Don’t call me “strong” (I’m just a woman who plays football).
This is the script for my TedX talk from November 2017 that you can find here.
I’m one of those really competitive people. You know the type –I get way too involved in staff team building activities, wrestle Christmas crackers out of hands, can’t let my niece or nephew win at crazy golf — that kinda thing.
But football’s my game. I’ve played since I was a kid in the garden, wearing my brothers’ shirts that came down to my knees because I thought it made me look professional.
I’ve always hated losing.
So, fast forward 2 decades to June 24th this year — What could make me celebrate a nil nil draw with absolute joy and elation!
Well, it was no ordinary match. And the end result — for once — didn’t actually matter to me.
Alongside 25 incredible women, I had just played a full 90-minute, FIFA regulation match, ankle deep in volcanic ash and gasping for oxygen. Our stadium was the crater at the top of Mt Kilimanjaro, our pitch, 2km higher than the world’s highest altitude pitch.
Why on earth would we do this?
We did it to start a conversation about why women and girls still face so many mountains every day just to play the game they love. We did it because we love the game and think no girl should miss out, just because she is a girl.
We did it, to do something exceptional, that people could not take away from us, as being a paler, less significant version of what guys do.
We played a game on the roof of Africa. You can’t take that away from us.
Football is the most popular game in the world.
There’s no game as easy to play whether in a dusty street in Tanzania or a pristine park in London. That should be the same whether you are a girl or a boy, but it’s not.
There weren’t any girls’ teams when I was a kid, so age 13 I started playing adult football with players two or three times my age. My parents paid more and I travelled further than my brothers to play. I put up with wolf whistles and harassment from the side-lines. I’ve been told so many times I’m good for a girl — by guys who are pretty average!
And we used to be assigned these terrible pitches week in, week out, waterlogged and muddy — miles from the changing rooms. I remember one of our games being cancelled so that the men could use our second-class pitch and let theirs “rest” for the week!
We were always an afterthought.
And it’s not just me. This is universal.
Our mountain squad brought together players, coaches and referees from more than 20 countries. Grassroots players and ex Olympians. Christian and Muslim and Buddhist and nothing at all. Petra from Germany was 55. Grace just 15. Women who described football as the glue that gave them friends, teammates, strength and health, taught them commitment, hard work and gave them confidence.
It didn’t matter who we were or where we came from.
Each of us were have climbed many small mountains just to play the most popular sport in the world.
Laura, who had the crazy idea in the first place — tired of never seeing any female sports role models on TV.
Erin, her co-conspirator, whose college team’s prize money was diverted into the men’s American Football squad.
Yasmeen from Jordan who got shouted at when she wore her kit in the street.
Rasha and her teammates from Saudi Arabia had to learn the rules (and tactics?) by watching YouTube videos, banned from playing in public spaces.
Jasmine who played professionally in Brazil — but had to quit when she never got paid.
Deena, a professional coach and former England U18 player — an 8-year-old boy refused to train when he saw his coach was a woman.
Morag our FIFA referee from Scotland, tired of being told to get back in the kitchen (til she started sending people off for it!)
Sasha who scored the winning penalty that put Canada into their first World Cup final ever — but who slept homeless in her car for months.
Hajar — whose couldn’t climb with us — but who ignored death threats to set up and coach a team in Afghanistan.
Would you carry on playing?
Girls shouldn’t have to be thick-skinned, just to play the game they love.
We had a gruelling 7-day hike up to the top of Kilimanjaro. On match day we woke at 2am wearing all the clothes we’d brought with us. We climbed up rock and ice in the darkness. We saw people turning back. 1000 people are evacuated off Kilimanjaro each year. We didn’t want to be in that number. We continued, one frozen footstep in front of the other. This lasted more than 5 hours.
[Hardly what you would call a good warm-up]
When we got to the top and set up the pitch, we knew the worst had passed. Now was the easy part — Just playing the game we love — even if we could hardly breathe, and the pitch was a mess of ash and pebble that would kick up in your face.
But never been done before.
Many times I looked around at my teammates and exploded with pride at being part of this troupe of strong, tough –exceptional — people.
But then it hit me. For every single one of us, maybe a thousand girls we’d known had never had the chance or stopped along the way — tired of the taunts, the jibes, the limited opportunities, the poor facilities, the double standards, the stolen pay packets.
Girls shouldn’t have to be tough just to play the game they love.
Things are changing.
Back home today there are a handful of girls’ teams. [In September, Saudi Arabia removed the sports ban on girls in state schools.
In July, a small club called Lewes FC became the first team in England — if not the world — to pay its female and male players the same.
Norway’s national men’s and women’s team now get equal pay.
The European championships in July drew big crowds and viewing figures proving there’s an appetite for women’s sport.
A few more people know a few more names of players in their national team colours.
But also in the last few months, players from the Danish, Irish, Brazilian and Australian national teams have gone on strike. Not seeking the big bucks! But tired of being paid below the national minimum wage. Tired of sharing tracksuits with the boys’ teams, changing in airport toilets. Tired of fighting those meant to promote them.
Tired of needing to be exceptional to be treated with respect.
So it’s changing, but is it fast enough?
Girls shouldn’t have to wait, just to play the game they love.
I once had an RE teacher who compared football to religion — the weekly worship, the singing and the icons, the things you wear and own that give you identity. This idea that it is “more than just a game”.
For me football is just a game. I want it to be, “just a game”.
But by denying girls the right to play the most popular game in the world — we deny them the right to be a whole person.
We say they don’t deserve to have fun.
We suggest they are less.
We contract their world a little.
That’s exactly why it’s more than a game — for women and girls around the world.
A lot can be done by media outlets, sponsors, clubs and Associations. But there are small things each of us can do, to challenge this idea that women and girls need to be exceptional to be worthy of respect.
1. Don’t say of anyone that she’s good — “for a girl”. She’s just good.
2. Find a better insult than he throws or plays “like a girl”. You’re not insulting him. You’re making it less likely that a girl will want to be active in front of an audience.
3. If you meet a girl who plays football, ask her what position she is, not whether she’s better than the boys or her brothers.
4. And go and watch women’s football! Support your club or your national team in its entirety and take your sons and daughters. Don’t get distracted talking about the differences, just get into the game.
Let’s make the existence of women’s sport unexceptional for the next generation.
We got a Guinness World Record up the mountain that day by the way. It’s officially the highest altitude football match ever played.
In the future, I hope that a band of women can climb a mountain and play a football game just for the challenge and not for this bigger conversation.
In the future I want boys and girls to have double the number of role models, because our female sports stars are visible in the media and in the games they go to see.
In the future, I want many more thin-skinned or untalented girls giving the game a go — just because they might like it.
Girls shouldn’t have to be strong — just to play the game they love.
