I’m a football fan, the daughter of a football fan, the wife of a football fan, the mother of football fans. We support a variety of clubs. In my home with three daughters, football is never far away from us. I have visited many grounds in the UK, both to watch my team and to watch others. I got engaged shortly before heading to an Italian club match at the Stadio Plimpico in Rome. I travelled to South Africa to watch the England men play in the World Cup and I have watched England women play in the European championships in France and the UK. I support both men and women playing the beautiful game, and I enjoy the nuance in how differently they play it. The game itself flexes around the gender differences and neither is no more or less enjoyable, until we lose.

While following the man’s game, I have been caught on a train platform between a large group of rival male fans facing up to each other, then spent hours sitting next to bleeding faces. I have been intimidated by drunk men hurling abuse at the pitch and I have received a chant of ‘get your tits out for the lads’ as I took my seat alongside my dad when I was 16. I have endured these moments, to enjoy the sport. It is for many men, their game within a deep-seated cultural framework and should woman wish to participate, it should be with boundaries. And this perspective is not only reserved for the matches.

Over the last few days, I have seen men using Linked In to put forward the case for why women should not receive increased earnings that are proportionately fair. Their flawed arguments are clearly driven by gender bias. The men who take this perspective to a business platform like Linked In, think they are demonstrating their commercial acumen. What I see is people unable to think inclusively or strategically. Someone who is unlikely to see potential, be able to 'think outside the box' or grow a market. Only seeing the status quo and belligerently attempting to maintain within it.

The innate sense of male righteousness over this sport is palpable in these comments. Would you want to work with, or employ a man exhibiting those views?  Can you imagine the potential, if half the men who refuse to accept women in football, took a different view? And that's not just a gain for women. Let's also imagine for a moment, if half the women who follow men's football stopped. Stopped buying the tickets, stopped buying the merch, stopped encouraging their children, played no part in it.

Inclusivity and equality does not mean less inclusive or inequal to others. Women playing football does not diminish the men’s game. It allows more people like me who are football fans, to enjoy the game with a new lens. How many times have you heard a man say judgementally ‘it’s not the same when women play’. Of course it’s not the same! Women are built differently, move differently, have different strengths, different skills. In business we negotiate differently, we solve problems differently, we run businesses, differently. All of this applies to how we play sport. Of course you are welcome not to enjoy it. But. in my opinion, men who say ‘it’s not the same’, loudly and disparagingly, are only exposing themselves as a man’s fan. Not a football fan. And what a limiting world view that is.

On the eve of England women’s first World Cup match against Haiti in Brisbane, there is change afoot of course. Big business is supporting change with sponsorship money and provocative creative. This year I’m enjoying Allianz The Squared Ball campaign.  

In the club where I received the ‘tits’ chant over 20 years ago, the women’s loos now offer free sanitary products, I share flasks of coffee with my dad and his pals, no one gawps at me and no one would dare chant.

The women’s games are inclusive, the atmosphere is energised positively, the crowd cheer has a higher pitch of course, but is no less passionate, just notably less antagonistic. I encourage any man who is critical, to become curious, and try to watch the beautiful game through a new lens, because they are really missing out. 

Next time you find yourself in the wrap-up ‘any more questions’ part of a job interview, how about asking their view on women’s football. Their answer will reveal a lot you need to know about the person's ability to work in an ambitious, contemporary environment.