By Jeff Yong
So, Spain eventually became the new champions of women’s soccer after they narrowly beat England 1-0 in the final of the 2023 FIFA Women’s World Cup in Sydney on Sunday.
The scoreline may look slim but “Red Ones” or La Roja were the better team and did justice to the presence of their Queen Letizia, dressed in all red, and her 16-year-old daughter, Infanta Sofia, who were with 75,782 others at Stadium Australia.
At the other end of the spectrum, the British royals only sent good wishes via social media ahead of the game. That was that! An estimated two billion football fans around the world watched the thrilling final.
Olga Carmona, 23, who plays for Real Madrid’s women’s team as left back, scored the winning goal — a powerful low shot that beat England’s “usually safe pair of hands”, Mary Earps.
The strong support for the Spanish players is almost unbelievable. For example, although Carmona’s father died two days before the final, her family kept the death away from her so as not to derail her form and thoughts. And her mum and brothers even flew to Sydney to support her. It was only after the match that Carmona was told of her dad’s passing.
In her social media message, Carmona had this to say:” I know you have been watching me tonight and that you are proud of me. Rest in peace dad. I know that you have given me the strength to achieve something unique.”
All in all, 736 players from 32 countries were involved in the month-long women’s football extravaganza played in several cities in Australia and New Zealand since July 20. But, for Malaysian football fans, it was a shame that the two local pay tv networks didn’t show the tournament at all.
To rub salt into the wound during the final, one of the networks even broadcast a delayed low-level women’s game between the Bay Football Club from San Francisco against Oregon when the thrilling Spain-England game was in progress. How “thoughtful” for supporting women’s football!
As someone not-so-tech savvy, I only knew that I could access the tournament online from the FIFAPlus website very late after the tournament had progressed — the second semi-final between England and Australia! Tun Li, my son, remarked to me that I had “chau kai”, a Cantonese term for having “missed the boat”, for three exciting weeks. A costly lesson learnt here.
To be fair, our local newspapers gave much prominence to FIFA Women’s World Cup.
I was also especially taken up by the fact that the prestigious tournament even featured two of our South East Asian neighbours – Vietnam, a country plagued by war some 50 years ago, and the Philippines, a nation whom many Malaysians always thought were more into the three B’s –basketball, baseball and boxing, and that football was not in their sporting psyche.
And where were we Malaysia after all that hype about sports? Nowhere for now.
The Filipinas did their country proud for they even beat co-hosts New Zealand. It’s said that their presence at the final rounds bonded Filipinos around the country and elsewhere despite that many of the Filipino players were born in the United States. A joke that went round the tournament was that there were two north American teams competing at the 2023 FIFA Women’s World Cup – the Philippines and the United States.
The Philippines may be a team to watch at the 19th Asian Games from Sept 23 in Hangzhou, China along with Vietnam, with their renewed confidence for having played with some of the world’s best.
Of course, we should also not rule out former world champions, Japan, out to make amends for their failure to advance beyond the quarter-final after losing 1-2 to Sweden. It must be remembered that Japan were the only side to have beaten Spain at the 2023 FIFA World Cup with a convincing 4-0 scoreline at the group stage.
But, controversy-plagued Spanish coach Jorge Vilda pulled his players together for the rest of the tournament. “No-one should lose hope,” he said after the defeat in Wellington on July 31. “We have not seen the best Spanish team yet. This defeat hurts, the players are angry and I am convinced they will be better.” And he was right for we saw what Spain were capable of at Stadium Australia on Aug 20.
At the Hangzhou Asian Games, hosts China would also want to make amends as they only beat Haiti 1-0 but lost 1-6 to England and 0-1 to Denmark at the FIFA Women’s World Cup group stage. Only time will tell.
As for prize money bonuses, the Filipino, Vietnamese and Chinese players will each receive US$30,000 each, sums not to be scoffed at. It’s big money for the women players from these countries. Not only that, their national football associations also got US$1.56 million each for qualifying.
FIFA president Gianni Infantino originally wanted to pay money directly into the players’ accounts from this year but somehow the proposal was not carried out. But FIFA is keen to see that the national football associations will be able to sort out the arrangements and allow direct payments be made so that the players don’t get shortchanged.
Case in point is Nigeria whose players wanted to boycott their opening game against Australia as many players were allegedly not paid their bonuses since 2021. But patriotism ruled the day. The Nigerians even moved to the last 16 and held England to a scoreless draw, only to lose at 4-2 on penalties.
The Nigerian players will each get US$60,000 while their national football association will receive US$1.87 million. Let’s hope these players will receive their dues soon.
As for Australia’s soccer heroines, the Matildas who crumbled 1-3 against England in the semi-finals after a promising start, also did something positive for women’s sports in their country. Their spirited performances have prompted their government to allocate US$125 million for further development of women’s sports in Australia.
What about Spain? Its soccer federation pocketed US$4.29 million while its players will get a US$270,000 bonanza each. As for the Lionesses, their football association will earn US$3.015 million while the players stand to get US$195,000 each. Some players are even luckier as their national associations will also reward them besides the FIFA bonuses.
FIFA’s Infantino has promised better bonuses in the next edition in an attempt to narrow the gap between female and male players, the latter who are said to be paid three times more. Watch my word – women’s soccer is on the rise.
As for me, I hope I don’t have to scramble my laptop’s keyboard again to watch the next edition of the FIFA Women’s World Cup in four years from now.
–WE