Manchester City Women (merged)

[Dubai Blue]

Re: Manchester City Ladies - Toni Duggan {merged}

True, to some degree.

Eurosport shows Women's football from international level u17 upwards, in tournaments.

BT Sport has recently been covering the national league and cup games.

Most male sports had decades of free coverage, but obviously things have changed media-wise. Still, the government should be intervening. Eg Why was there no coverage of the English Ashes win last time round? Even struggle to find anything on Sky.

The BBC did cover the women's darts final which is something, and having male/female tournaments running side-by-side is a good idea.

One problem I see with some ladies team sports is that they just don't work well, and to me football falls into that category. The pitch just looks too big, maybe they need to experiment with new formats to avoid constant comparison with established male versions, 7-a-side perhaps on a smaller pitch and smaller nets. Tennis has a different format in the major tournaments, and it's worked well for years.

I would actually be inclined to agree about shrinking the size of the game, to suit the female ability, at this current stage in development. Whilst the skill factor is there on a decent level, the general stamina it takes to be about the pitch, for 90 mins on a full sized pitch, is different for women.

The playing time shouldn't alter, but the changing the size of the pitch and nets will produce better quality, all round.

For example, we have the biggest pitch in all the FA division(something like 110 x 90/ 93, I think) whilst 100 x 66 yards is Crewe Alexandra's ground, the smallest. I would probably go 5 yards smaller to keep the quality of the women's game, in tact and improve it.

The reason being is it would equalise the gulf between the women that have been playing for years and the ones that have just been given backing. That includes internationals, for me.

Just my opinion on a developing game.

The pitches at the top level have to be the same size these days. You make a valid point but changing the size of pitches and goals would make women's football more expensive and even more inaccessible. The only realistic option would be to shorten the games to 70 or 80 mins but I have no idea whether that's even necessary.

And to johnnytapia, the reason there isn't a queue of 3rd or 4th tier teams looking to sign up Marta is because it's against FIFA's rules. There was a rumour years ago about her playing for Oldham in a non-sanctioned friendly as part of a TV documentary but it never materialised. Even the people in charge at Oldham were convinced she would be better than some of the men they had on their books at the time.

 

[Bigga]

Re: Manchester City Ladies - Toni Duggan {merged}

Gonna post a link to seeing a choice of the top ten players at the moment, some of which I agree with (Not seen too much of Louisa Necib, but she's fooking good and Abby Wambach should be higher as a ridiculous goal scoring machine!)...

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IB-itlQWZZA[/youtube]

 

[Chi-town blues]

Re: Manchester City Ladies - Toni Duggan {merged}

I blame my eyes as I only keep looking for Duggan ;)

 

[Centurions]

Re: Manchester City Ladies - Toni Duggan {merged}

Gonna post a link to seeing a choice of the top ten players at the moment, some of which I agree with (Not seen too much of Louisa Necib, but she's fooking good and Abby Wambach should be higher as a ridiculous goal scoring machine!)...

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IB-itlQWZZA[/youtube]

Cheers for that, can't say I've watched much women's footy (well none to be honest) but that was quite illuminating even if it is only youtube.

Lotta Schelin & Marta stand out for me as quite amazingly skilled. Can we sign them up?

 

[johnnytapia]

Re: Manchester City Ladies - Toni Duggan {merged}

Most male sports had decades of free coverage, but obviously things have changed media-wise. Still, the government should be intervening. Eg Why was there no coverage of the English Ashes win last time round? Even struggle to find anything on Sky.

The BBC did cover the women's darts final which is something, and having male/female tournaments running side-by-side is a good idea.

One problem I see with some ladies team sports is that they just don't work well, and to me football falls into that category. The pitch just looks too big, maybe they need to experiment with new formats to avoid constant comparison with established male versions, 7-a-side perhaps on a smaller pitch and smaller nets. Tennis has a different format in the major tournaments, and it's worked well for years.

I would actually be inclined to agree about shrinking the size of the game, to suit the female ability, at this current stage in development. Whilst the skill factor is there on a decent level, the general stamina it takes to be about the pitch, for 90 mins on a full sized pitch, is different for women.

The playing time shouldn't alter, but the changing the size of the pitch and nets will produce better quality, all round.

For example, we have the biggest pitch in all the FA division(something like 110 x 90/ 93, I think) whilst 100 x 66 yards is Crewe Alexandra's ground, the smallest. I would probably go 5 yards smaller to keep the quality of the women's game, in tact and improve it.

The reason being is it would equalise the gulf between the women that have been playing for years and the ones that have just been given backing. That includes internationals, for me.

Just my opinion on a developing game.

The pitches at the top level have to be the same size these days. You make a valid point but changing the size of pitches and goals would make women's football more expensive and even more inaccessible. The only realistic option would be to shorten the games to 70 or 80 mins but I have no idea whether that's even necessary.

And to johnnytapia, the reason there isn't a queue of 3rd or 4th tier teams looking to sign up Marta is because it's against FIFA's rules. There was a rumour years ago about her playing for Oldham in a non-sanctioned friendly as part of a TV documentary but it never materialised. Even the people in charge at Oldham were convinced she would be better than some of the men they had on their books at the time.

I didn't realise FIFA were allowed to discriminate like that - if so, and I've no reason to doubt you, then yes, women quite clearly will never get to play 3rd, 2nd, any tier of the "men's" professional game. Ability wouldn't matter. Fair point. Guess it would open up a can of worms - you couldn't prohibit men from playing in women's teams etc. It would be interesting to see a woman test FIFA's rules - restriction of trade etc. Is it called the men's premiership, men's world cup etc? If not, I'd have thought someone would have tried a Bosman-like case. I still think the numbers would be minuscule at best. But that's a different argument and well-worn territory.

 

[Dubai Blue]

Re: Manchester City Ladies - Toni Duggan {merged}

FIFA's rules only allow mixed teams up to the age of 11. Seems a unnecessarily young to me but them's the rules.

 

[Corky]

Re: Manchester City Ladies - Toni Duggan {merged}

The FA banned women's football at league grounds when they were getting massive crowds. If that hadn't have happened women's football could have been a major professional sport for decades.

 

[Viva El City]

Re: Manchester City Ladies - Toni Duggan {merged}

I would actually be inclined to agree about shrinking the size of the game, to suit the female ability, at this current stage in development. Whilst the skill factor is there on a decent level, the general stamina it takes to be about the pitch, for 90 mins on a full sized pitch, is different for women.

The playing time shouldn't alter, but the changing the size of the pitch and nets will produce better quality, all round.

For example, we have the biggest pitch in all the FA division(something like 110 x 90/ 93, I think) whilst 100 x 66 yards is Crewe Alexandra's ground, the smallest. I would probably go 5 yards smaller to keep the quality of the women's game, in tact and improve it.

The reason being is it would equalise the gulf between the women that have been playing for years and the ones that have just been given backing. That includes internationals, for me.

Just my opinion on a developing game.

They don't need to alter anything, stamina comes through training, and training comes through funding. All the women's game needs to improve the standard is funding.

Well, that's just not true due to the physiological differences men and women have. Generally, women don't have the testosterone nor the muscle mass to push to the same level as the men for 90 mins.

You will find, one or two, to have similar stamina to a man, but it's rare. So, overall, it's why a women's tennis match can finish in 50 mins, on average. I have seen a fair few games of footy, from start to finish and, on average, the 70 min mark is where the game becomes diminished due to the ground covered.

Less ground to cover will bring the quality up.

Like I said; my opinion.

Testosterone is more associated with 'short sharp' bursts of power rather than endurance - stamina isn't a by product of muscle mass and increasing muscle mass wont give you an advantage from an endurance point of view, infact it would do the opposite. Take a look at the average endurance runner (for the sake of argument let's pick marathon distance or greater) - you will find they are generally quite slight of build and 'wirey'. The performance gap between male and female actually shortens at 'great' (ultra-marathon) distances to the point where a woman has actually won a mixed extreme event.

 

[Bigga]

Re: Manchester City Ladies - Toni Duggan {merged}

They don't need to alter anything, stamina comes through training, and training comes through funding. All the women's game needs to improve the standard is funding.

Well, that's just not true due to the physiological differences men and women have. Generally, women don't have the testosterone nor the muscle mass to push to the same level as the men for 90 mins.

You will find, one or two, to have similar stamina to a man, but it's rare. So, overall, it's why a women's tennis match can finish in 50 mins, on average. I have seen a fair few games of footy, from start to finish and, on average, the 70 min mark is where the game becomes diminished due to the ground covered.

Less ground to cover will bring the quality up.

Like I said; my opinion.

Testosterone is more associated with 'short sharp' bursts of power rather than endurance - stamina isn't a by product of muscle mass and increasing muscle mass wont give you an advantage from an endurance point of view, infact it would do the opposite. Take a look at the average endurance runner (for the sake of argument let's pick marathon distance or greater) - you will find they are generally quite slight of build and 'wirey'. The performance gap between male and female actually shortens at 'great' (ultra-marathon) distances to the point where a woman has actually won a mixed extreme event.

Using your own 'argument', you will find football matches full of "short sharp bursts of power". You will need 'stamina' to be constantly doing this for 90 mins +. For some reason you are equating marathons with football and expecting women to have the same overall power, as men.

Your point illustrates how rare it is for a woman to beat a man in an equal event of power and endurance, as I have already conceded to, much earlier on.

On average 70 mins is where the majority of women fade during the game and leave massive holes in their formation. I have seen it a crazy amount of times in their game! Why haven't you, if you have watched the amount of games I have??

 

[Viva El City]

Re: Manchester City Ladies - Toni Duggan {merged}

My point has been consistent throughout, STAMINA. Endurance running is entirely stamina based so is an obvious example. Football is an endurance sport for some positions more than others (particularly the fullbacks under Pellegrini), the original point is that training will increase the quality of women's football. We appear to be going in circles so this is no longer a productive use of my time. Have a nice day.