To ask everyone to watch the World Cup Final at 11 on Sunday?

[YetiTeri]

It doesn't matter if you don't like football, or if you don't like sport this tournament and this game is about so much more than that.

• it's about showing women's sport is worthy of investment.

• it's about giving different role models to young and particularly teenage girls.

• it's about showing rivalry in performance but not through violence.

• it's about showing our daughters they matter as much as our sons.

• it's about showing women they can be coaches and compete with men on an equal footing.

• it's about highlighting the battles women from many countries have undergone to get to this tournament.

• it's about showing homophobia has no place in team sports.

And it's about giving women a voice in their sport.

The Spanish team are there in spite of their coach and have some really disturbing stories about how players have been treated. Without any eyes on women's sport these sorts of issues are allowed to take root.

Me too.

I might go to the pub that doesn't have a TV.

But my dad will be watching, he's always been a football fan and is taking an increasing interest inwomen's football.

Will be on our hols near the French/Spanish border. I'm a huge football fan so I'm hoping we can find somewhere we can watch!

Silly outlook.

Womens football was deliberately held back (it was banned at one point). Obviously it wont be at the level of the mens, but neither is womens tennis and it is on an equal footing as regards publicity and viewership as it was allowed to develop alongside the mens without any impediment. Womens football is deservedly getting a long overdue leg up to right some of the wrongs, and in time it will be at an equivalent level to womens tennis.

We're actually already seeing massive improvement. That evasive move by Hemp and then her sublime disguised reverse pass to set up Russo was world class (you could easily put that assist alongside what Messi does). James shows some fabulous footwork to get out of tight spaces.

I predominantly watch mens, but its clear as day the women are now starting to show real technique thanks to more resources being poured into the game. It's only going to get better and better.

I find watching other people kick a ball around tedious and bewildering. I just don't derive pleasure from it. I don't process who's doing what and have any appreciation of what kind of skill level is going on. I like doing some sports, not watching other people do it. Chasing/ kicking/ catching spheres is dull enough, plus the years of enduring PE and being belittled during it. Thanks to 90s sexist PE, I don't know the rules beyond the bleeding obvious.

Anyway, I'm busy with no access to TV. Football on radio may as well be listening to another language. There's a few languages I'd extract more sense from.

I'm pleased the Lionesses have done so well. I hope they have a good match, however first society said that I shouldn't have an interest in football because I was a girl, now it's trying to tell me that I should be interested for the sisterhood. Actually I'm not interested because it's of little interest to me, and there's nothing wrong with that.

I watch very little football, regardless of which gender is playing, so I won't be watching it. I hope those who are watching it enjoy it, however there are many other ways I can and do support gender equality without watching a sport that doesn't really interest me. DH will be watching it I imagine, as he's watched as many games as he could throughout.

I looked up what the women are paid the other day. Sam Kerr is the highest paid femail player in the world on £417,000 a year. Christiano Ronaldo is on £173 million a year!
Mind boggling.

I have zero interest in rugby. Don't understand it, don't watch it, don't care.

But I passionately support women's rugby so that any girl who wants to play gets the opportunity. This is about using football as a snowball to start an avalanche of interest in women's sport overall and not restrict girls to just netball.

Sorry, can't stand football and will not be watching it. I'll most likely be at church anyway!

I agree with this and I’m saying that as a woman. I can’t stand it. The quality is shocking

Footballers are appalling role models for anyone in sport - male or female. So no thank you, we won't be watching.

Nope. We'll be out doing sport on Sunday and I am not interested in football.

I listened to all that stuff about female role models, inclusivity etc from our local council when they made the decision to convert the only hockey pitch in our borough into the thirty first surface suitable for football in a 5 mile radius. GB were women's Olympic hockey champions at the time but didn't count as female sporting role models apparently. It's like women's sport didn't exist before football and whilst the football team have without doubt done very well and I wish them continued success they are not "better" than all the other fantastic women athletes.
Our (largely male) council is very supportive of women's sport...as long as it's women's football or women's rugby. Funny that.
In my experience at least, the growth of women's football is not advancing women's sport in general at grassroots level, it's just advancing football.
I'll stick to coaching and club committee work to do my bit to encourage more girls into sport and leave the football watching to those who are interested in it.

It has changed beyond recognition just in the last five years or so. I used to think, being frank here, that the pitch looked too big for women's teams. Now it doesn't. The players fill the whole of that space with football.

I've watched every England game in this World Cup, and been so impressed with the women's talent, skills and sheer bloody determination.

I have zero interest in rugby. Don't understand it, don't watch it, don't care.

But you will, presumably, watch women's rugby if you're that interested in women obtaining equality through sport. Or is it just because England have reached a final in something that you care now?

2 of my girls play football and have watched nearly every match in the tournament, getting up at weird times. They are so excited about the final and will be glued to it, along with my husband who loves football and has thoroughly enjoyed the tournament.

They all have less interest in the men's game as they feel it has been ruined by money and corruption. I hope the women's game doesn't go the same way.

I'm never home at weekends, this weekend i'm camping. However I'd never stay in to watch sport on TV anyway

I'm glad there is a rising interest though, that's great for woman's sport!

Football and tennis are the sports that I'm passionate about. I'll watch anything I can in both of them. Male and female.

In other sports, I like the atmosphere of big moments. I'd watch the final of any sport British women were in. I try and watch as varied sports as I can during the Olympics.

I’m with you OP. It’s been phenomenal and is so important. I’ll be watching Saturday’s game too. I’ve watched as many as possible, work permitting.

AIBU is a weird place at times!

Of course I will be watching out amazing Lionesses!
🦁🦁🦁

Me watching the football is not going to make any difference, OP.

I'm not on the audience measurement panel, so me watching just to show I'm watching is pointless.

Very few homes are on the measurement panel. Only 0.02% of the UK homes matters in terms of viewing.

And yet you're telling people who don't watch football or care about it to watch it?

I wasn't going to watch it and I still won't. I don't think trying to guilt or force people to watch a sport is really conducive to its growth.

I'll be in full pre match mode for watching my own team play, thank you.

Um yes. I would watch England roses in the Rugby world cup final if it meant more girls were given the opportunity to play rugby...

I will be watching but the OP is annoying and patronising. I have a lifetime of playing, teaching and watching sport. I used to run our school football team and included girls in the team. The idea that women footballers are saints is pathetic.
They're just as aggressive and competitive as the men.
I won't be supporting England. Anyone But England

God no.

Football is tedious.

You cannot possibly believe in all the things you have written above and also think it's ok to tell other women what to do/how to feel, surely?