How can you be so out of touch with reality to joke about sexuality when we are entering a period where a World Cup is being held in a country where you can be prosecuted for being gay, and there are likely hundreds/thousands pro footballers around world hiding their sexuality.
One of the many lovely parts of this Jake Daniels coming out story is that Sky Sports News and his club, Blackpool, have been aware of it for several months and it hasn't leaked, and they've worked out the best way for him to share his story. There are good people out there.
Sky Sports comms said yesterday that Vivianne Miedema and Beth Mead will go to Paris for the Ballon d’Or ceremony in a private jet alongside Bukayo Saka and Edu. Good to see from Arsenal 🔴⚪️
Before Sarina Wiegman was appointed England manager, Mary Earps considered retiring from football, certainly internationally. Now she's having her first name chanted by fans every time she touches the ball.
This afternoon Arsenal defender and England captain, Leah Williamson, will become the first England women’s footballer and Arsenal player to address the United Nations, where she will make an impassioned plea to challenge gender stereotypes and level the playing field for girls.
BREAKING: BBC and ITV will provide live TV coverage of the 2023 FIFA Women’s World Cup in Australia and New Zealand
In total all 64 matches from the tournament will be broadcast in the UK on either BBC or ITV except for the Final, which will be shown across both BBC One and ITV1
This is what happens when you market an elite level sport as something which allows fans to spend time speaking to players after every match. Fans become entitled, and it’s impossible for players to live up to, even if they wanted to, now the game has grown.
Disappointing that Sky Sports have given literally 10 seconds to Sheffield United’s tributes to Maddy Cusack, and given a longer package to the Solheim Cup
To pay tribute to Beth Mead’s mum, England women will wear Ovarian Cancer Action pin badges on their anthem jackets before kick-off. The Arnold Clark Cup also has a partnership with Ovarian Cancer action
Again, England using their platform for the greater good 💓
Lotte Wubben-Moy: “I’m at the stage in my career where I don’t want to be taken for granted, I want to push and (prove) I can go toe-to-toe with these players. Bunny Shaw didn’t have a great day today but I think that was because I had a good day.”
Breaking: Chelsea striker Sam Kerr today appeared in court accused of alleged racially aggravated harassment of a police officer (PC Lovell). She plead not guilty. There will be a four-day trial, scheduled for next February.
Maybe I’m triggered because I lost my mum to cancer but when you see a statement that says “family circumstances” after Mead has already openly talked about the fact her mum is in hospital and her family couldn’t travel to the game last night maybe just have a bit of respect.
“I was never one of the best footballers so I had to help team morale.”
A Euros winner, a full trophy cabinet but still as humble and down to earth as ever. Jill Scott.
🚨 Vivianne Miedema STAYS at Arsenal
“I feel like for me, winning titles with Arsenal will mean a lot more to me than winning them with another club at the moment. And that’s what I obviously hope to achieve with Arsenal,” she said.
This goal has 2.3 million views in 13 hours. Whatever is said about women’s football it is very, very clear it is on an upward trajectory. Jonas Eidevall right last night when he said we are witnessing history.
Doesn't matter how many ACL's I've seen in person, you feel sick every time. Really, really, really hope that isn't the case for Keira Walsh, but she mouthed to the physio "I've done my knee", and looked in serious pain
Exc: I understand Vivianne Miedema’s new deal at Arsenal is longer than a one-year extension
Story: Vivianne Miedema shuns Barcelona and PSG to stay at Arsenal
So proud of all the women’s footballers who have posted about their relationships on social media today, especially those who have taken that big step for the first time. It’s the exact reason why I and others are able to be comfortable being who we are in the game we love ❤️🏳️🌈
Going to be an emotional day. Three years today since I lost my mum to cancer. Thinking of Beth Mead too with players wearing black armbands to mark her mum’s passing, and fans of both Arsenal and Chelsea planning a moments applause in the 9th minute of todays game❤️Cancer sucks
Leah Williamson: This hasn’t just been a change for women's football but society in general. Tomorrow is not the end of a journey but the start of one."
To be fair to Beth Mead, I can’t think of anything else she could’ve done to win that award, on a personal level. On a team level a trophy for Arsenal and going further into the Champions League would probably have helped, but there’s obviously lots of variables that affect that
Watching back Keira Walsh’s assist for Ella Toone’s goal in the Euros final. It is ridiculous. There’s a five yard pass to Russo or an easy option to Daly on the left. Instead she produced a pass which cuts 8 Germany players out of the game and leaves Toone with the GK to beat 😮💨
Arsenal manager Jonas Eidevall on if he's daunted by facing Champions League holders Barcelona:
"It's a very good football team, but they are also beatable. It's 11 humans against 11 humans tomorrow. In Sweden, we say 'a shovel is a shovel'. A football game is a football game."
Tickets have sold out at the Camp Nou for Barcelona women’s match against Wolfsburg in the Champions League semi-finals in just 24 hours.
I guess that is a pretty clear answer to those asking if people just went for a one-off against Real Madrid last week.
Chelsea making a real spectacle of this trophy lift. First the backroom staff came onto the pitch, then Emma Hayes, and now each individual player in the squad running out of the tunnel to collect their medal separately to big applause
From a completely neutral club standpoint, it is bloody lovely to see Jen Beattie scoring in a Champions League semi-final after everything she's been through.
Kim Little has completed 129 of her 130 passes against Bristol City - a 99.2% completion rate. That is absolutely unbelievable. What a player, ageing like a fine wine 🍷
#WSL
#Arsenal
Exclusive: Kelly Smith joins Arsenal women’s first team coaching staff on a part-time basis for the rest of the season
Will be in the dugout at the Emirates stadium for Arsenal v Wolfsburg on Monday
@TimesSport
Every single one of these men clapping has no right to be anything to do with football, and even less so piggyback off the success of a team who won in spite of their manager + federation
After a wonderful on-pitch WWC, a stark reminder of exactly how far we have to go off of it
NEW: England drew 0-0 with Canada in a behind closed doors game this evening.
Every member of England squad apart from Ellie Roebuck and Bethany England, played in some capacity (roll on roll off subs).
Good news in the latest step of Millie Bright’s injury return.
🚨 Fran Kirby unavailable for Chelsea and England for the “forseeable future”, according to manager Emma Hayes, because she is suffering from as of yet undiagnosed fatigue
Puts her Euro 2022 future in doubt and is a blow for Chelsea. More importantly, desperately unlucky for her
*Trigger warning cancer/grief*
Beth Mead to BBC Sport:
“I know I’m not going to share them moments with my mum for the rest of her life anymore. So to share that moment with her last summer was just incredible. For me footballs always been my first true love.”
Vivianne Miedema has become the only player in FA WSL history to score against every single side they have faced in the competition Miedema has scored against 14 of the 14 teams she’s faced.
Emma Hayes presents Fara Williams with a Chelsea shirt with her name on, and a bouquet of flowers, in her final WSL match before she retires, against her former club
Exclusive interview with Tobin Heath for
@TimesSport
: ‘I love London – I get to live my dream as a professional footballer, and nobody knows who I am’
“Why wasn’t there a defibrillator? At this billion dollar state-of-the-art stadium, which has a VIP suite so lavish it includes a bedroom…why was there no defibrillator to hand?“
We don't always see too many elaborate celebrations in women's football, but you can tell that 92nd minute winner meant a lot to Sam Kerr and the team as a whole.
The next time a man asks “do you REALLY like football though?”
My response will be that I watched all 120 minutes of the Europa League final between Villarreal and Manchester United as a neutral
BREAKING: £8 million per year rights deal for Women’s Super League games on Sky Sports + BBC. To go from ‘deal’ that only covered production costs to this,is genuine break into mainstream
FA anticipate WSL will be most watched women’s sport league in the🌎
More on
@TimesSport
No concussion subs after Arsenal did right thing in taking off Mead who had been accidentally headbutted is ridiculous. They should be commonplace. Could hear Eidevall saying “what do you mean, no?” to official. Arsenal had used 3 sub windows but in WSL could use 1 concussion sub
Arsenal v Chelsea on Sunday in the Women’s Super League ⬇️
Arsenal will wear black armbands at the request of the players for Beth Mead’s mum passing away.
I understand Chelsea will wear black armbands to mark the passing of Gianluca Vialli.
Exclusive w/
@frankirby
@TimesSport
After 18 years of knee pain, starting when she was just 12, surgery to remove (pieces of) bone has given Kirby new lease of life
Now she can walk her dogs again, a joyful part of her life she’d lost earlier this year
I’m sorry you feel so threatened by womens football you highlight one poor miss in 100’s of clips BBC Sport posted during the tournament of fantastic play. I’m also sorry your masculinity must be so fragile you can’t accept women do indeed play football and they’re good at it✌🏻
35,000 tickets sold for the women’s North London Derby at the Emirates between Arsenal and Tottenham Hotspur on September 24. Current WSL record attendance is 38,000 👀
Leah Williamson’s interview in Women’s Health Mag is fantastic in drawing awareness on those issues and I learnt something new: “I had a concussion which they say can really impact your next period and it was bad – like, really bad.”
Don’t worry, England only beat Austria 1-0 in the first game of the women’s Euro’s and looked middling at best. Lifted the trophy 25 days later.
#Euro2024
#Lionesses
#ENG
Horrible, horrible way for Chelsea to lose that game. Deflected goal and then a second yellow card that should never have been. Poor officiating all evening. A real shame for a game of this magnitude to be altered by a decision like that.
If you’re looking for an example of the growth in value of women’s football and the players at the top end of the game, a world record breaking £500,000 bid being rejected is a pretty good one.
Rachel Daly announces her international retirement. It is hard to quantify just how brilliant and underrated her contribution has been to England, playing out of position and always giving her all. She filled in, in the position that was stopping England winning. Then they won 👏🏻
Lovely quote from Jonas Eidevall on the growing numbers watching Arsenal women at the Emirates
“I get the sense that we’re seeing history getting created very quickly in front of our eyes, when I see how the attendances and the culture is here at the Emirates Stadium." (1/2)