The WSL could bypass the Saturday 3pm blackout rule as stakeholders look to explore growing the league's audience.
The current ruling ensures that no live games in both men's and women's football can be transmitted on a Saturday afternoon, meaning fans are left to either keep track of the score via Twitter, radio or goals shows like Soccer Saturday. The ruling has been in place since the 1960s with an original purpose of ensuring attendances weren't diminished by the introduction of live television.
The rule also covers women's football in England, however the FA are now looking at the possibility of ending the blackout rule, at least for WSL fixtures. But Director of Women's Football, Baroness Sue Campbell, believes it would provide a chance for younger supporters to watch more women's football than previously.
The current regular broadcast slots for WSL fixtures are Saturday or Sunday lunchtime, normally shown by the BBC, and a Sunday evening game, broadcast live on Sky Sports. But the current broadcast contract expires at the end of the coming season.
"Whatever we do, we need regular opportunities to view games," Baroness Campbell told a Culture, Media and Sport Committee meeting on women's sport. "We have great visibility on the television, we had great BBC coverage during the Euros.
"That consistent opportunity to view the women's game is important. It still is a little bit random - you're not sure what time or day you're going to be able to turn on and see it, we need to get some consistency.
"We have been exploring Article 48, which is the whole business around 3pm on a Saturday which when it was put in place was for men's football. We want to see, could the women have that slot on television?"
Although there are occasional exceptions to the blackout rule - such as the FA Cup final - it has ensured UK-based football fans have to go to games in person to see traditional Saturday 3pm kick-offs live. The long-standing rule stops games being screened from 2.45pm until 5.15pm
It even extends to showing overseas football with Sky Sports unable to show the first 15 minutes of an El Clasico between Barcelona and Real Madrid in 2014, Luis Suarez's debut for the Catalan giants. This means the WSL could take advantage of an untapped market, if the rule no longer applied to women's football.
Baroness Campbell also explained that the Sunday evening slot was potentially difficult for some of the WSL's younger fanbase.
"We need to recognise that we have a younger audience so sticking it on during the evening might not be the best time, particularly the evening before school the next day," she added. "When games are being shown, we need to look at grassroots football and when that is being played so we can maximise the number of families coming to games," she said.
"At 6.45pm on a Sunday you have the school issue, then at 11.30am on a Saturday, that's when grassroots teams play football. You're destroying the viewership then.
"We need to look at a good day and time to maximise audiences, get bums on seats in stadiums and grow our fanbase. That's how our sport grows."
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