28 April 2020

Republic of Ireland manager Vera Pauw says 'women's sport always comes second'

The Republic of Ireland's manager Vera Pauw has said recent tournament postponements has once again shown women's sport takes second place.

The women's Euros were scheduled for the summer of 2021 but have now been pushed back a year to accommodate the postponement of the men's tournament.

She said: “You have the men’s Euros being rescheduled then the Olympics being rescheduled and then weeks later the women’s tournament (what was Euro 2021) being rescheduled.

“There must have been reasons for it but I do see that we are the last in line because even the youth development tournaments had been rescheduled before us," she told The Irish Times.

“But we need to be used to that. Women’s sport in general is always put in second place. Even the fact that the men’s tournament was put into the time slot for our tournament without even any discussion with the stakeholders . . . that says in itself that women’s sport needs to adapt to men’s sport. But that is not just in football."

Pauw's side are yet to qualify for the tournament with the rest of their qualification games penciled in for the autumn.

She added: “If they [players] get back playing, and I hope that they do, I hope that they play as many games as they can given our qualifying programme in the autumn but let’s see first when we can get back playing first; that’s the time to have a discussion about what we do because for the moment, we don’t know, nobody knows when football will start again.”

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