FIFA Women’s World Cup France 2019: How football girls are moving the goalposts .. By Elume Raymond (Sports Analyst)
football in the world can continue to grow. On 6 June the Women’s World Cup will kick off in
France – and the Lionesses, ranked forty-sixth in the world, are not among the favourites.
Another qualification for the round of 16 would not only be of huge significance to the Lionesses
but also to the future of the sport in Cameroon at every level – from grassroots to the professional
game.
It would also almost certainly raise further the aspirations of the FA (FECAFOOT), which is
ambitious for growth for the women’s game. At the core of this is one central aim: to create an
awareness of the women’s game by instituting a professional championship at all category levels.
But how far can the FA, supporters and enthusiasts of the women’s game really expect it to go?
Are there insurmountable barriers to our acceptance of the female game – and should we even
care?
First spotted in Rio de Janeiro as a circus feature in the 1930s, women’s football in Brazil was
forbidden by a presidential decree signed by Getúlio Vargas in 1941 and that lasted until 1979,
based on the reasoning that football was “incompatible with the conditions of the feminine
nature”. So it was only in the 1980s that women’s football took off and started to spread.
One of the other big stumbling blocks on the road to growing the game is continued poor
attendance at league matches in Cameroon and in many countries around the world.
Although FECAFOOT, as well as an army of enthused teachers, parents, coaches and volunteers
up and down the country, is doing its level best to raise the profile of the game, there is still a
long way to go.
"At times, we are forced to relocate matches or simply postpone them because we can't afford
to play on rocky pitches in this era. The way women's football is structured in Cameroon isn't
reflective of the country's reputation as a continental heavyweight." -- former Cameroon
international Regine Mvoue.
"The Lionesses have a good coach in Alain Djeumfa, but things aren't made easy for him. The
women's league didn’t kickoff properly and it's difficult for him to scout for new players. We have
to be pragmatic. I fear with such poor preparation we may have a poor output in France." --
Cameroon football coach Victorine Fomum.
This is surely inevitable when one of the biggest barriers to progress is a deeply entrenched
attitude many still share – even if they don’t say it out loud. And that is that football is a boy’s
game.
Reasons for progress
In June 2018 the French Federation (FFF) released the following figures: 169,312 affiliated
women (125,412 players, 35,000 officials, 8,000 coaches and 900 referees. However, the number
of affiliated women has increased significantly (+15%) since the men’s side won the World Cup
in Russia. The target of the FFF was to reach 250,000 by the time this World Cup starts.
In Norway, one of the powerhouses of women’s football, the women’s budget this year is actually
higher (14.8m Norwegian kroner (963m FCFA)) than the men’s (12.4m NOK (831m FCFA))
because it is a World Cup year. Interestingly – and impressively – the women earn as much as the
men (6.8m NOK per year (456m FCFA)) after the men took a pay cut in 2017.
Last March, Juventus Women played for the first time at the club’s Allianz Stadium against
second-placed Fiorentina in front of a crowd of 39,027. The previous record attendance for a
women’s club match in Italy was set in 2008, when Bardolino and Frankfurt played in front of
14,000 spectators. Sky Sports in Italy has secured (non-exclusive) rights to broadcast the World
Cup and Italian players are becoming increasingly popular with Italian football fans.
In Brazil, the top league now consists of 16 teams with all the men’s team obliged to have a
women’s team if they are to keep their professional license. This led to some of the bigger clubs
joining forces with women’s teams that already existed.
All you need to know about the FIFA’s Women World Cup France 2019
When: The tournament begins June 7, 2019, and ends July 7, 2019.
Where: Venues include Parc Olympique Lyonnais (Lyon), Parc des Princes (Paris), Allianz Riviera
(Nice), Stade de la Mosson (Montpellier), Roazhon Park (Rennes), Stade Océane (Le Havre),
Stade du Hainaut (Valenciennes), Stade Auguste-Delaune (Reims), Stade des Alpes (Grenoble).
Opening match: Host France opens the tournament against Korea on June 7, 2019.
How to watch: CRTV, the state broadcaster, has exclusive rights over the national territory
Here are the groups for all 24 countries in the Women's World Cup:
Group A
France
South Korea
Norway
Nigeria
Group B
Germany
China
Spain
South Africa
Group C
Australia
Italy
Brazil
Jamaica
Group D
England
Scotland
Argentina
Japan
Group E
Canada
Cameroon
New Zealand
Netherlands
Group F
United States
Thailand
Chile
Sweden
Group E Analysis – Cameroon’s daunting prospect and the clash of styles.
The key game is this group with four teams from four different Confederations providing a clash
of styles is certainly the match pitting Canada vs. The Netherlands. This is the second meeting
after their 1-1 draw four years ago in the group stage in Canada 2015. Meanwhile the
Netherlands are European Champions, the Canadians are fifth in recent FIFA Rankings.
New Zealand are Oceanian champions, have four appearances in the World Cup but have never
reached the second round.
A second consecutive World Cup appearance, having qualified for a major tournament for the
first time as recently as the 2012 Olympics, confirms the impression Cameroon made four years
ago as a team on the rise. One of the surprises of the tournament in 2015, Cameroon beat
Switzerland in the group phase and became just the second African team to reach the knockout
round -- matching the total number of knockout games Nigeria had played in its seven World
Cups prior to this year.
Cameroon's return strengthens its foothold in the international game (it even qualified for each
of the past two U-17 World Cups, suggesting the potential for more to come).
After qualifying with a game to spare in 2015, getting back to the World Cup went the distance
this time. Cameroon first needed to get through a difficult group in the 2018 African Cup of
Nations -- it trailed in both its opener against Mali and the group finale against host Ghana but
won both games.
Having survived to top the group, Cameroon then lost a penalty shootout against perennial
power Nigeria in a semifinal. That meant the trip to France depended on a rematch with Mali in
the third-place game. Not until Gabrielle Onguéné scored after more than an hour was that
victory secure.
This is a group that knows what awaits in France. Of the 13 players who spent time on the field
in the knockout-round loss to China in 2015, 12 are part of the roster four years later. There are
almost as many holdovers from the 2012 Olympics. With an average age beyond 27 years, it is a
veteran team. It is also a team that added some fresh depth this time with American-born players
Michaela Abam, Estelle Johnson and Alexandre Takounda.
Yet it might also be a rusty team. Two games in China in April and a May warm-up friendly against
Spain were the only full-fledged international games played between qualifying last November
and the start of the World Cup. On top of that, Cameroon dismissed coach Joseph Ndoko in
January, leaving new coach Alain Djeumfa few opportunities to audition players or test anything
under game conditions. Djeumfa was on the staff previously, so at least he won't have to
introduce himself, but it adds a layer of complication.
Players to watch
Michaela Abam: The Houston-area product starred at West Virginia in college and spent time
with U.S. youth national teams. She was then the fourth overall pick in the 2018 NWSL draft but
played only a handful of games for Sky Blue before she signed with Paris FC in France's top
division. It remains to be seen where she fits in, but it's not inconceivable she could become to
Cameroon what Janine Beckie, another American-born player from the Big 12, is for Canada.
Gabrielle Onguéné: She scored the second-half equalizer that set Cameroon on the path to its
historic win against Switzerland in the last World Cup and has been a productive goal scorer in
the Russian league in the years since. More recently, coming off the bench for the only time in
the team's five games in the final phase of the African Cup of Nations, she scored the eventual
winner in the game against Mali that clinched World Cup qualification on a gorgeous strike from
beyond 20 yards. If there are more skilled attacking players among World Cup entrants ranked
outside FIFA's top 20, it's a very short list.
Only France, Germany, Switzerland and the United States finished the 2015 World Cup with a
better goal differential than Cameroon, which scored five more goals than it conceded in four
games. Granted, that had a lot to do with piling up goals against Ecuador in group play, but it also
says something about how competitive Cameroon was from start to finish in its World Cup debut
-- a distinct improvement on its 2012 Olympics effort. Unlike then-newbie Thailand, which beat
Ivory Coast in 2015 but was routed in its other games, Cameroon was competitive in every game.
Let’s hope the Lionesses stay competitive by playing attacking football, with intent and courage,
dominating possession and allowing opposition players to adapt to their style of play.
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