Sophie Greenwood

UA92 | | Degree: BSc (Hons) Sports and Exercise Science| Level 6
Perceptions of women's football in university female fans, following England women's Euro 2022 football victory

Abstract

Within the last century, English women’s football has gone from being banned pre 1921 to the National team being crowned 2022 European with record-breaking attendance, demonstrating a significant rise in its popularity. In this study, the perceptions of four women's football fans aged 20-22 were explored. using semi-structured interviews lasting 30-37 minutes. Braun and Clarke’s (2006) six-stage framework on thematic analysis was adopted to inspect the transcribed interviews, generating 21 codes that were underpinned by 3 main themes. The three main themes analysed were the ‘popularity’, ‘accessibility’ and ‘stereotypes’ with findings indicating that women’s football is becoming more popular and normalised. Participants identified football as “entertaining”, especially in the younger generation. Whilst, there is still stereotyping and traditional beliefs of female football within society, the results demonstrated that perceptions of women’s football have positively changed, increasing opportunities for younger and older females in schools and communities. This study supports the growing body of research across women’s sport, aiming to develop acceptance and engagement from all, around females playing the great game of football.

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Sophie Greenwood