Women's and Girls' Football

Women’s and girls’ football continues to grow with more players competing in affiliated competition than any other team sport.

There has been an increase in the number of players, clubs, leagues and competitions since 1993; the number of players has increased from 10,400 to over 150,000 today.

Sport England’s Active People survey in 2008 highlighted that 260,000 women and 1.1 million girls play some form of football in England. There are 26 million females playing across the world, of which 4.1 million are playing affiliated football – this is a 54% growth since the year 2000 (FIFA Big Count 2006).

Over 16,000 females have successfully attained FA coaching qualifications, 1,300 female referees have been trained by The FA and full-time women’s football development officers are employed across the country. Women’s football has a well-regarded player pathway and a strong Centres of Excellence infrastructure. The number of national players emerging from these Centres is evidence of their success.

There are 52 licensed FA Centres of Excellence in operation across England providing weekly quality coaching and a localised fixture programme for talented girls from the age of 8-16.