Without bums on seats, support for women is lip service
Who better to ask about the notion that 2018 has been a pivotal one for women’s sport in Ireland than six athletes who are at the top of their game right now?
They were unanimous in their belief that it was and statistics back them up.
Ireland won 54 medals in Olympic sports in 2016. That jumped to 73 last year and to 75 this year and, significantly, this was the first year that women and girls won more medals (over 60%) than their male counterparts.
2018 also saw a new attendance record at the ladies football All-Ireland finals (50,141) but that one day in September continues to be the exception to the rule. Men’s sport, as a rule, (especially team sport) continues to attract many more regular attendees and far bigger audiences.
Dublin football captain Sinéad Aherne didn’t put a tooth in it: If the Irish women’s hockey team do not sell-out their Olympic qualifying tournament in Dublin next June then all the support they received last summer was mere lip service.
That’s already easy to suspect given that attendances at the EYHL (the women’s domestic club league) have not seen any noticeable increase this season.
Irish captain Katie Mullan, one of four Irish women now playing Bundesliga hockey, says club attendances in Germany are similarly small.
But she noted that more people come to watch when women’s games are played as double-headers with their men’s team and likens Germany’s multi-sport clubs to the GAA’s ‘One Club’ principle.
But the ‘one club’ notion is not universal in GAA clubs and a ‘one county’ notion — supporting your inter-county team irrespective of gender — is something that’s still largely absent and deeply frustrates female inter-county players.
Ditto with our international rugby and soccer players. The IRFU’s social media tag-line is #teamofus but, if that really was the case, wouldn’t far more Ireland rugby supporters go to women’s Six Nations games, irrespective of their form?
Women’s sport advocates in Ireland launched the 20x20 campaign this Autumn with the aim of increasing participation/attendances/media coverage of women’s sport by 20% by the year 2020.
But inherent in any such campaign is the danger of becoming an echo chamber and not reaching and convincing more non-converts to your cause.
Bums on seats are vital. They help to convince sponsors and media that there is a growing audience for women’s sport and that investment, in turn, helps athletes to become better due to improved support systems.
Bums on seats are still pretty scarce for women-only events.
The recent annual Teneo Sport and Sponsorship Index found that 58% of 1000 people felt women’s sport didn’t get sufficient media coverage.
But it also found that only 41% had watched a female sports event (on TV or online) in 2018, and that number was only 35% when it came to women.
Worse still, only 13% had actually attended a women’s sport event in 2018, 12% in the case of women.
Munster, in fairness, bucked the trend slightly where 50% had watched a women’s event and 17% had attended one.
But the overall trend shows an obvious hypocrisy.
You can’t criticise the media for lack of coverage but rarely watch or go to a women’s event and women, it appears, are marginally more hypocritical about that than men.
People argue that you cannot make people watch events if they don’t find them skillful or entertaining but that happens all the time in male sport.
Male athletes are not always brilliant or eye-catching yet people still support them loyally because it’s ‘their team’.
Irish women proved how skilful and entertaining they were throughout 2018. Katie Taylor retained her IBF and WBA world professional boxing titles and Kellie Harrington became only the third Irish boxer to win a World amateur title.
Sanita Puspure became a world rowing champion, the women’s hockey team made the World Cup final and Jenny Egan won bronze at the canoe sprint World Championships.
Ellen Keane became a European para-swimming champion, Sarah Healy became a double European youth champion on the track. Ireland’s U20 4x100m relay team won silver at the World Junior Championships and Rachael Blackmore is currently involved in an epic tussle for national hunt’s jockey’s title.
The Cork camogie team retained their All-Ireland title in another cliff-hanger with Kilkenny and the Dublin ladies footballers made history with their first league/championship double.
All of that was compelling action from star athletes. The pity is that more sports fans don’t show them regular support, especially where it matters most — in the stands.
KELLIE HARRINGTON (2018 World Amateur Boxing champion (60kg) and European bronze medallist)
“I was genuinely shocked to win Sportswoman of the Year because of the amazing amount of success that Irish women had this year. I think we should keep talking about it, we need to keep talking about it because it needs to be recognised. I really appreciate that the media have given women’s sport a good bit of coverage this year, I really do, but I would like to see a lot more for female boxing. The only way people here could see the World Championships was on streaming, there was no live TV.”
“I’d like to see a lot more going into getting females into boxing clubs. People say ‘strike when the iron is hot.’ Well the iron is very, very hot right now. There’s me, there’s Katie Taylor in the professional ranks and we also have a lot of other girls who medalled at things like European Youths this year. I’d love to see more funding going into clubs that is put aside especially for girls, to help keep them in there. In my club there’s four of us girls in the elite group which probably has 20 to 30 lads. There’s 100 kids in my club training every Monday/Wednesday/Friday and a lot of girls in that. The challenge is trying to keep them in there”
KATIE MULLAN (Captain of Ireland team that won silver in the 2018 Hockey World up)
“It definitely feels like that. It’s the success in competition that is the most powerful
element of it all for me, and there’s been so much of that this year.
“People performing well is the best way to reach out to young girls, to give them a reason to get involved. Let the actions do the talking is how I view it.
“This year, whether in the ring, on the pitch, in the boat, on the athletics track etc... there’s just been some incredible performances.
“It’s the success of Irish women in sport this year that’s been the biggest driving force.”
“We can’t expect that this success will continue if we don’t have the necessary funding and support.
The 20x20 initiative is really powerful obviously but it needs to get to the point where we’re not talking about 20x20 anymore because there’s no issue there; where everything for female and male athletes is level peggging.
“We had to do this (20x20) in order to get there and we’re going in the right direction.
“I like to reinforce that it’s so important for other women to get behind us.
It’s not something that’s going to change without their support, so, as long as we are united about that, we’re heading in the right direction.”
ELLEN KEANE (European Para-swimming champion in SB8 100m breaststroke)
“It has been an incredibly successful year for Irish sport in general, not just women, but the fact that women are getting more coverage and more people are aware of what’s going on, that means that we are recognising it a bit more. Better media coverage is definitely one of the reasons why everyone’s so in tune with it and I think that’s great for future generations. Young girls have so many role models now in so many different sports so hopefully, in their school PE classes, they’ll ask ‘can we try this and that?’ now.”
Sponsors appear to be balancing their investment better between male and female athletes so more of that please and more coverage of female competitions.
I think the 20x20 campaign is bringing out a calendar with all the women’s events in 2019 and that’s amazing. I’d like to go and see more (women’s) events but usually don’t know when they’re on. You feel bad looking on Twitter and seeing there was something on but you missed it so I’m really excited about having a source where I can everything that’s going on and pick events to go to.”
KATIE WALSH (Third in 2012 Aintree G/National and rode a third Cheltenham winner in 2018 before retiring)
“It was huge. The women’s hockey was massive. I’m not gonna lie, I hadn’t watched a lot of hockey before but I found myself stuck to the TV and looking up the rules online!
“That was just great. For me what Rachael Blackmore is doing in National Hunt racing at the moment is absolutely huge, she is absolutely bombing along.
“Then Leona Maguire getting her European Tour card and Katie Taylor winning again.
“You could talk about even more successes this year, so I’d feel it was a huge one for Irish women in sport.”
“It’s going in the right direction so just keep going. There seems to be a lot of women involved in sport right now and when they’re getting the opportunities they’re taking them, putting their head down, doing what they need to do and getting the job done.
In racing that’s the way it has always worked.
“You just put your head down, keep working, try and stay injury-free and do the best you can and I think the same goes for most athletes, in any sport.”
LEONA MAGUIRE (Broke record for most weeks at the top of World Amateur golf rankings in 2018 before turning professional)
“The women’s hockey was definitely a highlight of the summer but even the amount of world titles (won) this year across a load of different sports. For me that’s the
biggest thing, that it’s not just one or two sports but success across such a wide range of sports. What Irish women have won this year has been phenomenal.”
“I’m involved in the 20x20 campaign and I think that’s definitely generated a great buzz. Just getting that exposure is important, making people aware how good women’s sport is in Ireland. As a country we traditionally always get behind our teams and support them.
“We love to celebrate Irish sport, so I think it’s really important to let people know what’s happening and when things are on, because I think Irish people will always get behind it then.
“I’ve explained the concept of 20x20 to others abroad and there’s loads of people wanting to get involved.
“That’s the power of social media now. You can spread a message all over the place very quickly. That’s why it will be exciting to see where 20x20 goes in the next two years.”
SINÉAD AHERNE (Dublin ladies football captain and 2018 LGFA Footballer of the Year)
“I think there was a lot more conversation about women’s sport naturally because of 20x20 and it was about time that people started taking stock of what is out there. It was great too that so much success happened in so many different sports. I thought the calibre of athletes across so many different sports was just phenomenal and the level of their achievements, winning World and European championships in a non-Olympic year, that was amazing.”
“I think the media has begun to move, the standard of the game has begun to move and because of that the sponsors are starting to move so it’s all circular. However the next part that has to come is attendance. People respect the game now so it’s about getting opportunities for them to see it more. From my perspective, I’d like to see more double-headers with our male counterparts and use that as a stepping stone to grow bigger and more regular attendance. The hockey team are playing in Dublin next Summer and those matches really should be selling out. If that’s not happening then we’re talking in a vacuum and things haven’t really changed much.”
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