Uefa urges Safa to invest in resources, make women's football aspirational

Uefa Assists programme officials, who have been in SA to advise on how the women's game can grow, have urged SA's football mother body Safa to invest in resources and make women's football aspirational.

The Uefa Assists initiative aims to help develop football around the world, and they work with different football associations.  They have been involved in 400 football development projects in 60 nations. 

Yesterday, the head of international relations at Uefa,  Eva Pasquier, and Uefa Assists official Kenny Macleod visited SowetanLive's Marawa Sports Worldwide (MSW) show to discuss their findings about SA football and recommendations they made to Safa. 

Pasquier, who specialises in the development of women's football, elaborated on how there's not a lack of talent in the continent but of resources in terms of facilities and funding.  

“In Africa, the biggest problem is not that there is no interest or talent, the challenges are there with the provision of infrastructure and provision of funds which are needed for the development of football at whichever level you are," Pasquier told MSW host Robert Marawa. 

She acknowledged that Safa is in the right direction with their equal policy on the national teams –Bafana Bafana and Banyana Banyana – when they make appearances. However, she said for women the money is not enough to sustain themselves.  

“The first step has been done, the equal salary for male and female national team players, which is very important.

"Are they able to live off this money? Are they able to survive? Most probably not; they will have to take another job. They will not be able to concentrate their efforts on football," she said on MSW. 

Macleod said Safa is on par with some of the Uefa associations with the progress they have done on the field but still lacked on the administration front. 

“On the pitch, it’s going great, you can benchmark yourselves against a lot of European federations in that way but there’s a lot of work to be done on the pitch, maybe a little bit from the administration point of view," Macleod told Marawa. 

Macleod went on to reveal that they suggested to Safa that they need to invest in the promotion of women's football among young girls, saying they have to use the upcoming Fifa Women's World Cup to make it aspirational for girls.

"What we want to challenge the federation on is to make women’s football more aspirational, so that when a young girl is choosing which sporting code, chooses football. That’s one of the challenges they haven’t thought too much about at this stage.

“I enjoyed challenging them on that. What are you doing, what is your brand strategy and the image they’re trying to create for young girls to play this game? They have this unbelievable opportunity with the World Cup coming up in a few months," Macleod said.