The FIFA Women’s World Cup 2023 is kicking off this Thursday 20 July in Auckland, New Zealand's Eden Arena between Norway and New Zealand. The tournament is set to be held in Australia and New Zealand and last a month, culminating in the tournament's final on 20 August in Sydney’s Australia Stadium. Matches will be held between both countries in ten venues.
How the tournament works
The World Cup is broken down into five stages. The first stage is the group stage, where all participating countries get put into a group of four. This year’s tournament has 8 groups. The teams then play each other once. The two highest-ranking teams from each group will then progress to the next stage of the tournament.
The second stage is the round of 16, or sometimes called the knockout stage. The remaining teams get assigned fixtures consisting of a winner and a runner-up from different groups. After the round of 16, eight teams are left.
The third stage is the quarter-finals, where the eight remaining teams play each other until four teams are left.
The fourth stage is the semi-final, in which the four final teams play to reach the final.
The fifth stage is the final where the last two teams fight it out to win the tournament.
Teams and odds
This year's Women’s World Cup consists of 32 countries, 8 more than 2019’s tournament. The last winners of the tournament were the United States, who won the final match against the Netherlands. Bookmakers are setting high odds that the champions regain this title during 2023’s tournament. Second on the list is the UEFA Women’s Euro 2022 winners, England. England won the European title against Germany on 31 July 2022. However, England may be in trouble in this tournament as they are missing two of their star players, Beth Mead and their captain Leah Williamson. Other countries with high odds of winning the tournament are France, Spain and Germany.
Women’s football
Football has been a male-dominated sport and many still see it that way. In England, the Football Association decreed in 1921, that women were not allowed to play on the football team’s grounds. The ban was in place for over 50 years.
Women’s football is still not taken as seriously as the men’s game. Viewership for men’s matches tends to be much higher than that of women’s matches. A startling example of this is the 2022 Men’s World Cup final, which garnered a high viewership of over 1.5 billion viewers. While the women’s World Cup 2019 final only had 260 million viewers. The entire 2019 tournament garnered 1.12 billion viewers for all its matches combined. Commercially, men’s football is worth over €29.5 billion for European teams, according to Deloitte. While women’s football is only estimated to be commercially worth €116 million in Europe, according to Statista.
However, popularity and respect for women’s football is on the rise. It is estimated by the UEFA, that by 2033, women’s football could be worth an annual estimate of over €686 million and viewership to grow from 144m viewers to 328m viewers.
Women’s football has been underrepresented and appreciated. The sport is as admirable as its male counterpart and deserves the same love and respect from football's dedicated fan base.
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