When I played for England, we had a saying that each individual was a custodian of the shirt and it was their job to leave it in a better place by the time they finished. I see my role in leading the review into women’s football in a similar vein, hoping that through the efforts of the team that took part we will have done the same for the game as a whole through our research and recommendations.
The headlines in the women’s game make it look as if it is in a healthy position: records for attendances and TV viewing figures are frequently being broken, and England are the European champions. Nothing can take away from these great achievements but it is like Instagram v reality, and the latter is worrying and we need to address it. We scratched beneath the surface to identify issues that need rectifying.
