来源：《卫报》
刊登日期：2021年3月23日
Advocates of women’s football in England spent most of the last decade pushing for broadcasters and the Football Association (FA) to take the game more seriously. Nearly £20m of sponsorship investment by Barclays was a breakthrough. But regular attendances at matches have never taken off in the way that enthusiasts hoped.
在过去十年的大部分时间里，英格兰女子足球的支持者们都在敦促广播公司和英足总更认真地对待女足。曾经，巴克莱(Barclays)在赞助方面投入了近2000万英镑，这是一个突破。但是，定期观看比赛的人数从未像支持者所希望的那样增加。
Big television audiences and unprecedented levels of interest, particularly in the winning US team, ensured that the 2019 World Cup was a turning point. But the arrival of the pandemic meant that progress was checked. This week’s announcement of a £24m investment in women’s football over three years, by the BBC and Sky Sports, is the culmination of a process that has taken years. But the sheer difficulty of current circumstances, including the unfairness of pandemic rules that have seen girls’ football stopped while boys’ has continued, means that it has also come as a shock.
庞大的电视观众和空前的兴趣，尤其是对获胜的美国队，确保了2019年女足世界杯是一个转折点。但新冠大流行的到来意味着进展受到了遏制。本周，英国广播公司（BBC）和天空体育宣布在三年内投资2400万英镑用于女子足球，这是一个历时数年的过程的高潮。但当前形势的严峻性也令人震惊，包括防疫规则的不公平性，女子足球已经停止，而男子足球还在继续。
Starting with the 2021-22 season, women’s football will be much more prominent, with 44 live games on Sky channels and 18 on BBC One and BBC Two. Beyond these scheduling facts, what sort of change should the money be expected to bring? Simple comparisons with the men’s game are generally unhelpful: men’s football developed into its current form over many decades, and in parallel over different continents. In England, by contrast, women’s football was hardly played at all for almost half a century after 1921, when it was banned by the FA on the false grounds that it was harmful to female bodies. In schools, playgrounds and attitudes, there is much catching up to be done.
从2021-22赛季开始，女足比赛将更加引人注目，天空频道将直播44场比赛，BBC1台和BBC2台直播18场比赛。除了这些日程安排之外，这笔钱还能带来什么样的变化？与男子足球进行简单的比较通常是无益的：男子足球发展到目前的形式已经有好几十年了，而且在不同的大陆都是平行发展的。相比之下，在英格兰，女子足球在1921年之后的近半个世纪里几乎没有人踢过，当时英足总以对女性身体有害为由禁止了女子足球。在学校、操场和态度方面，还有许多方面需要迎头赶上。
But at last, the women’s game will have the chance to stand on its own feet. Under the terms of this deal, described as the biggest for any women’s football league in the world, the rights are decoupled for the first time from the rights to Premier League matches. Promises from broadcasters and officials to invest in marketing, commentary and what the FA’s Kathryn Swarbrick described as “story-telling around the WSL”, mean the clubs – and not just the top few – are guaranteed a powerful helping hand.
但最终，女足将有机会自立。根据这一被称为世界上金额最高的女足联赛赞助合同，女足联赛转播权首次与英超比赛转播权脱钩。广播公司和官员承诺在市场营销、报道解说以及英足总Swarbrick所说的“围绕着女足超级联赛讲故事”方面进行投资，这意味着俱乐部——不仅仅是少数顶级俱乐部——将得到强有力的帮助。
The boldness of the deal-makers, including the FA’s Kelly Simmons and the director of BBC Sport, Barbara Slater, should not be underestimated. This is a huge decision, the aim of which is to transform women’s football and narrow the gap dividing the opportunities on offer to male and female players. In Mexico, Monday night became women’s football night. Regular TV slots for English women’s league games are still being agreed. Viewers and players have much to look forward to.
不应低估包括英足总凯利·西蒙斯和BBC体育部总监芭芭拉·斯莱特在内的交易制定者的魄力。这是一个巨大的决定，其目的是改变女子足球，缩小男女球员在机会上的差距。在墨西哥，周一晚上成了女子足球之夜。英国女子联赛的固定电视时段仍在协商中。观众和球员都有很多期待。