Women's football remains undervalued, even as its popularity rises — especially since the Lionesses' historic achievements.
Women's football was banned in the UK for 50 years, with the ban only lifted in 1971 — just 54 years ago. Since then, the England women's team have managed to accomplish a feat no other England team, men or women, has ever done before: crowning themselves arguably the best England side ever. They stand alongside, and maybe even rival, the 1966 World Cup-winning men's team or the men's so-called golden generation from 2001 to 2006.
Of course, being a boy, I can only offer a limited insight, but I've had the luxury of playing with talented women footballers at younger ages, and more recently, playing against Manchester United Girls on multiple occasions with my old club Timperley FC.
Some leagues, like East Manchester, even have almost ten divisions, proving just how deep and structured the grassroots scene really is.
When you first join a club around the age of six, teams are usually mixed — boys and girls together. That's mainly because of the low numbers of girls playing football at that age, leaving too few to form a full girls' team. In my first Timperley team, there were only two girls — the rest of us were boys. It was technically a mixed team, but in reality it wasn't anywhere near balanced.
By under-8s, as more girls joined and began to enjoy football, the numbers were finally enough to form a girls-only team, which could then enter a girls' league. This is the earliest glimpse of women's football in UK grassroots, although in some areas you can see girls' teams even before U9s if there are enough players. Even though girls-only teams and leagues exist, mixed teams are still common across the UK. In fact, in U14s it's more common to see at least one mixed team in a league than to find a league without any.
Between U9s and U13s, in every league I played in there was always at least one girl or two playing in a boys' team — a quiet sign of how flexible those early years can be.
When I was with Timperley, we played in the Timperley District Division 1, which was almost entirely boys' teams apart from one all-girls team. During our U11 season, Manchester United Girls joined the league. They were the only girls' team in the division, apparently playing in our district because they were too strong to face other academies of similar calibre.
The season after they left, one of their ex-players — recently released — joined us at Timperley and played in a boys' league. While at Timperley, she was offered many trials, including one with Liverpool FC, which she narrowly missed out on. As we grew older, the FA began to place heavier restrictions, preparing players for the transition from mixed football to single-gender football. She eventually moved back to the girls' game too.
There isn't a fixed age where girls have to stop playing with boys. The cut-off varies between leagues and even between different divisions. At one point we were told our teammate had to leave due to restrictions, but in the same district just a couple of divisions down, you could still see girls playing in mixed teams. From my experience, it seems the higher up you go, the more strictly those rules are enforced.
As the women's game grows, so does its grassroots scene — giving more girls the chance to dream like Ella Toone and Chloe Kelly.
Following the Lionesses’ success, we’re seeing more advocates speaking up for the women’s game—ensuring it isn’t overshadowed by the men’s game, but instead championing equal recognition and popularity. As Professor Dr Idlan of Birmingham University, and a coach mentee in the England Women's Talent Pathway programme, once said:
If you've made it this far, thank you for reading! Football is so much more than what happens on the pitch, and it's time we talk more about the mental battles that define players' careers. If this article resonated with you, share it with your teammates, coaches, and fellow football fans. Let's keep the conversation going and help more young players navigate the game's toughest challenges. Stay tuned for more on Pitch Side Journal—and see you back here soon!
