Women's soccer in England - What the motherland of football teaches us

Lina Magull's blog, in which she points out how the attention and recognition of women's soccer in Germany can be increased, rightly attracted attention last year.

However, this attention was not granted to her because of blatant slogans, not because of populist exaggerations. No, in it she described in a factual manner and with strong arguments ways in which we can move women's soccer forward in Germany. Lina also drew comparisons with the Barclays FA Women's Super League (FAWSL), the first women's soccer league in England.

And it's true, the level of professionalism in British women's soccer is far higher than in the Flyeralarm Bundesliga. As a player at West Ham United, I see this firsthand. I would therefore like to make an attempt to highlight concrete differences. Just like Lina, I'm not interested in badmouthing anything. It's about pointing out concrete approaches on how things can be better, how we can learn from others.

Lina rightly pointed out that the dovetailing of men's and women's teams at German professional clubs leaves much to be desired. Many professional men's clubs do not have women's teams that play at the highest level or completely separate their women's teams from the men's professional structures.

The names of the clubs in the FAWSL, on the other hand, make you sit up and take notice: Arsenal London, Manchester United, Manchester City, Chelsea FC, Tottenham Hotspurs, West Ham United. Eight clubs in the FAWSL, which comprises a total of twelve teams, are in the Premier League, while the remaining four are in the Championship, England's second division.

Belonging to Premier League clubs comes with access to modern training grounds; in some cases, these are shared with the male professionals. At my club West Ham United, for example, we train at the Chadwell Heath Academy ground. This legendary training center has been the training ground of club greats such as Geoff Hurst, Bobby Moore and Martin Peters.

In concrete terms, this means that we train there on three grass pitches, an artificial turf pitch and a covered artificial turf hall. In addition, the Academy offers a weight room, media rooms, physio facilities and a cafeteria where the team is fed after the sessions.

These professional conditions can only be found in the top clubs in the Flyeralarm Women's Bundesliga - I would like to single out Bayern Munich, Vfl Wolfsburg, TSG Hoffenheim and Eintracht Frankfurt.

Another important factor of professionalization is the composition of the staff. In addition to a head coach, co-coach and goalkeeper coach, each FAWSL team has at least one full-time physiotherapist. In addition, there is a team doctor, who is sometimes present at the training sessions, a full-time video analyst and a full-time athletic trainer.

Champions League representatives Chelsea and Manchester City don't have to hide from the male teams in this area either: the staff here comprises almost 20 employees who offer the players the most professional care. These structures did not fall from the sky. In particular, they are the result of the FA's licensing process. It has set standards to professionalize the league in the long term.

FAWSL is also a few steps ahead when it comes to innovation and digitalization. In England, for example, the use of GPS trackers is increasing in order to control training and thus the load on the players individually. But the technology is also used on match day, so that a holistic stress picture can be created for each individual player.

At West Ham United, we also use video footage from matches and training sessions - visual aids that help us work on our (individual) weaknesses in as much detail as possible. Every training session is recorded with permanently installed "field cams" and made available on the "Hudl" analysis platform, so that every player has the opportunity to view the training sessions afterwards.

Stress monitoring is also managed here at the highest level. After the sessions, each player evaluates the perceived training intensity on an app - all teams in the FAWLS use this system.

In addition, we fill out a short questionnaire on how we feel physically in the morning before the first session. The background of this strategy is to avoid injuries due to overload.

The successes are clearly visible: the periodization of the intensity can be better and more individualized and is a big plus in terms of training control.

But when it comes to the recognition of women's soccer, the question that arises in particular is how women's soccer is perceived, what presence it has in England.

Lina rightly complained about the lack of (media) attention for women's soccer in Germany. How does that compare in England? Not everything is optimal here either, but I see developments here that the Bundesliga could take a leaf out of.

Above all, a clear strategy is becoming apparent: commercialization and visibility are 100 percent the focus of those responsible for the Woman Soccer League.

FAWSL matches are regularly broadcast on the association's own streaming platform "FA PLAYER". This ensures access and media presence for all teams. A top match of the week is additionally broadcast on BBC or BT Sport on English TV, thus extremely increasing the attention for the league. Is it conceivable that ARD and ZDF will broadcast isolated Bundesliga matches? I'm afraid we still have a long way to go.

In Germany, only one match per matchday is currently broadcast on Eurosport, and sometimes another on the DFB-TV streaming platform. As a fan of a single club, you don't get to enjoy the excitement in front of your TV/laptop every weekend.

In England, media rights are to be sold in a decentralized manner in the future in order to expand revenues for the clubs. So as not to be misunderstood at this point:

I don't want to talk about commercialization as in men's soccer. It's about fair financial conditions under which we professionals can earn enough to live on.

But each individual club can independently do something to increase the presence of their women's division. On social media, you're increasingly seeing the merger of the male and female accounts of FAWSL and Premier League clubs.

For example, Manchester City has a joint account - providing updates on the women's team as well as the men's team. That's the way it has to be! Such a step costs hardly any effort or money, but brings women's soccer decisively forward without weakening men's soccer.

Another example: Time and again, there are promotional campaigns to keep the attention on the women's teams high. For example, outside of the Corona phase, they repeatedly play in the men's stadiums in front of large crowds.

These structures then also lead, among other things, to top players coming to England, for example Pernille Harder, who moved from Wolfsburg to Chelsea, and further increases the attractiveness of the league.

In the end, we have to learn from each other, see how things can be done better and formulate constructive approaches. Only by keeping a critical eye and being ready for change can we move women's soccer forward in this country.

It deserves it!