[Albion] Women’s Football

[The Clamp]

Edited

 

[drew]

I dont have the approved viewpoint on cricket. My magic solution is to avoid watching it and then avoid complaining about it.
You spent £100 to go watch a game you knew were going to have the same pitch and goal dimensions you have a personal problem with, because according to you general media and the Brighton PR team somehow forced you to go and watch it. Then you go home and complain about the goal and pitch dimensions you knew about before you even bought the tickets. And now you appear to be surprised that people find it dumb and laughable

Really? He never said he was forced to go but, encouraged by the promotion of this game and women's football in general, he went. He is then perfectly entitled to pass an opinion. Unfortunately, there are some that are so entrenched that their response is to belittle any criticism rather than look at ways to develop and improve the game. I've never seen the Albion women play live but if the game is broadcast I will watch it on the laptop. I have been to a couple of internationals and what I would say the quality between that and the Albion is vastly different. So, how do you close the gap. 1st option is for the club to spend big and we know that isn't the Albion ethos. I don't think playing in a near empty stadium is going to help either. The purpose built stadium will help. Better to play in a 10k stadium with 9k of fans than a 32k stadium with 9k of fans.

I don't agree with changing pitch dimensions or the goals, as someone pointed out, it's the same for both teams. Training facilities for the Albion have been improved so maybe over the next few years there will better prepared local talent emerging. There is a lot being done to promote the game but at the end of the day, it is the product on the pitch that will make people come back for more.

The standard will improve but it isn't going to be overnight. From my own experience I thought massive opportunities were missed in 2015 when England got to the semis of the world cup. I was expecting the local FA to use that as a catalyst to promote the girls game across schools in the county but they did almost bugger all.

As for the game last night (well the second half which I saw), I thought Brighton were trying to play the ball around but were let down in the last 3rd and also too many passes being easily intercepted by a poor Everton side. I don't believe girls can't shoot from outside the box but, not unlike the men, there seems and unwillingness to try!

Finally, I would echo what someone else said, stop comparing the two games. Women will never be able to compete on level playing field with men, same in tennis, same in Athletics and pretty much every sport. So treat it like a separate sport and enjoy it for what it is and what it may become.

 

[Frutos]

Opera built in VPN working
Not blindly in love with a football coach
No fan of dumb takes on women´s football
Not that interested in politics but sometimes have a word or two
Making a couple of posts every day because I like it
Makes entirely logical statements
Replying to people quoting me
Looks were on the same page

You seem jolly.

 

[Exilegull]

IP address in Sweden?

Hates De Zerbi?

Gets upset by people being negative over women’s football?

On the political threads?

Posting all day despite being a workaholic?

Makes ridiculous statements like the one above?

Has to have the last word?

Tick tock.

Opera built in VPN working
Not blindly in love with a football coach
No fan of dumb takes on women´s football
Not that interested in politics but sometimes have a word or two
Making a couple of posts every day because I like it
Makes entirely logical statements
Replying to people quoting me
Looks were on the same page

All that said:

I'm pretty sick and tired of playing this illiterate goofball-persona and might as well bin it here and now and return under a better, more suitable cover not riddled with lies and burning my eyes. I want to use the ' apostrophe rather than the ´ variant, but its real hard work remembering all this self-impairment.

My next persona will probably be a little bit more simple and difficult to detect. More in touch with the common man, while still not deceitful as the fucktarded character I made now. I'm not that good at role-playing. All the tongue biting. Have to find a workaround.

Will be fun to see if you figure out the next one as well.

Hope everything is fine and well with all you NSC:ers. See you soon!

 

[hart's shirt]

So it’s moved on from ‘don’t comment if you haven’t watched it’ to now ‘well you’ve watched it but you deliberately didn’t enjoy it’. Perhaps I should be forced to enjoy it somehow?

With food / drinks / travel I must have spent close to £100 last night for a family of 4. Maybe I’m different to you, but I don’t tend to give up my Friday evening to spend £100 and have my kids go to bed late for something I was hoping I wouldn’t enjoy. That would seem a very odd thing to do. I also covered this in the original post, but you clearly didn’t read it properly and just jumped on the ‘misogynistic evil man’ line. Which as @Stumpy Tim says, is part of the problem with women’s football.

It's risible, isn't it? The idea that people would pay money and take time and effort to go along and support Albion Women with their family, but somehow aren't supporting in the right way because they'd made up their minds already. As for misogyny, there's a degree of misandry coming back in that assumption. The less said about the reference to Andrew Tate, the better. Albion Women could have done with some of the same degree of dogmatic defensiveness shown by a few on this thread late in the 2nd half last night.

The Lewes post of a few days ago about attracting numbers to the Palace game was revealing. The fact that the word 'Women' had been omitted was picked up on and gently mocked, as NSC has a rich history of doing over the years with single issue, single post contributors regardless of topic. But dig a little deeper and one might suggest why it might've been left off in the event that it wasn't purely an oversight.

Barry Collins wrote a piece in 2019 about why he resigned as a director from Lewes FC. It's well worth a read - "I joined a football club and feel like I'm leaving a political party...the equality campaign has become an internal crusade that trumps all else... some on the board crave groupthink."

I've coached women's football at uni and coached, sponsored and managed a side in DWFA (Dubai Women's Football Association) for 4 years. Admittedly and even with a few good US college and European semi-pro former players, it was low level and I certainly wouldn't compare my managerial nous in any way to top WSL managers, male or female. But even at that level, it was clear to see that the game was very different to the men's game and should be valued differently as much as to protect itself from unhelpful comparisons. An equality at all costs approach isn't always in the best interests of participants who are being held to unfairly high standards.

Equal opportunity doesn't necessarily entail equal output or equal interest. 4 million watched Rhona Martin's 'stone of destiny' to win GB curling gold in 2002, an estimated 10 million tuned in for Maddie Hinch's penalty shootout Rio heroics on BBC1 for GB Women's Hockey gold. Unlike these 2 minor sports, there's much wider participation and grassroots support for girls in football, which is great. But for spectators, like these 2 sports, there's a surge of interest in major tournaments, but significantly less interest week-by-week through the WSL and Championship turnstiles. For every record-breaking London derby high attendance (with low ticket prices), there's WSL Everton who struggle to get 4 figures at home. Official attendances from 2nd tier Women's Championship games are hard to find.

Albion Women's season tickets available at £55 for adults and £25 for kids for 11 home games including 2 at the Amex, it's not that people are being priced out. And an evening game at the Amex isn't going to help with the numbers, even on a Friday without school the next day.

A group think, defensive default setting mentality isn't going to help Women's Football grow and improve.

Your feedback should be appreciated and welcomed, not criticized and vilified.

 

[The Clamp]

All that said:

I'm pretty sick and tired of playing this illiterate goofball-persona and might as well bin it here and now and return under a better, more suitable cover not riddled with lies and burning my eyes. I want to use the ' apostrophe rather than the ´ variant, but its real hard work remembering all this self-impairment.

My next persona will probably be a little bit more simple and difficult to detect. More in touch with the common man, while still not deceitful as the fucktarded character I made now. I'm not that good at role-playing. All the tongue biting. Have to find a workaround.

Will be fun to see if you figure out the next one as well.

Hope everything is fine and well with all you NSC:ers. See you soon!

Yeah. Of course you’re going. Chinny Reck-on.

 

[Commander]

Why compare it ?

Because it’s hard not to. Watched one game on Tuesday and it was great, watched another on Friday and it was crap. It’s human nature to put the two together and think one was far better than the other, isn’t it?

 

[Harry Wilson's tackle]

Really? He never said he was forced to go but, encouraged by the promotion of this game and women's football in general, he went. He is then perfectly entitled to pass an opinion. Unfortunately, there are some that are so entrenched that their response is to belittle any criticism rather than look at ways to develop and improve the game. I've never seen the Albion women play live but if the game is broadcast I will watch it on the laptop. I have been to a couple of internationals and what I would say the quality between that and the Albion is vastly different. So, how do you close the gap. 1st option is for the club to spend big and we know that isn't the Albion ethos. I don't think playing in a near empty stadium is going to help either. The purpose built stadium will help. Better to play in a 10k stadium with 9k of fans than a 32k stadium with 9k of fans.

I don't agree with changing pitch dimensions or the goals, as someone pointed out, it's the same for both teams. Training facilities for the Albion have been improved so maybe over the next few years there will better prepared local talent emerging. There is a lot being done to promote the game but at the end of the day, it is the product on the pitch that will make people come back for more.

The standard will improve but it isn't going to be overnight. From my own experience I thought massive opportunities were missed in 2015 when England got to the semis of the world cup. I was expecting the local FA to use that as a catalyst to promote the girls game across schools in the county but they did almost bugger all.

As for the game last night (well the second half which I saw), I thought Brighton were trying to play the ball around but were let down in the last 3rd and also too many passes being easily intercepted by a poor Everton side. I don't believe girls can't shoot from outside the box but, not unlike the men, there seems and unwillingness to try!

Finally, I would echo what someone else said, stop comparing the two games. Women will never be able to compete on level playing field with men, same in tennis, same in Athletics and pretty much every sport. So treat it like a separate sport and enjoy it for what it is and what it may become.

I once thought that making the goals a bit smaller might be useful given that female keepers are only slightly taller than Matty Ryan. However I expect the long term solution will be the recruitment of taller female goal keepers.

I will also step in to defend @Commander here, someone with whom I sometimes disagree; not sure his nuanced 'criticism' is quite worth the come-back he's getting. Other opinions are, of course, available

 

[Commander]

It's risible, isn't it? The idea that people would pay money and take time and effort to go along and support Albion Women with their family, but somehow aren't supporting in the right way because they'd made up their minds already. As for misogyny, there's a degree of misandry coming back in that assumption. The less said about the reference to Andrew Tate, the better. Albion Women could have done with some of the same degree of dogmatic defensiveness shown by a few on this thread late in the 2nd half last night.

The Lewes post of a few days ago about attracting numbers to the Palace game was revealing. The fact that the word 'Women' had been omitted was picked up on and gently mocked, as NSC has a rich history of doing over the years with single issue, single post contributors regardless of topic. But dig a little deeper and one might suggest why it might've been left off in the event that it wasn't purely an oversight.

Barry Collins wrote a piece in 2019 about why he resigned as a director from Lewes FC. It's well worth a read - "I joined a football club and feel like I'm leaving a political party...the equality campaign has become an internal crusade that trumps all else... some on the board crave groupthink."

I've coached women's football at uni and coached, sponsored and managed a side in DWFA (Dubai Women's Football Association) for 4 years. Admittedly and even with a few good US college and European semi-pro former players, it was low level and I certainly wouldn't compare my managerial nous in any way to top WSL managers, male or female. But even at that level, it was clear to see that the game was very different to the men's game and should be valued differently as much as to protect itself from unhelpful comparisons. An equality at all costs approach isn't always in the best interests of participants who are being held to unfairly high standards.

Equal opportunity doesn't necessarily entail equal output or equal interest. 4 million watched Rhona Martin's 'stone of destiny' to win GB curling gold in 2002, an estimated 10 million tuned in for Maddie Hinch's penalty shootout Rio heroics on BBC1 for GB Women's Hockey gold. Unlike these 2 minor sports, there's much wider participation and grassroots support for girls in football, which is great. But for specators, like these 2 sports, there's a surge of interest in major tournaments, but significantly less interest week-by-week through the WSL and Championship turnstiles. For every record-breaking London derby high attendance (with low ticket prices), there's WSL Everton who struggle to get 4 figures at home. Official attendances from 2nd tier Women's Championship games are hard to find.

Albion Women's season tickets available at £55 for adults and £25 for kids for 11 home games including 2 at the Amex, it's not that people are being priced out. And an evening game at the Amex isn't going to help with the numbers, even on a Friday without school the next day.

A group think, defensive default setting mentality isn't going to help Women's Football grow and improve.

Your feedback should be appreciated and welcomed, not criticized and vilified.

Excellent post sir.

The fact is, Brighton should be getting more than 5,000 for a women’s game in the WSL on a Friday night with dirt cheap tickets. They threw everything they could at it last night to attract people, but the level of interest clearly isn’t there yet. The club are frustrated that their women’s social media content doesn’t get much interaction, and last night proved that there is a massive amount of work to be done to get it up to anywhere near the potential it has.

People just lazily shouting ‘misogynist’ at anyone making any vague criticism of the women’s game just has the opposite affect that the perpetrators are looking for.

 

[dazzer6666]

Because it’s hard not to. Watched one game on Tuesday and it was great, watched another on Friday and it was crap. It’s human nature to put the two together and think one was far better than the other, isn’t it?

To some extent yes, but then put up a heavily critical post based on that comparison that appears to show you have a sneeringly dim view of the women’s game detracts massively from the worthy of discussion suggestions you make in terms of how the game might be improved and is bound to attract defenders of the women’s game. I went to a Burgess Hill game on Tuesday, it was shite but I’m not about to publish a list of suggestions for improvement (I did bluntly suggest a few to the club president when I saw him on Wednesday but they didn’t involve pitch or goal sizes)

 

[Commander]

I will also step in to defend @Commander here, someone with whom I sometimes disagree; not sure his nuanced 'criticism' is quite worth the come-back he's getting. Other opinions are, of course, available

Thank you. I was expecting a lot more flak, to be honest, I had my tin hat on and was hovering over the ‘post’ button for a while.

 

[Guinness Boy]

All that said:

I'm pretty sick and tired of playing this illiterate goofball-persona and might as well bin it here and now and return under a better, more suitable cover not riddled with lies and burning my eyes. I want to use the ' apostrophe rather than the ´ variant, but its real hard work remembering all this self-impairment.

My next persona will probably be a little bit more simple and difficult to detect. More in touch with the common man, while still not deceitful as the fucktarded character I made now. I'm not that good at role-playing. All the tongue biting. Have to find a workaround.

Will be fun to see if you figure out the next one as well.

Hope everything is fine and well with all you NSC:ers. See you soon!

I’ve done you a favour and banned it.

Almost a shame as this was possibly your best post on here, but the final whistle has blown (as it should do after 80 mins of a women’s football match )

Au revoir

 

[Guinness Boy]

It's risible, isn't it? The idea that people would pay money and take time and effort to go along and support Albion Women with their family, but somehow aren't supporting in the right way because they'd made up their minds already. As for misogyny, there's a degree of misandry coming back in that assumption. The less said about the reference to Andrew Tate, the better. Albion Women could have done with some of the same degree of dogmatic defensiveness shown by a few on this thread late in the 2nd half last night.

The Lewes post of a few days ago about attracting numbers to the Palace game was revealing. The fact that the word 'Women' had been omitted was picked up on and gently mocked, as NSC has a rich history of doing over the years with single issue, single post contributors regardless of topic. But dig a little deeper and one might suggest why it might've been left off in the event that it wasn't purely an oversight.

Barry Collins wrote a piece in 2019 about why he resigned as a director from Lewes FC. It's well worth a read - "I joined a football club and feel like I'm leaving a political party...the equality campaign has become an internal crusade that trumps all else... some on the board crave groupthink."

I've coached women's football at uni and coached, sponsored and managed a side in DWFA (Dubai Women's Football Association) for 4 years. Admittedly and even with a few good US college and European semi-pro former players, it was low level and I certainly wouldn't compare my managerial nous in any way to top WSL managers, male or female. But even at that level, it was clear to see that the game was very different to the men's game and should be valued differently as much as to protect itself from unhelpful comparisons. An equality at all costs approach isn't always in the best interests of participants who are being held to unfairly high standards.

Equal opportunity doesn't necessarily entail equal output or equal interest. 4 million watched Rhona Martin's 'stone of destiny' to win GB curling gold in 2002, an estimated 10 million tuned in for Maddie Hinch's penalty shootout Rio heroics on BBC1 for GB Women's Hockey gold. Unlike these 2 minor sports, there's much wider participation and grassroots support for girls in football, which is great. But for spectators, like these 2 sports, there's a surge of interest in major tournaments, but significantly less interest week-by-week through the WSL and Championship turnstiles. For every record-breaking London derby high attendance (with low ticket prices), there's WSL Everton who struggle to get 4 figures at home. Official attendances from 2nd tier Women's Championship games are hard to find.

Albion Women's season tickets available at £55 for adults and £25 for kids for 11 home games including 2 at the Amex, it's not that people are being priced out. And an evening game at the Amex isn't going to help with the numbers, even on a Friday without school the next day.

A group think, defensive default setting mentality isn't going to help Women's Football grow and improve.

Your feedback should be appreciated and welcomed, not criticized and vilified.

Spot on

 

[dazzer6666]

It's risible, isn't it? The idea that people would pay money and take time and effort to go along and support Albion Women with their family, but somehow aren't supporting in the right way because they'd made up their minds already. As for misogyny, there's a degree of misandry coming back in that assumption. The less said about the reference to Andrew Tate, the better. Albion Women could have done with some of the same degree of dogmatic defensiveness shown by a few on this thread late in the 2nd half last night.

The Lewes post of a few days ago about attracting numbers to the Palace game was revealing. The fact that the word 'Women' had been omitted was picked up on and gently mocked, as NSC has a rich history of doing over the years with single issue, single post contributors regardless of topic. But dig a little deeper and one might suggest why it might've been left off in the event that it wasn't purely an oversight.

Barry Collins wrote a piece in 2019 about why he resigned as a director from Lewes FC. It's well worth a read - "I joined a football club and feel like I'm leaving a political party...the equality campaign has become an internal crusade that trumps all else... some on the board crave groupthink."

I've coached women's football at uni and coached, sponsored and managed a side in DWFA (Dubai Women's Football Association) for 4 years. Admittedly and even with a few good US college and European semi-pro former players, it was low level and I certainly wouldn't compare my managerial nous in any way to top WSL managers, male or female. But even at that level, it was clear to see that the game was very different to the men's game and should be valued differently as much as to protect itself from unhelpful comparisons. An equality at all costs approach isn't always in the best interests of participants who are being held to unfairly high standards.

Equal opportunity doesn't necessarily entail equal output or equal interest. 4 million watched Rhona Martin's 'stone of destiny' to win GB curling gold in 2002, an estimated 10 million tuned in for Maddie Hinch's penalty shootout Rio heroics on BBC1 for GB Women's Hockey gold. Unlike these 2 minor sports, there's much wider participation and grassroots support for girls in football, which is great. But for spectators, like these 2 sports, there's a surge of interest in major tournaments, but significantly less interest week-by-week through the WSL and Championship turnstiles. For every record-breaking London derby high attendance (with low ticket prices), there's WSL Everton who struggle to get 4 figures at home. Official attendances from 2nd tier Women's Championship games are hard to find.

Albion Women's season tickets available at £55 for adults and £25 for kids for 11 home games including 2 at the Amex, it's not that people are being priced out. And an evening game at the Amex isn't going to help with the numbers, even on a Friday without school the next day.

A group think, defensive default setting mentality isn't going to help Women's Football grow and improve.

Your feedback should be appreciated and welcomed, not criticized and vilified.

From what I saw and heard (from inside the club) that’s very much how it must have felt…….with Murphy leaving and the women about to get get relegated I suspect the ‘crusade’ may be about to run out of steam. There appeared to be a clear divide in the club of those that drove and supported the growth of the women’s game (to the point where it started to dominate certain discussions and strategies) and those that had no interest in it. Looks like the second group are ultimately going to win - still, they got a very nice new pitch out of it while it lasted

 

[Simster]

Thank you. I was expecting a lot more flak, to be honest, I had my tin hat on and was hovering over the ‘post’ button for a while.

To be honest there is a difference between:
a) going to a game, spending £100 in doing so, and coming on here with constructive solutions to make it more watchable and give it more appeal
and b) saying women's football is shite and leaving it there.

The idiots will not spot it though, and ludicrously accuse you of Andrew Tait esque misogyny and their hard of thinking seal chums will clap along with it.

For what it's worth, your ideas around pitch and goal size deserve consideration. I'd also throw in that women's football needs to find it's own audience. It doesn't need 40-50 year old men to suddenly fall in love with it (although some might) It needs 15-18 year old girls to provide the game's audience of the future. There might be some culture cross over of course, but it needs to forge it's own path.

 

[Terry Butcher Tribute Act]

IP address in Sweden?

Hates De Zerbi?

Gets upset by people being negative over women’s football?

On the political threads?

Posting all day despite being a workaholic?

Makes ridiculous statements like the one above?

Has to have the last word?

Tick tock.

Now it all makes sense. He kindly directed me to some posts from our favourite Potter fanatic on Facebook. Class nonsense.

Excellent post sir.

The fact is, Brighton should be getting more than 5,000 for a women’s game in the WSL on a Friday night with dirt cheap tickets. They threw everything they could at it last night to attract people, but the level of interest clearly isn’t there yet. The club are frustrated that their women’s social media content doesn’t get much interaction, and last night proved that there is a massive amount of work to be done to get it up to anywhere near the potential it has.

People just lazily shouting ‘misogynist’ at anyone making any vague criticism of the women’s game just has the opposite affect that the perpetrators are looking for.

Did they throw everything at it?

A few photos mocked up on social media of men holding shirts with the ladies names on the back, a couple of web pages - but certainly not a full on marketing campaign with a real desire to sell out.

Apparently it was half price for men season ticket holders last night, I didn't know that, and I waste hours of time each week online absorbing Albion content (and bollocks from our favourite Swede).

I think you've got to be open minded when it comes to Women's football. It's very new, it's only going to get better. And just because the standard of a game isn't as great at the male equivalent, doesn't mean some people don't find it bloody fun.

 

[Colonel Mustard]

I’ve been to Lewes Women a few times and have enjoyed it on its own merits. What I mean is that if you’re constantly comparing it with the men’s game you’ll conclude that it’s a very poor spectacle. Try not to do this. So instead of comparing a team with their male counterparts you have to compare them with their opponents and rival women’s teams. I can still enjoy watching Sunday league park football on the same principle. If I was constantly thinking, “Bah, Joao Pedro would have scored that", "Verbruggen would have caught that", then I’d be totally missing the point. My main disappointment with women’s football is the increasing incidence of cynical tackles and play acting. We don’t want theatrics, we want the 'at-tricks!

 

[Herr Tubthumper]

I once thought that making the goals a bit smaller might be useful given that female keepers are only slightly taller than Matty Ryan. However I expect the long term solution will be the recruitment of taller female goal keepers.

Given the state of the Albion men’s team in front of goal maybe make their goals bigger? It’s a similar argument.

 

[Diablo]

Thank you. I was expecting a lot more flak, to be honest, I had my tin hat on and was hovering over the ‘post’ button for a while.

That`s why I`m keeping out of it... A 67 year old male with old fashioned views .

 

[Colonel Mustard]

Talking of which, Barcelona v Chelsea Women (Champions League semi) is just getting underway, 1230 Saturday. Think I’ll check it out.