At least the top players heading to the Women’s World Cup have got some balls.
Remember when the best men’s footballers said they would not be silenced when it came to highlighting concerns about basic human rights at Qatar 2022? FIFA then made some vague threats about yellow cards and the multi-coloured armbands - hardly the most daring gesture of defiance in the first place - were ditched in an instant.
Gianni Infantino, the FIFA president, had been derided ahead of last year’s World Cup when he said, basically, that national associations should ‘stick to football.’ But that is exactly what they did. Thankfully, it looks like high-profile women footballers will not be so pliable.
