Why more of Fifa’s billions must be ploughed into Women's football

As a non-profit organization, Fifa should spend its money on programmes that are visible, instead of putting money in projects in countries that do nothing for the game

As we watch the final game of the Women’s World Cup in Vancouver, Canada, please keep in mind that the game is being played by the ladies for the love of the game. The women who play this game sacrifice a lot to play, including our own Super Falcons.

Very few countries have functioning leagues and when they do have one, it is usually not financially viable. But the women persevere. This World Cup is being played on artificial turf (absolutely does not happen in the men’s game), the teams/opponents share hotels and the prize money is a meager $15 million (up from $10 million in 2011) with $2 million going to the winning team.

The 16 teams at the 2014 World Cup Brazil that did not get out of the Group stage got $8 million each, $6 million more than the winner of tomorrow’s final game. The obvious disparity is so glaring that FIFA and its executive committee should be ashamed of themselves.

The world body of football is sitting on over a billion dollars and it decides to spend this small amount of money on our women. FIFA gives out more money to individual federations through its ‘corrupt’ Goal Project than it will give to the majority of the teams in Canada. On the average, a federation will get about $650,000 after the winner takes home $2 million. 

For the records, FIFA is a non-profit organization and it should spend its money on programmes that are visible (Women’s World Cup) instead of putting money in projects in countries that do nothing for the game.

The winner of the Women's World Cup gets just $2m in prize money

Nigeria has collected close to $2 million from FIFA under its Goal Project, we claim to have built two technical centers and I stand to be corrected if they are ever in use. The World Cup is still the most important and biggest women’s sporting event in the world. It is bigger than the World Championship in basketball, rugby and cricket and yet it is treated in this manner.

Now that we know that our football federation will have some money ($300K) come to them for our Super Falcons’ participation, our question should be what to do with this money?

In the USA that has seen three professional female football leagues fail in the last several years, the one in operation today is handsomely being supported by the USA, Canada and Mexico federations. These federations pay a salary to national team members that play in the league, in a way to help the league survive. The US federation pays 24 national team players, the Canadian federation pays 16 and the Mexican federations pay between 12 and 16 of its national team players playing in the professional soccer league in the US.

The survival of the league is partly due to this subsidy (not fuel subsidy), and many other small innovations like the family hosting system. In the towns where these teams play, families guest host the players for the three months of the league; this is another form of subsidy. Many players do not have to pay rent and other things that come with renting a place for three months.

In Houston, I know that a former Houston Rockets coach, Jeff Vangundy presently hosts two national team players that play for the Houston Dash. These three federations plough their FIFA money back into the game for their game to develop and we can all see how well they are doing.

I know that the women’s game does not command as much money as the men’s World Cup, but FIFA can learn from what the US Tennis Federation did many years ago. In 1973, the tennis federation started to pay both men and women participating in the US Open the same amount. See how far women’s tennis has come, not only in the US but around the world.

FIFA must make serious concessions to the women in the next several World Cups, so that the women’s game might grow.