Column: Lingerie football? Our real sporting heroines deserve limelight first

WOMEN. PLAYING AMERICAN Football. In lingerie. In Ireland. There’s a lot that is odd about that idea, but the organisers behind America’s Lingerie Football league seem to believe that there is enough about the concept to introduce it to a series of countries across Europe, including Ireland.

Thankfully, we live in a country where everyone can pretty much do as they please – aside from inflicting hurt on others – and if there are women out there that prefer playing a sport in their underwear rather than competing at a decent level in the many other options available to them, I’m not about to criticise.

However, as someone who was involved in sport for years and who talks to female athletes on a regular basis, I can promise you that women don’t want to be known for being good at something because of their sex, they want to be known for the skills that they have spent years developing – demonstrating the same level of commitment as their male counterparts.

I spent some time recently talking to a player that competes in the Women’s National League for Cork Women’s FC. She spoke at length about her desire to win every game that she is part of and as someone who is also involved in the Cork Ladies football panel, she quite often plays back-to-back competitive fixtures with 24 hours. When I asked her why she pushes herself to that degree, her answer was simple: “I just love it.”

Boxers in skirts

Those sentiments are not unusual and you’ll find them in every dressing room up and down the country – regardless of whether participants are male or female.

The recent adventures of Katie Taylor in London have done a lot to counter the belief that women’s sport isn’t competitive. The Bray woman was repeatedly described as a great fighter at 2012 Olympic Games rather than a great female boxer and those tributes will, no doubt, have meant the world to her.

The focus was firmly on Taylor’s ability and potential rather than her looks and what she was wearing, and let’s not forget that there were moves to have the female boxers wear skirts while competing at these Games.

Research in the UK by the Women’s Sport Fitness Foundation has found that women’s sports account for only five per cent of all television coverage in the UK on a yearly basis (in a non-Olympic year) and that just 0.5 per cent of all sports sponsorship secured was used to support female competitors or teams.

More recent findings – from a survey conducted during the Olympics Games - confirmed a growing interest in women’s sport in the UK with 74 per cent of respondents impressed by the quality of what they witnessed in London.

In Ireland, like the UK, only a limited amount of air time is given over to women’s sports outside of the Olympic Games. It includes coverage of the All-Ireland Ladies Football and Camogie finals as well as Wimbledon’s Ladies Singles final.

Vicious circle

Editors and TV schedulers will argue there’s only a niche interest in many of these sports and that viewing figures don’t justify coverage. However, exposure to a mass audience is crucial in driving the development and popularity of any sport and more TV and media coverage is essential if women’s sports are to gain increased interest, backing and crowds.

It’s a vicious circle. Sports and individual competitors don’t get extra attention from the media and Ireland’s sporting public without a decent level of interest, but they usually need that same attention to increase the numbers interested in the first place. Take Irish cricket as an example – the squad did well at successive international tournaments that were broadcast on Sky and suddenly interest at grassroots level has skyrocketed. It’s not just women that have to battle to secure some prime time television coverage!

Katie Taylor’s achievements will hopefully inspire a generation of young Irish girls to become more active in sport over the coming years but though we knew we had a world class boxer on our hands, she still prepared for the Olympic Games in a gym without a toilet and rarely had any of her fights before London covered live on television.

The ESRI found that four in every five Irish women were not getting enough daily exercise in 2005 and though the Irish Sports Council’s ‘Women in Sport Initiative’ is hard at work trying to reverse this, our gold medal-winning Olympian will probably achieve more in terms of getting children active in Ireland than any other State scheme.

Thousands of women across the island demonstrate the same dedication and will to win as Katie Taylor week in week out, and they are only too ready and able to take up the mantle of putting women’s sport up on a public stage where it belongs. The talent is there, the infrastructures are (slowly) improving while the establishment of the Women’s National League in 2011 are important developments in the overall picture.

However, these steps need to be accompanied by a better understanding of some of the biggest issues facing all sports in Ireland – so forget about women playing American football in lingerie, it’s time to give our real sporting heroines more of the limelight.

Niamh O’Mahony is a journalist, content strategist and sports fanatic based in Cork. She blogs at Balls Handbags.

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