary when starting to review the differences between the teams to look first at the level of success that each team has achieved in the past and then to look at how or if

this translates into how the teams and players are rewarded for their successes.

The Liverpool Ladies Football Club has been very successful and has topped the table for the last two years. Liverpool Football Club however, has not had as much ongoing success, having dropped to 6th in the 2014-15 Barclays Premier League when the year before they finished in 2nd, two points behind Manchester United Football Club.

In 2013 Liverpool Ladies Ranked 1st with a total of twelve wins, having lost two games in the season and not drawing any. In 2014 they Ranked 1st once again with seven wins, two loses, and five draws. In comparison to this, Liverpool FC in 2013-2014 Ranked 2nd with twenty six wins, six loses and six draws. Then in 2014-2015 they came sixth with eighteen wins, twelve loses and eight draws.

Despite their success, Liverpool Ladies average attendance in 2014 was only 684, going up to 740 for WSL games according to. The Select Security Stadium, which the Liverpool Ladies use as their home ground, has a capacity of 13,350. The Liverpool Football Club has significantly higher attendance with the average attendance for Liverpool FC home games in 2014/15 being 44,659 while in 2013/14 it was 44,671 according to World Football, 2014. The Liverpool Football Clubs home ground Anfield has a capacity of 45,552. Meaning that Anfield seats nearly 3x the amount that Select Security Stadium does.

Having said that, attendances in FA Women’s Soccer League 1 have increased by 22 per cent in the last year, while in FA Women’s Soccer League 2 attendances are up 12 per cent. The average attendance in FA WSL 1 is 892 and 326 in FA WSL 2. These increased numbers show that women’s soccer is slowly becoming more popular as a spectator sport. These numbers could potential continue to increase to significantly higher numbers if the women’s league received more support from sponsors and the media.

Difference in Pay
There is a significant difference in how much the professional male players earn compared to the professional female players. First team players for Liverpool can earn an average of £67,486 ($147,085 AUD) per week, £3.51m ($7,639,514 AUD) annually (Liverpool Echo, 2015).

In comparison, England players in the Women's Super League on average earn up to about £35,000 ($75,590 AUD) from their clubs, according to Professional Footballers' Association agent Matthew Buck. The majority of the female players earn only around £20,000 ($43,544 AUD) from their clubs, however there are players who are on as little as £50 ($108 AUD) a week. Players in the female league often have to work second jobs or are employed in other areas of their clubs.

It can be assumed that the large difference in pay can be partly attributed to the far superior crowd attendances and club membership of the men’s team.

It is also very likely that the sponsorships attracted by the men’s team would be worth significantly more than the sponsorships attracted by the women’s team. While I believe that they are playing the same sport and should therefore earn similar salaries, these things affect how much the club has available for salaries and also how much they are willing to pay to retain top players. Quite simply, the women’s clubs just don’t have the money available to pay higher salaries.

This staggering difference in pay inequality is not limited to the English league, it was made particularly evident after the World Cup in relation to the American teams. The U.S. Men’s and Women’s Soccer Teams each won the World Cup however the Women’s team was only paid a total of US $15 million compared to the $575 million paid to the Men’s team. In addition to this, the average salary in the U.S. men’s soccer league is $305,000, while for the women, it’s significantly less at $14,000.

Difference in

games
When it comes to how the games are played, the rules and game lengths are exactly the same for both leagues. The only difference between the two is that Women’s football is generally less aggressive with the focus being on agility and technical ability. Female players are far less likely to fall down with either real of faked injuries than their male counter parts. Because of this the game is far less entertaining than the men’s fast paced game which may account for a small portion of the difference in attendance numbers. Another part of this may be due to pace of the woman’s game which is usually a lot slower than the men’s as well as being less action packed, it is however easier to follow. Females also are more likely to play the game purely because they love doing it, rather than focussing on the prestige or their pay like the male team.

Amount of games played throughout the year
There is also a difference in the number of games played each season by the teams. The Liverpool Football Club is part of the Premier League which features 20 clubs. During the course of a season (from August to May) each club plays the each other twice (a double round-robin system), once at their home stadium and once at that of their opponents, for a total of 38 games.

The Liverpool Ladies team is part of the Football Associate Women’s League that has only 8 teams in Woman’s Super League 1 and 10 teams in Woman’s Super League 2. There are 55 games played across the two divisions with the WSL 1 team playing 7 of those games.

Broadcasting/Media
There are three broadcasters for the Men’s English Premier League; Sky Sports, BT Sport and BBC Sport (which shows highlights only). Recently, SKY Sports and BT Sport won the UK television rights to broadcast English Premier League games in 2016-2019 for a record £5.1 billion ($10 billion AUD). Sky will pay £4.2 billion ($8.2 billion AUD) for five of the seven packages and will show 126 games per season while BT Sport has the remaining two packages, showing 42 matches. As a result of this deal, each match is said to be worth $20 million, coming to $222k oer minute. It is also predicted that the top team will earn $306 million per season because of the deal and a regulation team will earn approximately $195 million.

Now comparing that to the Women’s Super League coverage, and it couldn’t be more different. The WSL attracts nowhere near as much interest from broadcasters. In 2011 ESPN which is a UK digital sports television channel owned by the U.S. global sports broadcaster ESPN Inc. had exclusive media rights to the new Football Association Women’s Super League. At the time England coach, Hope Powell, said: “This is a huge step for the women’s game. In this country the women’s game is growing and this league has attracted so much media attention.” In 2011 there was an average of 60,000 viewers for each match and as a result of this ESPN doubled to ten the number of live games it showed in 2012. In 2014 the BBC signed a deal with the Football Association to broadcast radio commentary of women's football. The deal meant that from 16 April Women's Super League had news and commentary of at least 16 games in the season on both 5 live and sister station sports extra.
Broadcaster and Media interest in showing and promoting WSL increased in 2011 when the England women’s football team reached the quarter finals of the World Cup in Germany. The team went on to lose on penalties to France. The BBC initially planned to show the match via its interactive red button service and website. MPs and women’s sporting organisations rightly claimed that the poor coverage could harm the development of the women’s game and stop wider public support. In response the BBC broadcast the match live on BBC2 attracting 1.67 million viewers. Since then media coverage online and in consumer and lifestyle press has increased. An increase in media coverage in the local areas surrounding the eight FA WSL clubs has helped increase overall awareness of The FA WSL (FA WSL, 2012)

Conclusion
In conclusion, it is clearly evident that despite the Woman’s team being more successful in the last few years, professional Woman’s Soccer is not afforded the same opportunities or prestige as professional Men’s Soccer. There are far less teams and games played, there is far less money available for salaries and far less media and broadcasting coverage. Until more funding becomes available to promote the Women’s League these large differences will continue.