Spanish women’s football, with increasing quality and a better audience, has taken another important step in England to get closer to the superpowers
While Spain couldn’t even match its best historic performance, that continental semi-final lost to Austria on penalties in the 2017 edition in the Netherlands, La Roja has taken an important step in this European Championship in England to get closer to the superpowers. Nothing to do with the obvious current situation with that dark time, not so far away, which ended with the departure of Ignacio Quereda after the failure in the 2015 World Cup. There was a terrible atmosphere between the coach and the players, who even met with President Ángel Villar to bid farewell to their coach, who they accused of degrading behaviour. In that Canadian event, Spain’s first stage journey ended abruptly, after a draw against Costa Rica and defeats to Brazil and South Korea.
Already with Jorge Vilda on the bench, the turning point came at the 2019 World Cup, which was held in France. “It’s true that a lot has changed since that World Cup, where we arrived better than ever and felt like we could now look every team in the face. We won our first game at a World Cup and made it very difficult for the United States, who later became champions. A penalty prevented us from reaching the quarter-finals,” the Spanish coach recalled about the comparison with the 2019 World Cup in France.
Vilda works with the players and is not discussed despite the small flight she has given to some, such as Basque forward Amaiur Sarriegi, unprecedented until the final stretch of the quarter-final clash against the hosts. The federation’s president, Luis Rubiales, fills his mouth saying the women’s team enjoys “one of the best coaches in the world” and that confidence materialized with Vilda’s extension just before the European Championship for another two years, until 2024.
The key to the exponential growth of Spanish women’s football lies in the improvement of the First Division, thanks in large part to the sponsorship of Iberdrola, and in the slow but unstoppable evolution of working conditions. In line with this, before the European Championships, the Federation has presented an agreement for the next five years, a cycle that includes two continental tournaments and two World Cups, in addition to the Paris ’24 Olympic Games in case of qualification, for which it is equivalent to the percentage of bonuses based on sponsorship and awards received by the men’s and women’s teams.
This does not mean that women and men will receive the same amounts, as they will continue to be dependent on the global income of each group, but it is an important step that puts Spain on a step where the major powers, such as Norway, already before world women’s football, Finland, the Netherlands, England, Ireland, New Zealand, Australia and the United States. Exactly, the US women’s team is the only one that, in addition to these equal terms, distributes the total amount of income from sponsorships, prizes, television rights and ticket sales equally between the men’s and women’s teams in the World Cups , something that is unprecedented in the sport.
Source: La Verdad
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