Woman's Hour - A Celebration of Women's Sporting Success

Episode Date: May 31, 2021

Over the last few weeks and months we have seen women make huge progress in the world of sport. It was just over a month ago that the jockey Rachael Blackmore made history by becoming the first female rider to win the Grand National in its 173 year history. Also last month Rebecca Welch became the first female referee to oversee an English Football League match in 134 years. And the former footballer Alex Scott has become the presenter of the BBC’s Football Focus, becoming the show's first permanent female host in its history.It comes against a backdrop that has seen viewing figures for women’s football and rugby continue to grow despite a virtually invisible summer of competition last year. But a recent BBC Survey of elite sportswomen found that more than 60% earn less than £10,000 a year from their sport. So what still needs to be done when it comes to building on women’s success in sport and how can this upward momentum be maintained and include a variety of sports and not just football, cricket and rugby?We have gathered some of the biggest influencers in the sporting world around a virtual round table. Zarah El-Kudcy a Trustee at the Women’s Sports Trust and the Head of Commercial Partnership Development at Formula 1, Emily Defroand a Great Britain and England Hockey player, Catherine Bond Muir the CEO of the W Series a motor racing championship for women, Kelly Simmons the FA’s Director of the Women’s Professional Game, Alison Kervin a writer and former Sports Editor for the Mail on Sunday (she was the first female sports editor on a national newspaper) and Dr Ali Bowes is a senior lecturer in the Sociology of Sport at Nottingham Trent University.Presenter: Anita Rani Producer: Rabeka Nurmahomed Editor: Beverley Purcell

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BBC Sounds. Music, radio, podcasts. Hello, I'm Anita Rani and welcome to Woman's Hour from BBC Radio 4. Hello and welcome to Woman's Hour where today we'll be celebrating the recent successes of women in the sporting world and asking what can be done to maintain this momentum? Are we in a pivotal moment where women will finally break through in sport and gain the same level of success and respect as men? This is a pre-recorded programme, so we won't be able to include any of your comments. However, we would love to hear your thoughts.

So if you do want to get in touch with us, then you can do so via social media. We're BBC Woman's Hour on Twitter and Instagram, or you can email us via our website. Now, over the last few months and weeks, we've seen women make huge progress in the world of sport. It was just over a month ago that jockey Rachel Blackmore made history by becoming the first female rider to win the Grand National in its 173-year history. Also last month, Rebecca Welch became the first female referee to oversee an English Football League match in 134 years. Let me just repeat that, 134 years. And just over six

months ago, a Premier League football team, Tottenham Hotspur, allowed its women's team to train full-time alongside its men. And Alex Scott has just been announced as the new host of Football Focus. And viewing figures for women's football and rugby continue to grow despite a virtually invisible summer of competition last year. But a recent BBC survey of elite sportswomen found that more than 60% earn less than £10,000 a year from their sport. So what still needs to be done? And how can this upward momentum be maintained not just in sports like football, cricket and rugby, but in all sports? To discuss this, we're doing a virtual round table with some women who are at the top of their game, leading in their fields. Zahra El-Kudsi, a trustee of the Women's Sports Trust

and the head of commercial partnerships development of Formula One. Emily DeFront, a Great Britain and England hockey player. Catherine Bond-Muir, CEO of the W Series, a motor racing championship for women. Kelly Simmons, the FA's Director of a Women's Professional Game. Alison Kirvan, a writer and former sports editor for The Mail on Sunday, the first female sports editor on a national newspaper, no less Dr Ali Bose a senior lecturer in the sociology of sports at Nottingham Trent University. Welcome to Women's Hour to all of you. Ali I'm going to start by coming to you. Let's talk about these recent significant wins and successes. Can you put these stories into some kind of context for us? Yeah I think as you said there's been some huge successes for women in the the

field of sport especially when we look at women kind of making headway into these traditionally really male dominated spaces the grand national refereeing coaching we could put into that as well so there's been some really significant wins but I think it's probably important to situate that within a sort of a broader historical discussion we've always had trailblazing women in sport we've always had women that have pushed the boundaries taken it upon themselves to go and do incredible things I think probably one of the most popular examples famous examples would be Billie Jean King in the tennis so the notorious battle of the Sexes tennis match.

She played against Bobby Riggs. That was in 1973. And that's been talked about as one of these significant moments for women in sport, not just tennis, but sport broadly. It occurred at a really significant time for women in society in the 70s and really pushing for gender equality anyway. And she significantly beat Bobby Riggs, and that was huge. But there's been significant moments for women in a range of sports women competing against men in professional golf tournaments so we can see how important it is when women make

sort of headways into these male-dominated spaces where the success stories really give us like a springboard for I guess equally incredible opportunities for women to take part in sport. Are these moments of excitement just that like a flash in the pan wow a woman's done brilliantly or is it helping the cause is it progressing the sports when this happens? I think we could probably look at it from both angles, couldn't we? I think you do see these like headline moments, these significant moments that become almost embedded into kind of like the folklore of sport. But let's not detract from the fact that there are still kind of barriers to be broken for women in sport. one significant thing happens and then all the inequalities or difficulties that women have faced have gone away because it doesn't work in such a simple way to that. But the significance of those kind of headline moments that really kind of put women's sport into popular consciousness, onto the headlines, onto the front pages, etc. They're the moments that kind of start the ball rolling and give

other women and other sports organizations springboards to to demonstrate that women can be successful and can draw the big headlines can win the big races can perform on the highest level so i think probably a combination um allison you were recently um until very recently the sports editor on the daily mail so we know that Rachel Blackmore made the front pages of most of the papers but what sorts of women's sports make the back pages as well? Is it still really all about football

and men? And sometimes the women Yeah it is when you have these big moments they are hugely significant. When I started the Mail on Sunday it was 2013 so we just had the Olympics. And I think a lot of us thought there'd been such heroines created by the Olympic Games, such a lovely kind of parade of female brilliance throughout those Games,

that that would be the moment that changed things. But of course it doesn't. Two weeks doesn't change things. And I think what we need to do with these moments is appreciate them for what they are. But the problem, I think, one of the key things that I think happens with women's sport is that we love Serena Williams during Wimbledon. And we love, you know, Simone during the gymnastics in the Olympics. And we have these great moments, these great stages where we watch women's sport and think it's brilliant but then it's not like men's football where it weaves its way into the fabric of our lives through the week and then we've got another one at the weekend and another one they become huge characters the sort of women's sport that gets covered is in the big events even with the football

it was really the world cup that it really gets us because we know what england is we understand that it's not just women's sport it's a lot of sports where they don't have leagues that are very public that happen week after week after week. It does tend to die, but it still makes a difference. It doesn't mean it's not on the back page of the Mail on Sunday every week, but all these wins make a difference. They are changing things slowly. It just doesn't happen overnight.

Although I flicked through the papers just before coming to talk to all of you and the women's game was there. Chelsea, Barcelona, sadly it was 4-0 to Barca. But Kelly, let me bring you in. I mean, this is a 10-year journey to get the football onto the back, women's football onto the back pages. What was it like at the beginning? Well, before the Women's Super League was created in 2011, it was an amateur sport. The clubs weren't set up any differently really to grassroots football.

They were run by volunteers. The players had to work full time. and therefore of course that impacts on the quality of the product as well and you haven't got the resources off the pitch to to grow grow the attendances grow the commercial strategy I mean the big change really came in 2011 because on and off pitch the FA set criteria in the development super league. At that time, it was part-time, so it was a step forward. It's only 2018 that the game became fully professional. And I think, you know, those who watch it now all say that there's been a massive shift since 2018 in the quality of the product.

Well, that's because the players are training full-time. They've got all of the performance services they need to excel as elite athletes. But the clubs have got people off pitch driving the commercial strategy and we've really been able to make a transformational change. And I'm just listening to what Ali and Alison were saying. You know, one of the reasons that I was really attracted to this job, I came in in 2018. I was previously director of development at the FA and talking to the chief exec. We want to do this transformational change piece on the women's super league. And I jumped to the chance because for the exact frustration that you guys

have just talked about is for me, women's sport, big moments, fantastic, high profile, big audiences on the back pages, Olympics, world cups, European championships, and then disappears. And I really felt that the women's super league could be the one that could break through that. If we could felt that the Women's Super League could be the one that could break through, that if we could invest in the quality of the product, invest off pitch in growing interest and engagement and audiences and attendances,

we could start to get women's sport, and in our case, obviously women's football, you know, in the mainstream and in the newspapers and on the television every week. And I think we've seen with the announcement, which I'm sure we'll sort of go on to talk about, of the new TV deal next year, it feels like that's a moment where we're really kind of breaking through

into week-in, week-out coverage and profile. Yeah. Emily, how important is it for you to see your sport covered in the papers? Yeah, I mean, just hearing what you ladies have already spoken about, it, you know, really hits home for me as a current Great Britain hockey player. We want our sport to be on those front and back pages, like what we're seeing the growth in other sports such as football. I think for me, speaking personally,

obviously the GB women's hockey side won Olympic gold five years ago. And for me, I hope i'm not being biased when i said it but it was truly one of the highlights of the olympic games that summer and i mean just looking back everyone i speak to they remember that night they remember where they were when they watched the girls win olympic gold and for me looking back that was you know our sport in the limelight right then and to try and build on that you know as as allison mentioned you know we've had a world cup where we hosted it at the lee valley hockey and tennis center in 2018 we packed out the stadium we had record-breaking ticket sales we

had coverage on bt sport for every single game but is that you know a sustainable investment and coverage throughout an Olympic cycle rather than just you know in the Olympic Games that limelight and then the World Cup the big tournaments that we're involved in for me as a player obviously I want to speak selfishly here we want to be you know consistently shown on the TV in the papers throughout an Olympic cycle not just waiting for the big tournaments. I mean, Alison, you're the sports editor of a national newspaper. Did you ever feel any pressure to put women's sport in the papers? Yeah, yeah, very much.

I mean, when I was appointed to the job, I felt pressure both ways because Twitter, which everybody here will know is a joy. I get tons of people texting me saying, you better put loads of women's sport in the paper and then equally a load of other people say you better not fill your newspaper with women's sport so there was an instant assumption that because i was female that i would be a problem for some people and great for other people well i wanted to put more women's sport in the paper because it it appealed to me and i was when i started the job i was very clear that that's something i wanted to do. And I made the shift slightly, but you are quite hung by issues in newspapers.

Like, for example, when it comes to things like the Premier League football, it's so popular that it affects circulation of the paper. The circulation of the Mail on Sunday and other Sunday newspapers goes up when it's a Premier League weekend. Not when it's World Cup or not when it's European Championship, when it's League because that matters so much to people because like I said before it weaves its way through their life it's part of who they are and it will go up and then a lot of people when we do research into why people buy papers a lot of people will open the papers and if they're a West Ham fan look and see how much which paper's got the most West Ham coverage and buy that one so you know that the more Premier League you put in there the more papers you will sell so you've got that to start with well i'm sure we'll come on to talk about it this whole

it's a vicious cycle isn't it because the reason people don't aren't fascinated by what's happening is because it's not in the papers because it's not in the papers but the thing is it has to start somewhere else it's never going to start in the papers when i go i do a lot of talks and keynote speeches and things and people always say why do you not put the women's football in more often you said to them what's your local women's team who's the captain of the england women's team and they don't know and it's very odd to think that a major national newspaper would put things in the paper that people just don't know do you know what i mean it has to start with on the other the other side of it and it definitely is it really is is with all the work in football that's going on.

But I think it's very difficult for me to say to the editor, I want to cover this match, even though there aren't many people there and it will get any clicks online. People won't click on it and read it. And we will lose sales because you have to miss something out to put it in. So it's a case of getting there a different route yes kelly please you know i was watching the women's world cup you know 25 million people following the lionesses and all i could think all summer as everybody else was enjoying it was we have got to translate some of this wsl you know i've really felt the pressure and we you know the clubs were fantastic we worked with the clubs we came back and made sure we came back when there's no men's

premier league um we had games in the big main stadiums. We were getting 20,000, 30,000 people. Then we followed with the women's football weekend. We were trying to find ways to keep women's football in the spotlight and not just let it fade down from the lionesses. And it's really important. I listened to Emily talk how important it is that sports try everything to pull some of that interest through

into the more more regular so that you know alice if you're under pressure you know you'll you'll be put under pressure more wouldn't you if if you're not playing where there's 20 30 000 people yeah very much so and another thing is i think i mean it's very difficult for women's sport because there isn't the um investment in them and the structure there in a lot of sports but sometimes it can be very hard to find the information out so it's a simple fact of you know every morning I get an email from Chelsea men's club telling me there was a press conference that day this information that information putting players up and it's very easy to cover Chelsea because it's all laid on for you and it's all it's very easy I remember I was a gymnast when I was younger and I'm very keen on

gymnastics and there was a I can't remember it was right at the beginning when i first started there was a gymnastics tournament and it was due to finish on a saturday night because with a sunday paper obviously you're very you know clued up to covering what's happened on that saturday and um i kept ringing the number i had for press office i kept looking on twitter and we simply couldn't find out the results and i don't kind of blame them because they've got a million things to do in very small budgets but i couldn't cover it I had I had up to about midday we got information on Twitter and the rest of it died away and I was ringing the tournament organizers we couldn't find it out I mean one thing I've done since Lingamills and I've set up this media agency advising sports and

advising sports brands on how to get in the media because sometimes you've just got to ring you've got to keep letting people know what you're doing because a lot of time with women's sports there's a reticence and there's a sort of unwillingness to kind of get out there and scream and shout about it and I would just get on the phone to all the newspaper editors organize a sports editor's lunch get them all in tell them everything that's going on because then you're right there'll be pressure to cover it. I'm going to bring Catherine Bond-Murin on this. Catherine what do you think? I think it's incumbent on media owners to effectively take a leap of faith to cover women's sports. We've only had one season and that's sorry when I say we I run a female only motorsport championship called W Series. We've only had one season so far. We're starting

again this year at the end of June. We were covered in our first season live by Channel 4 and we were the only motorsport to be on the front five channels live in 2019. So Channel 4 took a leap of faith on us. They had never seen us race before. They didn't know what sort of programming we would produce. No one knew that we were going to have exciting racing, and we did. But that helped us have enormous coverage for a brand new sport. Catherine, the story is quite remarkable remarkable and we'd love to hear you kind of take it back a little bit because the W Series is groundbreaking race championship for

women that you launched as you said in 2018 I mean we all know as a generalization that women are much better drivers than men right right I mean that's just a given and it's more than 40 years since the last time a female driver started a Formula One race. 40 years. So the W Series is hoping to push forward and get some real change. And you have been, you're the CEO of it, you're the driving force behind it. But the story of how you got there is quite incredible. So I'd like you to actually take us back a little bit and tell us how you first got involved in the W Series. Well, I wasn't working and I'd given up work to have a baby very late in life. I was 45 years old.

After two or three years, I realised I wanted to go back to work again. I was a solicitor formerly that specialised in sport. And then I went into corporate finance for over a decade doing sports and leisure deals so sport was in my DNA and when I was trying to figure out what I wanted to do with the rest of my life professionally a couple of friends mentioned what about a women's only motor racing series I thought it was a an interesting idea to begin with then I thought it was a completely rubbish idea because men and then I thought it was a completely rubbish idea because men and women theoretically can race equally in motorsport so what is the point of

having a separate series but then when you actually uh when I researched the numbers of women that were involved in motorsport if you look at single seatersaters around the world, at that point, and that was in about 2017, the numbers of women racing in single series were actually going down year on year. And the world wasn't improving at all. And this was at the point where, obviously, in the UK, football, rugby and cricket was really starting to burgeon on the women's side so um i wrote a business plan and started knocking on doors and it took me a couple of years to raise over 20 million pounds in order to get on the track but um but but that's what we did and we had six european races and then covid hit and we had to cancel our season last season.

But now we've got eight races this year on the Formula One calendar. So, you know, that's so we're delighted at that. And hopefully, you know, that will give us a big, bigger platform to, you know, push ourselves forward into the future. And I'm just thinking about the Formula One and how in many ways it seems like such a closed shop you know it's for if you need a lot of money to be able to even to get into the sport in the first place how are you going to open opportunities for women who want to you know I mean one day I will I too will be an F1 driver Catherine how am I going to get involved basically well at the heart of W Series DNA are two things one we don't ask our drivers for any money at all to race in W Series so we

fund absolutely everything for for all of the drivers and actually I'm sitting in in Anglesey at the moment and we're we've got our first test so I'm Anglesea at the moment and we've got our first test. So I'm just off track at the moment because otherwise you wouldn't be able to hear me properly. But also all of our cars are as identical as they possibly can be because we're about finding the fastest drivers, too. So we're not a technological series. But the fact that we are out there and we put 18 drivers on the track is a source of joy for young girls who come to watch us. We our last race was at Brandt Hatch in 2019, and we had thousands of that but what we the journalists were amazed at was you know the number of young kids especially young girls that had come to watch us and you know it's the old adage if you can't see it you can't be it. Catherine I mean you obviously drive a hard bargain and we know you can make a deal I mean 20 million to raise is outstanding how did you

convince channel four to broadcast it by not accepting no as an answer actually it is about the cell of the excitement of motorsport and the fact that women can do it just as well as the men. I mean, there was certainly, I think, some novelty factor about them and other broadcasters taking us. But the great news for this year is that, you know, we've got even more broadcasters across the world. And we think we'll be in, you know, over half a billion households across the world this year. I don't know whether the fact that once women are in a car, no one can see that they're a woman, whether that actually has positive or a negative impact.

I mean, I've thought about it quite clearly because obviously people watch us because it's great racing. But if they could tell that they were women on there, would that make a difference? Or is actually the people involved in motorsport itself, they are incredibly supportive of W Series just because everyone wants to see more women racing. And hopefully in future years, we'll have a lot more women you know racing in the upper echelons of motorsports and then hopefully obviously you know we get one of our drivers into Formula One. Zara I'm going to bring you in here Zara Al-Qudsi is a trustee of the Women's Sports Trust and head of commercial partnership development of Formula One.

Bit depressing to think that, you know, it's popular because we don't know it's women driving the cars. I think to look at it a different way, and I agree the numbers haven't been great, but it's also looking about, and as Catherine mentioned, it's broader than just the participation piece as well. I mean, the W Series, Catherine and the team have done a tremendous job at bringing a focus

on the driving piece. But actually, it's also making sure, as Catherine mentioned, that we're looking at the engineers, the mechanics, the broader paddock piece, and I think that's a good parallel to sport in general. We all talk about women's sport being more commercially viable, having a greater following, but you also, and Kelly probably knows more than anyone on this call about

that whole grassroots piece around participation around coaching around you know having the actual structure around the sport diverse as well as what's actually on the field I think a lot of the conversation that's been had so far is about visibility and with Women's Sport Trust you know we did a big piece of research that we unveiled last month that talked about and showed the differences in visibility whether it's from a media point of view whether it's how fans consume sports there's very small windows to see women in action and 50 percent of all women's sport tends to be in one month of the year versus three months for men's sports and it tends to also be at international levels. So, you know, you talk about these major events like an Olympics or Commonwealth Games.

And actually, that's in a way where you need to have the sort of reverse to the men's game, where the men's domestic product across a number of sports is very strong and therefore always on throughout the year. And then you have those international peaks. Women's sports, I think football, have done a tremendous job at building, as Kelly said, that domestic game so that you start to see them more often. And it's not just about World Cup and Euros. And we'll see this year with the cricket and the 100. They've got a new domestic product coming out

where they very much set out right from the start it's going to be equal domestic, equal men, equal women, whether that's pay, strategy drafting the sponsors etc and they set this all out quite early so i think it's there's a couple things that it's in reverse to the men's game and equally also just the participation piece the data from this research also showed that there's a huge opportunity in women's sports to actually get women who participate in sports and then follow those sports i've always thought that was a myth but you know that people if they're going to run and do park run,

they don't necessarily watch athletics, etc. But in men's sport, you do see it. If you play rugby, play cricket, play football, you tend to also follow all of those sports. Whereas at the moment in women's sport, there is a big gap between people that play it and then don't follow it. Let me bring Emily in on this. Emily de Fronde about hockey hockey because i played hockey and i i remember coming to see a hockey match between england and holland in like another era a hundred years ago but at wembley we had a school trip from yorkshire piled in and it was so inspiring

but not every school has that opportunity not Not every school brings hockey to the girls for them to play. Hockey traditionally is quite an elitist sport still, isn't it? Yeah, I mean, it's really interesting what Zara was saying because, you know, a lot does resonate with my experiences, obviously, within hockey. As you touched upon, hockey is probably predominantly a white, middle-class,, private school sport. And, you know, that's kind of a, you know, stereotype that is within society right now. Now, my thing is, you can probably tell that I do speak completely different to all

of my teammates within the Great Britain Hockey Squad. I come from a state school in Essex, you know, I had kind of a different progression into the sport now i feel very lucky that i went to a state school that did offer hockey as part of our curriculum my pe teacher bless her she didn't necessarily have too much um hockey experience herself but she had the enthusiasm she had the passion that obviously you know really did transfer into her students um and I think you know if if I went to the state school down the road about 200 meters down the road from me that didn't offer hockey uh on their curriculum my pathway into school I probably wouldn't be sitting here with all of you and listening in awe of the conversation we're having because you know I didn't

have that opportunity but I think for me now it's it's you know I find it really important for the position that I'm in I'm in a very fortunate position that I can call playing hockey my full-time job and I play for my country which is something that obviously not many people can do but I also am wary that are we missing out on the talent that is in wider you know more diverse areas of the country that don't have the opportunity to play hockey in their school or don't have the access to, you know, facilities, whether that be an AstroTurf pitch to play on or a field or any of the equipment that you need, like a stick and a ball.

And I think, you know, I'm pleased that so I did touch upon it's the grassroots, you know, aspect of that so i did touch upon it's the grassroots you know aspect of things um that is really important for us to address you know when you're at school speaking from my personal experience i don't know whether it's similar to you guys but i was offered hockey netball rounders but i love football i love cricket i love rugby i would have loved to have had the opportunity to play all of these different sports. But we kind of, you know, channel our children into certain sports at such a young age

that actually maybe we are missing that on the talent that isn't necessarily tapped into further down the line. Catherine, how are you going to find talent for the W Series? I think it's just about creating role models for young girls. We've got to create heroes. We've got to create people who young girls look up to and they want to be. So we want to create more fans coming into the sport.

And hopefully those fans will decide that they want to get into a small cart you know we need to just you know grow our sport across the world and you know we have grand plans to do that in the next few years um and we we want to um embrace you know this feeling of excitement and advancement and that you know girls can do whatever they want to do I mean I was only just speaking in a school last week and I got this lovely letter back from the form teacher to say that one of the girls said that you know she was going to work much harder at maths because she wants to become one of our engineers. We've just got to touch as many people as we possibly can to give that inspiration to all the girls,

to believe that they can go into whatever sport that they want to do. Now, one of the big successes when it comes to women's sport is, of course, football and the Women's Super League. It was set up 10 years ago in 2011 2011 featuring eight semi-professional teams moving to 2018 when the sport went fully professional with 12 teams high fives all around ladies uh this year the women's super league um also secured a new broad new broadcast rights with the bbc and sky now kelly simmons you're the football association's director of the women's professional game. What a remarkable 10 years it's been.

So, you know, just to understand, we're talking about finding role models. You're creating the role models of the future, you know, from a sport that was originally run by volunteers. How have you managed to get from there to here? Investment. You know, the FA has invested significantly in the women's game as have the clubs you know it costs to to build a development program to build a player pathway to invest in a professional league I think if you sort of look above that it's about leadership and ambition and I've worked the last couple of chief execs I've worked with, Martin Glenn and now Mark Bullingham,

massive ambitions for the women's game are prepared to fight in the board to get the resources required to help transform the game. So I think, you know, a lot of work, a lot of investment to sort of get where we've got to. Of course, the job is nowhere near done. I was interested, you know, listening to the discussions around the grassroots game and the pathway. I think one of the great things about the development

of the Women's Super League and the women's game at the top level is it's attractive brands that want to invest in that area of the game, but also want to invest in community. So Barclays have come in as a record deal we think for women's sport in europe team sport in europe in terms of a title sponsor for the women's super league but alongside that we're investing significantly in our ambition that every girl in school has the chance unlike emily unlike myself uh who was channeled into netball and hockey that every girl has got the

chance to play football in school so i think we're seeing you know more as the game grows its profile we're seeing more brands more partners really want to help us drive widening that base and giving girls those opportunities to and i you know for me that is personally really really exciting because you know my generation we weren't allowed to play and and you know i wanted to play football and cricket too. I mean, it really is a truly remarkable story of our time from just volunteers playing it to now, you know, you've signed these deals. It's a professional sport in the papers, on the back pages. Ali, put this into some sort of historical perspective for us

because it really, since the 1970ss let's just say this out loud to everyone here's the ban on women's football was lifted when we talk about women's sport now I think we want these massive wholesale changes and we want it to look like the sport that we know it can look like which is has always been men's sport it's always been so far ahead I always think it's really important to position the growth of women's sport for all the things that we can still complain about as well, to position that within that bigger discussion. So 1971, I think the ban was lifted

on women playing on FA sanctioned pitches, which is 50 years. When we then look at the successes of the Lionesses, of the Super League, of Chelsea and the Champions League final, then we can say, wow, that's incredible. Look at the successes of the lionesses of the super league of chelsea in the champions league final then we can say wow that's incredible look at the growth look at the development of the sport over that time going back to what emily was saying pe teachers have been hugely significant in getting girls involved in sport i also am from the era of no rugby at school etc we've still got women playing international level rugby who

probably started playing the sport at university because they haven't had didn't have access to it at school like when you put things like that into context that's crazy and I think for many sports fans who maybe aren't as invested in women's sport or don't maybe have a good understanding of the broader context I guess those kind of key things I think they're huge they're like lost in the in the discussion of women's sport when we're like we've got women who are have been operating training and having full-time jobs or training and part-time jobs and then when you put it into context like that you can sit there and Kelly can sit there probably really happy and and look at that massive 10-year growth and think that's pretty incredible for the start point of 50 years ago for sure. Yeah you mentioned athletes, sports

players having to have part-time jobs the latest BBC elite British sports women survey found that four out of five elite British sports women feel they're not paid enough compared to their male counterparts and more than 60% of the UK's top female athletes make less than £10,000 a year. On the other hand, revenue generated by women's sport in the UK is set to grow to a billion pounds a year by 2030, up from the £350 million a year currently, making it one of the fastest growing sectors in the sports industry. And the Women's Sports Trust says the key to unlocking this impressive

growth will be the increased visibility of female athletes and teams which we've talked about so what does need to do to really be done to increase this visibility to benefit all sports and not just some more than others and zara i'm going to come to you first because this is about investment isn't it i think part of it comes comes back to Alison's earlier point around assumption and access to information. And I think the example that Alison gave around it being quite hard actually sometimes being on a news desk and not knowing, you're not given the information like you are in men's sport. I think that's kind of reflective in a number of the different stakeholders

as well, because I've heard some rights holders and fans say that they believe more brands should be investing in the sport or they think it should be on tv but you know I asked the question of why kind of I think there's an assumption that people should just be doing something without the data to back it up and I think that where um you know Kelly and the WSL and the FA have done a tremendous job of building that momentum over a long period of time, whether initially it was Barclays. And then this year you have the well-documented bidding war over the broadcast rights. All of these things start to – they are obviously tangible value because they bring money in,

but it's this perception of value as well. Because when people start to see that there are bidding wars or there are blue chip brands investing or they are on back pages of sports or they are getting, you know, 11 million watching a semi-final during a World Cup, all those things add up. And it's not just one thing that happens. You know, the whole sort of tide has to rise together

with each of those stakeholders in it. And I think that's really the challenge. And I think one of the biggest issues and the hurdles to overcome is a total lack of data in women's sport. There's just not enough of it. And I think if every rights holder, whether it's the league, club, governing body, was able to actually focus on getting more data around whether that's participation, whether that's eyeballs and exposure or engagement on their social platforms, just having more data to be able to actually say to a brand or a broadcaster or whoever, this is why we're worth investing in. And one that came out in the research that there was a 23% gap in ticket purchase of data between men's and women's international sport. That percentage increased at domestic level.

So if you can't already know enough about your existing audience, how can you go and find a new audience to build on that? So it's very difficult to attract sponsorship to the women's game then? I think it's difficult in general at the moment with sponsorship. I think across all sports, male or female. And I think some sports, again, using using football have done a great job of finding good brands to invest in them. I think the WNBA also in the last 12 months, if you look at how they've set themselves up, they actually came out last year and said, we want people

to come and be a WNBA changemaker. And immediately Nike, AT&T and Deloitte signed up and last week Google signed up. So I think what's also interesting is you're starting to see a lot of tech brands where there is money to invest. And they equally have their own issues with wanting to address D&I within their own organizations, are viewing women's sport as a great place to go and invest. So there's a growing trend and a change in who those brands are. So obviously, it always talks about the fact with men's sports, there's a lot of reliance on alcohol and betting.

And yet women's sport, clearly a different audience, different opportunity is attracting different partners as well. Yeah, because you were in part of women's cricket before your current role. Was women's cricket able to attract the brands beyond the sort of, like you say, the stereotypes? Yeah, it's really interesting so i did um the women's world cup in 2017 um which england won although i had nothing to play in that part at the time the icc sold the rights together so if you were investing in men's cricket you also invested in the women's cricket and i think there's pros and cons to both um as to whether you you know you see the upside but also you miss out on opportunities and one of

the stories I always tell about that is that the final at Lords where England played India and we sold out it was fantastic we set our stall out quite early that was going to be the goal to make sure that that one match in particular because it was on TV and it had a huge digital following whether England were in it or not we wanted that match to be sold out and coming back to this point around data after that game we got the data back that said for the first time ever at Lords more coffee was sold than beer and so you just think that is such a great opportunity for cricket to go and to actually get a coffee brand on board for women's cricket because it is different we had the data that could back it up so I mean at the time it didn't because they were sold together. But I know the ECB has taken a lot of learnings

from that tournament because we got the data. So 65% of ticket purchases for that tournament had never seen cricket live, or I think it was 30% were under 16. So we were able to hand that data over to help them make more informed decisions in their own strategy moving forward. And Kelly, what's it done to now that football has gone professional, fully professional in 2018? How has that growth and change affected the brands that come to football now, women's football?

There's more of them. We made a decision to unbundle our rights. I think there are pros and cons, as Zara says. I think the most important thing though is being really clear what you think the value are if you're bundling and making sure that the partner that you you bring on board the brand you bring on board is right um in our context for the women's game we've seen a number of brands come to the table i think it's a huge opportunity at the moment for women's sport because because of the dni agenda that zara touched on i think

brands you know they're thinking about the know, they're thinking about the brand purpose, they're thinking about the brand values. Women's sport is still relatively cheap to get into, invest in and have a big impact in. Just to say D&I is diversity and inclusion. Sorry, diversity and inclusion, yeah. So when we talk to Barclays, they've got a fantastic track record and credibility in supporting the men's Premier League.

But they're really passionate about delivering an important message internally and externally, particularly internally around diversity and inclusion. So partnering with the Women's Super League, which is a women's equivalent top domestic league, absolutely made sense for them when they were reviewing their portfolio of sports sponsorship so i think there's some great opportunities uh for women's sport around that whole sort of a gender of diversity and inclusion and brands wanting to to invest and have an impact so um we've seen some brands coming on men's and women's uh and some come in specifically boots a partner just for the lionesses we to bix just a partner brilliant um emily when you started out uh wanting to be a young hockey player you said you you said your PE teacher inspired you because you were you played hockey at school your mum also played hockey didn't she when you set out

for a career in the sport did you think you would make money from it? Well, yeah, if I'm being blunt, of course not. I started playing the sport that I love through going to watch my mum play every Saturday. My two older brothers and my dad would be going to watch West Ham play at Upton Park and I'd be going along to watch my mum play and that was kind of the first time where I was introduced into the sport and I guess looking back now it's probably

inevitable that I was gonna follow in my mum's footsteps we actually played in the same team together for a few seasons which you know still remains some of my most fondest memories on a hockey pitch but you know when I first started playing the sport it was through you know the love of you know being active but playing alongside my friends and giving me something to do and it's one of those where at that age I would never have considered that I would be able to call myself a full-time athlete right now and you know I feel very fortunate that um you know the women that have come before me in a GB hockey shirt have um given myself and my teammates that platform to be able to be you know fully funded uh we're part of a centralized program here at Bisham Abbey um where we train every day

we get um you know our APA funding from UK sport um and you know I do feel very lucky to have that opportunity and be able to call it our our job but you know touching upon what we've said before you know I would love that hockey could be seen in the same sentences the salaries that men's football will get in like I would love that obviously like but there's no comparison I can't compare it because you know speaking personally and and for some of my teammates as well like we have to seek extra sponsorship to gain additional income or you know some of the girls uphold part-time jobs some of the girls are you know studying to you know set themselves up in the future and it's kind of still having that um in the forefront of our minds that you

know we are very very lucky to be able to call it our job but it's still you know you still need to have that you know outlook that one our careers don't last forever and two we probably don't get paid enough to sit back relax not do anything and you know touching upon what what's already been said again like the role model aspect of it all that you know 10 years ago the centralized program was only just being introduced and that's come off the back of many women many men that have played in the GB hockey shirt um have given so much and obviously their success has paved the way for us right now and you know if I look ahead in 10 years time I'd hope that the work that we do now can inspire you know further people to pick up the hockey stick but also to put the put the sport in

a better position um in in the future. It's interesting you talk about individual sponsorship as well have you pursued that Emily? Yeah so speaking as hockey players it's usually common to have your own stick sponsor your footwear footwear sponsor and that sort of aspect of things. Speaking as a team, you probably see on my top, Vitality are our lead sponsor. They came on board last year. And off the back of that, I think it is really important that you are getting the investment whether it is in these sponsors that invest in the squad or as individuals because as you know female athletes that's so important for us. Zara we know that in most work spaces women are not very good at putting themselves forward to ask for things like promotions and pay rises is it similar in sport?

Interesting question I mean i don't know whether it's similar i think it's just equipping people with the right information and you know emily was actually part of women's sport trust last year that ran a sort of mentory um program unlocked which was about pairing different people in the industry with different athletes at different points in their career where they just started out well established or close to retiring and what they all you know the support they were looking for and and emily can probably well should will be able to speak to it better than i because she was on the program as an athlete but you know we're very mindful of trying to add value and help each of the athletes to understand you know where their value sits and

what they need because i think a lot of the time and this is know where their value sits and what they need because I think a lot of the time and this is just in sport in general there's an assumption that everyone just knows what they're doing you know that just because you're good at your sport you'll know how to sell yourself or just because you're on twitter you know how to run a social media campaign like they're very different things and they're very different skills to have yes oh yeah just um wanted to kind of contribute to that in terms of we've spoken about a lack of data around women's sport, which definitely exists. What obviously my position here is as a researcher of elite women's sport. And in relation to the conversation that kind of Emily's raised and some of the points Zara raised, there's an emerging amount of research on women as professional athletes and research I've been involved with there's a collection of researchers in Australia that have done some research into professional

women athletes and something that's quite interesting I find quite interesting is there's like a narrative from elite sports women and Emily correct me if I'm wrong here but that women feel like they're grateful for the opportunity to be playing in professional sport. We're all very aware of where sport was 5, 10, 15 years ago, and that these are women that are kind of treading new territory, especially in emerging professional sports. So particularly in this country, let's look at, in some instances, rugby at some levels of some teams. And we're in this transition period of women's sport becoming more professional

women's super league really leading the way in that regard but the the research that's coming out of australia on women's aussie rules football and rugby league football is that there's a almost a reluctance to complain about work conditions or pay or lack of sponsors or lack of visibility because they're in this new space where well actually we're really lucky because women before us haven't had this or we haven't had the access opportunity so we can't complain about because we might take it away so we're actually just going to keep keep going with it so I think that's been quite an interesting thing that's come out of some research in Australia that women are really grateful but does that then put them on the back foot potentially? You're nodding Emily. Yeah I mean it is spot on Ali because you know I feel that I've just said five minutes ago that I would never

have even dreamt that I'd be able to be in the position that I am and call myself a fully funded full-time athlete but actually you know if you're looking looking at my current situation right now you know Zara touched upon the Women's Sports Trust Unlocked program. Now, I was really lucky to be involved in the program. It was 41 athletes partnered with 41 activators from a range of different industries within sport, outside of sport. And it was kind of that that really ignited the flame within myself to really use my opportunity that I have right now I'm not taking it away I feel very lucky that I am in the position that I am but you know I wanted to understand my purpose as an athlete and how I can have a bigger impact not just within my sport but across a range

of different sports and for me one of those things was um raising the inclusion and diversity aspect within hockey um so I touched upon that hockey is predominantly played in you know public private schools by um certain um members of society and I want to uh broaden that out and and also building a a brand as you know what I what I stand for what I'm most passionate about I'm really using my voice and you know we've seen that so much recently you know Marcus Rashford is a fantastic example of that um you know Dina Asher-Smith she's currently writing some supplements within the Telegraph there's a range of different athletes that are out there at the moment really fighting for what they really believe in and trying to use their platform to good use.

And I think, you know, that the investment is one side of things, but really building on the platform that you have as an athlete and trying to utilise that for good is something that I feel really, really passionate about. Absolutely, Emily. And you're a pioneer and you'll change the landscape. Sorry, who was that? I've just interrupted somebody.

Sorry. All I was going to say is just to build on Annie's points. You know, I think that comes back to where you also need to, sort of change the landscape sorry who was that i've just interrupted somebody sorry yeah all i was going to say just to build on annie's points um you know i think that comes back to where you also need to that's why you need diversity in the administration point of view as well because you know we i've worked before and cricket being a good example where we've right gone to run campaigns with female players and we've you know gone to speak to people to get appearance time with them etc and they're more than willing to just offer their time up because you know there's this sense of well that's great I'm going to get some exposure I'm going to be on the marketing material

like it's good for me and we made a point of saying no no we're going to pay you for all of this time so actually can you tell us what time you've got available and um you know one of them in particular Charlotte Edwards who we used as an ambassador during the tournament one of them in particular was Charlotte Edwards, who we used as an ambassador during the tournament, one of England's greatest cricketers. And she was happy to give all her time for free. And we had to say to her, no, this is the benchmark we're setting for your appearance fees. And this is the schedule, because if you were a male player, we'd be asked for that. So we're doing that for you. And I think that's where it's so important to have just as much diversity off the field to be able to make those decisions and lead and lift up

as it is the people on the pitch asking for that. I think this is what, Ali, absolutely what you've touched on is really interesting, this gratitude. And that could be, like you say, just at the individual level or even at the top level. I'm going to bring in Catherine. What do you think, Catherine? On sponsor values, I think that we need to start

talking to sponsors a lot more in a stronger fashion by saying it's not acceptable that you are paying only small percentages of the male value of the same sports. have really got to start making stronger positions and actually start paying women's sport a lot more. And we need to start standing up and saying there's got to be some equality here. Absolutely. And once we've got money, sponsorship deals, is this the sort of stuff that's going to turn the papers on, Alison? It's just a case of grabbing those big moments

when they happen, isn't it? And really, when you mentioned the hockey, that happened on a Friday night. So for a Sunday newspaper, we're going to conference on Saturday, and there was huge excitement about what had happened. It was a huge big moment. But then you hear about things like hockey sticks all sold out. I know that when Olga Korbut won the Olympics, you couldn't get leotards anywhere.

The sports just weren't prepared for it. So I think it's getting the most out of these big moments um i'm gonna we've got this is just flown by i'm gonna come around to each and every one of you and ask you the same question so let's start with uh zara al-kudsi a trustee of women's sports trust and head of commercial partnership development at f1 no less where do you see women's sport in the next five years tough being first i can't say something profound because I haven't heard everyone else. It's like when you order at the table, I always like everyone else to order first and then let them go in.

I mean, I just think just bigger and bigger and bolder. I don't think it's, you know, we talk about all these numbers, et cetera, but just the trajectory is there. And I think it's going in the right direction. Maybe just bigger domestic. I think that's where we need it to be. And that's where the growth is. The international has historically done well,

particularly around the Olympics and major events. So, you know, bigger and stronger domestic product, hopefully. Emily Dufron, Great Britain and England hockey player. What do you think, five years from now? I think, what a question. I think, you know know the inequality between um men's and women within sport is not new and actually we've been fighting this battle um for decades now and i think that that fight will continue within the next five ten years um until

it is equal basically um i think right now right right now, I think it can be a real historical moment for women's sport. I think the fact that we're having this conversation in itself is, you know, a good starting point to embrace committing to a long-term sustainable investment within women's sport and by everyone from businesses to the government. I think, you know, the female athletes will continue to use their voice and celebrate all that is amazing about women's sport.

It's a global shift now that we need to make and now's the time to do it, I think. Kelly Simmons, the FA's Director of Women's Professional Game. What do you think? Exponential growth, I think. If I look at the Women's Super League, you know, when we come back next season, we've got 57 live games on BBC One, Two and Sky and you know we're going to get some of the biggest audiences in sport not in women's sport in sport there's no reason why we don't we won't see a

massive shift or continue to see a massive shift in women's sport in this country. Catherine Bondmuir, CEO of the W Series. I think the idea of women's sport will be less novel. I'm sure it's going to be more commercially successful. I think women's sports profile will continue to rise and I think audiences will be larger. And Hallie Bowes, what do you think? We'll always have this point of comparison in sport between men and women and that's not going anywhere and there's always going to be that and uh Hallie Bowes what do you think we'll always have this point of comparison in sport between men and women and that's not going anywhere and there's always going to be that benchmark and there'll always be challenges for women involved in sport at decision making positions and playing etc but the continuation of women's sport being really on the agenda for people to really continue to care about it and for

me as a researcher and people I work with to want to continue to to put numbers for these guys to be able to use to their to their benefit um that's going to be really important so it's like carrying on this narrative of women are playing sport and they're here to stay and and we're getting better and better at it so I think it's that that kind of growth narrative i guess it becomes really really important makes allison's life easier i think when all those jigsaw pieces fit together well allison's no longer the sports editor of the mail on sunday as of a few days ago but allison apart from badgering your successor with emails to say put us on the back pages put us on the back pages what's going to get women's sport on

the back pages for good it's well i think it's just i mean talk about this five years i think it just takes time you know there's a lovely story my dad told me remembers when he was a boy people going come on come on come and see this come and see this and they ran up to the end of the road and the car drove past and they went it's being driven by a women by a woman and they collapsed with laughter they'd never heard of anything so funny and then they were worried she's going to crash she's going to crash and you think what captain's managed to do with the w series there's like 60 70 years between those two things but it's a huge huge development in the way we see women and the expectations we have of women and the opportunities we give to women and i don't think these things happen in five-year periods unfortunately i think it takes

a long time but all the little things that happen along the way make a massive difference and it's a case of maximizing those I like you say badger my successor and just keep shouting about it well I think women's sports is in safe hands with all of you at the forefront thank you so much I thoroughly enjoyed speaking to all of you best of luck to all of you and so much. Emma, we'll be back tomorrow from 10 a.m. I'm Sarah Trelevan. And for over a year, I've been working on one of the most complex stories I've ever covered. There was somebody out there who was faking pregnancies. I started like warning everybody.

Every doula that I know. It was fake. No pregnancy. And the deeper I dig, the more questions I unearth. How long has she been doing this? What does she have to gain from this? From CBC and the BBC World Service, The Con, Caitlin's Baby. It's a long story. Settle in.

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