S ome see the decision to use artificial surfaces as discriminatory and point the finger firmly at FIFA. Is that fair? Shouldn't critics be looking closer at the surfaces women already play on regularly?
The top five ranked nations in women's football – the USA, Germany, Japan, France and Sweden – along with Scotland and England, have senior women’s teams playing on artificial turf regularly within their national league systems. Within those seven nations, there are 25 top flight teams playing at 23 different stadia which have artificial surfaces.
The real discrimination is that out of those 23 stadia which regularly host top flight women’s games on artifical surfaces, only 40 per cent are checked and approved by FIFA – and only 32 per cent are checked annually to comply with FIFA’s top quality mark, FIFA 2 Star. Clearly there have been no headlines about how the national leagues are being sued for discrimination as a result of playing on these artificial pitches.
Some of the players who feel so strongly about being “forced” to play on FIFA approved pitches during Canada 2015 are, it seems, happy to ply their trade on untested, unregulated artificial pitches during their regular season.