A flagship programme to encourage more women and girls to play football has exceeded its annual target for participants.
Since the two-year scheme was launched in October 2013, 20,992 females aged 14-25 have played football in sessions which run for 30 weeks of the year, as part of The FA Women’s and Girls’ Programme.
England and Liverpool stars Fara Williams and Natasha Dowie were at Cowley International College in St Helens, Merseyside on Wednesday 5 November to meet young women who have taken up football through the scheme, in sessions run by Liverpool, Tranmere Rovers and Preston North End.
The scheme was launches in October 2013 and has exceeded its target
The initiative was created when The FA, Sport England, the Premier League and the Football League Trust joined forces to provide new grassroots football sessions. The target is that by August 2015, 40,000 females will have participated in football through the scheme.
It is the first time all four bodies have worked together on a project such as this.
The sessions have been delivered by 87 member clubs of the Premier League and Football League, following £2.4m of National Lottery funding from Sport England invested into The FA for the specific development of the female game.
The programme is part of The FA’s wider strategy on growing participation figures for women’s football and its vision to be the second largest team sport after men’s football by 2018.
Kelly Simmons, FA director of national game and women’s football, said: “When we launched our Game Changer strategy for developing women’s football in 2012, growing participation was a key objective for us.
“Working alongside our partner organisations to deliver such excellent results demonstrates just what potential there is for women’s football in this country, at both grassroots and elite levels.
“One of our biggest challenges, apart from attracting new players, is retention, so programmes like this which run for long periods of time, will certainly help us tackle that and help women’s football to become the second most-played sport in the country.”
England striker Natasha Dowie
Dowie added: “It’s great to see many teenage girls playing football who have got involved through the programme.
“There are so many more opportunities for young women to play football today and it’s especially good to see so many female coaches here today leading the sessions, which wasn’t the case as much when I was younger.
“For the younger girls now that they can see the success of The FA WSL and events such as the Germany game at Wembley, it means that they can see a real path for themselves in football.”
Sport England Chief Executive Jennie Price said: “It is great to see so many women and girls taking up the opportunity to play football thanks to this programme.
“Getting women and girls active is really important to us. We know women play less sport than men but most would like to do more. In fact, almost 120,000 women tell us that they want to play football. But the opportunities have to be right for those women to turn ambition into a reality.
“Our investment in The FA for the delivery of Premier League Girls’ Football and the Football League Trust girls’ programme is helping us do this by giving young women the chance to try football and get quality coaching in a way tailored to them.
“By working together we can continue to address the barriers to women’s participation and close gender gap in sport.”
Participation in women's football is at an all-time high
Simon Morgan, Head of Community Development at the Premier League, added: "The Premier League is proud to have been a trailblazer for the Sport England satellite club model that works so well in engaging young people in sport and promotes a sporting habit for life.
“This initial positive experience, allied to the unique ability of Premier League clubs to continue to engage, motivate and inspire young people has made the first year of this collaborative girls programme such a success.
“The quality of experienced and qualified Premier League club coaches has also had a demonstrable effect in retaining and sustaining this participation by the girls involved. We are not taking anything for granted, but these first year results have surpassed our expectations and give us great cause to be confident of even greater success going forward.”
Mike Evans, general manager of the Football League Trust, said: “Football clubs are at the heart of their communities and have an emotional pull that enables them to reach a vast amount of people.
“Our network of league clubs means we can access and influence communities all around the country and we aim to use this power to make a positive difference to people’s lives.
“This, as well as developing a strong partnership with the County FAs, has enabled us to provide fun and fitness to close to 15,000 women and girls in the first year of the programme.”
Minister for Sport Helen Grant said: “It’s great news that more girls and women are getting into football at a time when so much effort is going in to strengthen and raise the profile of women’s sport generally.
“These results show what can be achieved when The FA, Premier League, Football League Trust and Sport England all pull together and shows the growing demand and interest there is in women’s football in this country.”
For more information on the programme please visit the Football League website or the Premier League Communities page
