Corine Deacon’s players are two games away from a historic coronation for French women’s football. Les Bleues are for the first time in the last four of this competition. The occasion of take the temperature on the visibility of women’s football at one of our local clubs. In Albi, the women of Albi-Marssac Tarn Football, which plays in D2 Féminine (equivalent to Ligue 2 for men) resumed training at the start of the week.
Future generations will have all the more structures and professional clubs to break into the middle – Kim, player at Albi-Marssac
“I would have liked to start football in these conditions”
Kim at 29. Originally from Albigensian, she knew the professional world for two years in Rodez, she notably played in Brest and Soyaux. She returned to her favorite club this summer after starting football there at 13. Today, women’s football has changed a lot and it has good days ahead of it according to the Tarn striker: “The coming generations are, in quotes, luckier than us. Me, when I started the professional world, it only existed for a few, but it was not as developed as now. I have had the chance to be professional in my career and that’s something fantastic when you want to make a living from football. It’s also the clubs that are becoming more professional. We now see that there are more and more pro clubs where the girls only do that, there was not that ten years ago and now it is starting to become generalized.
– Louis Fontaine
But this is not the opinion of all players, for Anna, 19 years ago, still efforts to be made on the Women’s D2 : “We make the same efforts as the girls in the first division. We see our families less, we travel very far, we give a lot. Our championship is not rightly recognized. Me, I intend to finish my studies, football will come after as long as I am not sure of making it my job”.
“The Euro will have repercussions on our number of licensees”
At the Albi-Marssac club, there are 130 female including 35 seniors. Bernard Espié has been co-chairman for twenty years. For him there is no doubt, the Euro will boost women’s football in its club : “The quality is improving year after year. The top flight is getting closer. We can definitely see the enthusiasm. The big Ligue 1 matches manage to fill stadiums. The Euro matches make good audiences. We are sure that if we go to the final and especially if we win it, we will have a few more young girls who will start football. 130 girls at the club, that’s great, but we have enough to progress , largely. It is also a click in the parents too because football for a girl, it is not always obvious that we are talking about the parents.