My FIFA Protest Has Turned into Something Pretty Great

When the Men’s World Cup started, I had complicated feelings. I fell in love with soccer while living in Brazil. I was there for the 1992 event, which Brazil won. Brazilians go all out in their love of the game. We had to shut down my workplace every time the home team played because even public transit was pulled off the roads, leaving employees with no way to get home.

By the time of the Qatar event four years ago, I was pretty much over FIFA’s management of the tournament but I had grown to love the women’s game, which I discovered via the Olympics.

This year’s Cup was shaping up very badly, at least in the USA, what with the treatment of that Somali referee and the entire Iranian team, and I just couldn’t bring myself to give the organizers even a penny of advertising dollars by watching games.

So when I saw repeated slights* to the women in reporting on the men’s game, I bought a ticket to an Ottawa Rapids game. The Ottawa Rapid is part of the Northern Super League of Canadian women’s soccer.

What started out as a bit of a protest instantly became my new favourite summer sports thing to watch. The game was fast and skilled and it was fun to see so many past and future Olympians and Women’s World Cup players up close. I’m not quite ready to commit to season’s tickets because scheduling in the summer is complicated, but I have gone to a second game and have plans to take a friend for a third.

I have previously written about the joys of watching the PWHL, and Sam has written about the queer joy of the WNBA. I’m happy to have another professional league to support.

I have a lot to learn – names of players and teams (I was even confused about what team was playing at my second game – turns out it was Calgary). And how can they run around in the heat, especially with all that long hair touching their backs? I was uncomfortably hot just watching!

*Slights included:

• claims that the USA could win their first World Cup (the women have won four);
• Canadian men had scored the first ever Canadian World Cup goal and gotten past the group stage (Canadian women did both, years ago, and this image never gets old);

• Lionel Messi had scored the most World Cup goals (that was Marta, though he since tied her record), and been in the most World Cups at six (that’s actually Formiga, who played in seven, though Marta has also been in six, and is likely to play in next year’s Cup so may also be able to recoup that scoring record);
• and overlooking Christine Sinclair when talking about greatest players (she scored more international goals than any person and and was at the game when it happened);
• and all the men getting angry when any of this gets pointed out (patriarchy should not be the default, my dudes).