The representation and visibility of International Women’s Day 2023

Another year, another piece of history. International Women’s Day has fallen upon us once again on Wednesday 8th March 2023. It’s a time where women can celebrate the achievements made by all. And with every yearly celebration comes with a specific focus to target. This year - #EmbraceEquity. The aim is to focus in on the gender equity and the differences it has from equality. And where football is concerned, equal opportunities for girls and women at all levels are still unbalanced – just take a look at what Chelsea manager, Emma Hayes, thought about the current standards.

Women’s football is gradually increasing and improving across aspects of the game and the female representation within the sport is something to highlight. Nicole Allison, CEO of Worcester City Women Football Club, commented on International Women’s Day and the role it helps play within women’s football and all the continuous improvement. She said:

“In the last three to five years particularly, we’ve seen growth not just on the pitch of course with the players, but also coach development. And also, off the pitch we see more females in media, with pundits and co-commentators in commentating. We see presenting; and that’s really important for visibility so that young girls grow up knowing that they can work in these roles in football. This is an industry for them.

Allison further added: “And it’s really also important for young boys to grow up seeing women in these roles because it starts to normalise women and girls being involved in football. The achievements have been significant, there’s still a long, long way to go, and I think that’s where all of us are responsible to ensure that future generations don’t even need to be talking about gender equality or equity – which is of course the main theme of International Women’s Day this year - to embrace equity.

The end goal in years to come is strive to what this year’s campaign is all about – beginning to see equity roll into motion. The CEO of Worcester City – an ambitious football club, is strongly passionate about witnessing changes to the current world.

“In the future, we don’t want to even be talking about that, we don’t even need to want to feel like we need to have an International Women’s Day, where we have to raise awareness of the inequalities that currently exists in our world. And we have to keep striving for that and that’s what International Women’s Day is about”.