BQ, that comes across as very condescending. Women’s rugby for girls only? As a male member of a family in which more females than males both hold Quins season tickets and play the game, one of the huge attractions of rugby is that it’s a far more family friendly sport than soccer or even cricket. There were a higher proportion of women in the stands than usual on Saturday, but mostly because a lot of girls’ youth teams had turned up to watch it.
The women’s game does need our support. In many ways it’s where the men’s game was in the late 1990s, except that the backers of the clubs are older and wiser and being more cautious with their money - so there’s no injection of cash to kickstart everything. If fans start turning up to the games on a regular basis, then the revenue will start to enable more fully pro players and the quality will rise. Some of the skills on display from Quins at the weekend were on a par with those of their male counterparts, but there are only one or two teams with enough pro players to reach that level. If we want that to change -and I think as fans of the game we should, because it’s another way to get players and supporters into the game - then we need to vote with our feet and our wallets.
It's not condescending in the slightest, it's the opposite.
It's the entire driver behind the growth in the game and why companies/sponsors/etc who obviously want to project (or actually have) an interest in equality but also want to make money have finally got off their behinds and started doing something about.
I've spent a lot of time talking to people like Maggie Alphonsi and other female sporting role models who are working in the field as part of my job.
It's a success story.
The point is they don't have to convert lots of middle aged men with "traditional" views who (and some lurk here) post disparaging comments about women's sport. They have a massive audience out there who haven't been encouraged to go to live sport who are now starting to do so. If existing fans do it's a bonus, but that's not where they see the potential for growth.
The women's rugby world cup in France was a massive success, and the tickets were sold in large numbers to women and teenage girls not to existing rugby fans - it is entirely uncondescending and in fact vital to the future direction of the sport to note that this is a very difficult demographic to get to go and watch live sport.
Many women (such as Maggie) will tell you that they talk to hundreds of women who say they didn't grow up being encouraged to go to watch team sport, that they felt it "wasn't for them", for reasons of culture, stereotypes and a lack of role models.
There was some great rugby played at the Stoop on Saturday - and yes "male" rugby is a highly family-orientated sport compared to, say, football - but the normal Stoop crowd is nonetheless male dominated (and 35+).
On Saturday the crowd was noticeably different (as it was at the women's world cup) - and Levi thingy the membership manager said he met tonnes of people who had never been to a rugby match before.
It's entirely a good thing that there is a big unexploited market of potential fans because that's why commercial companies will reach a tipping point and help the game grow - and nothing to do with saying that women's sport is for women.
If more of us go then great -- I really enjoyed it. The point is that's not where those actually involved in growing the sport think the growth is going to come from.
And if they can therefore avoid having to try to attract dull middle aged rugby bores who maintain that women can't play sport at the same standard as men then it can't be bad.
