{"id":301766,"date":"2025-07-29T17:37:23","date_gmt":"2025-07-29T17:37:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/301766\/"},"modified":"2025-07-29T17:37:23","modified_gmt":"2025-07-29T17:37:23","slug":"first-minister-john-swinney-admits-womens-football-in-scotland-has-been-neglected-and-says-scottish-government-will-consider-investing-more-in-the-game-after-lionesses-success","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/301766\/","title":{"rendered":"First Minister John Swinney admits women’s football in Scotland has been ‘neglected’ … and says Scottish Government will consider investing more in the game after Lionesses’ success"},"content":{"rendered":"

First Minister John Swinney<\/a> admits women\u2019s football in Scotland has been \u2018neglected\u2019 – and says the Scottish Government will \u2018evaluate\u2019 its investment in the game after the success enjoyed by England<\/a>\u2019s Lionesses.<\/p>\n

Sarina Wiegman<\/a>\u2019s side stormed to a historic victory in the European Championships<\/a> on Sunday, beating world champions Spain 3-1 on penalties.<\/p>\n

Their achievement is being widely regarded as the \u2018greatest ever\u2019 in English football, after the women defended their crown and became the first English national side to win a major tournament on foreign soil.<\/p>\n

The Scotland women\u2019s team, meanwhile, were left watching on from the sidelines after failing to qualify for the tournament.<\/p>\n

First Minister Swinney told Mail Sport the women\u2019s game in Scotland had \u2018not been encouraged as much as it should have been in the past\u2019 and insisted there was now an \u2018arguable case\u2019 for the Scottish Government to invest.<\/p>\n

\u2018I am certainly very supportive of encouraging and nurturing the women\u2019s game,\u2019 he told Mail Sport.<\/p>\n

\"First <\/p>\n

First Minister John Swinney talks to Mail Sport’s Heather Dewar at the opening of Donald Trump’s new golf course in Aberdeenshire on Tuesday<\/p>\n

\"England's <\/p>\n

England’s Lionesses won the Euros, a tournament for which Scotland failed to qualify<\/p>\n

\"Agony <\/p>\n

Agony for Scottish players as they lose European play-off in Finland in December 2024<\/p>\n

\u2018I was at the Women\u2019s Scottish Cup final in May. It was a super game of football. I\u2019ve seen lots of games of men\u2019s football and they were not nearly as good as that. So there is an arguable case for us to invest, and obviously we\u2019ll do as much as we can within the resources that we have available.\u2019<\/p>\n

Asked if the Scottish Government might put more money into the pot to help Scotland qualify for the upcoming World Cup, the First Minister said he wouldn\u2019t rule anything out.<\/p>\n

\u2018Subject to the usual caveats I have to put in, that we\u2019ve got budgets to set and budgets to live with, I want to be as supportive as I possibly can be. Because the women\u2019s game, it has been neglected, it has not been encouraged as much as it should have been in the past.<\/p>\n

\u2018There have been some tenacious women that have made the game what it is today, and I want to do everything I can to support it.\u2019<\/p>\n

In 2019, the Scottish Government were forced to step in after Scotland qualified for the World Cup finals in France, committing \u00a380,000 funding to enable the team to train full-time.<\/p>\n

While this undoubtedly helped prior to the era of professional women\u2019s football in Scotland, there have been recent calls for more investment, to support both the SFA and the leagues in their abilities to grow the game.<\/p>\n

Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar, who joined Mr Swinney at the opening of Donald Trump\u2019s new golf course in Aberdeenshire yesterday, said it was up to the Scottish Government to decide whether or not to provide money for women\u2019s football.<\/p>\n

\u2018If you look at the story of the Lionesses, I think there is an affinity and an interest across the UK,\u2019 he said.<\/p>\n

\"Melissa <\/p>\n

Melissa Andreatta is new Scotland head coach, with her mission to take them to World Cup<\/p>\n

\"Andreatta's <\/p>\n

Andreatta’s Scots earned an impressive 1-1 draw away to the Netherlands in June<\/p>\n

\"The <\/p>\n

The Scotland team pose proudly ahead of their match with Austria at Hampden in May<\/p>\n

\u2018It\u2019s perhaps safe to say maybe the same levels of sympathy don\u2019t exist in the men\u2019s game. I think the Lionesses have been a great advert for women\u2019s football.<\/p>\n

\u2018Women\u2019s football is really, really popular and growing in Scotland, and so what this Government does choose or doesn\u2019t choose to do, is for them.<\/p>\n

\u2018What I\u2019m clear about is that if we are successful next year, then I want to make sure we are maximising participation in sport. Women\u2019s football will be a key part of that. That\u2019s something we\u2019ll definitely take a look at.\u2019<\/p>\n

The last time the Scots qualified for a major tournament was the Women\u2019s World Cup in 2019.<\/p>\n

It was hoped they would learn from the process but Scotland have failed to qualify for the last three major competitions and are now in a period of transition under new manager Melissa Andreatta.<\/p>\n

The Scots now have their sights set on qualifying for the World Cup in Brazil in 2027.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"First Minister John Swinney admits women\u2019s football in Scotland has been \u2018neglected\u2019 – and says the Scottish Government…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":301767,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5009],"tags":[748,92,393,94,4884,7852,712,104,93,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-301766","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-scotland","8":"tag-britain","9":"tag-dailymail","10":"tag-england","11":"tag-football","12":"tag-great-britain","13":"tag-john-swinney","14":"tag-scotland","15":"tag-spain","16":"tag-sport","17":"tag-uk","18":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114937741110854382","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/301766","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=301766"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/301766\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/301767"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=301766"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=301766"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=301766"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}