The year 1991 was a formative year for women in international team sports. Many people know about the football tournament that was originally called the FIFA World Championship World Championship for the M & M’s Cup, which was held in China in November of that year and was recognized retroactively as the inaugural FIFA World Cup.
But in April 1991 another army of women came together at the game of playing in Wales. These were the women who played in the inaugural world cup of Women’s Rugby, a tournament of a dozen teams that was originally not recognized by the International Rugby Board, but after a number of years it was recognized retroactively as a first world cup.
The recognition of the retroactive effect was not the only common between the two tournaments. Whatever they had in common was that the United States both won them.
Now we all know what kind of history the American women’s football team has forged over the years: four world cups and four Olympic gold medals.
The American rugby team for women ended the next two tournaments after the first victory with the Silver Medal. At the second of those occasions, New Zealand won gold in 1998 for the first of the six World Cup titles of the All-Blacks.
Unnecessary to say that the domination of New Zealand came in sport at the same time that the United States have had trouble going back to the stage in the 15-a-side game. The best that the US has done since 1998 was a fourth place in 2017.
It was hoped that a bronze-medal finish of the United States in the Sevens tournament in Paris 2024 perhaps American Fortunes had brightened up for the completely sided version of the game, but yesterday England handed the United States a 69-7 defeat in the opening match of the Tournament 2025.
I had to pause after typing the last paragraph. 69-7.
The result will do little to send the perception that the American team is little more than a group of amateurs, while other countries have raced ahead to create their own professional competitions.
Look up and down the American Roster and most better players drive their trade abroad. Ilona Maher, the social media star who is a mean tackler, plays for the Bristol bears in England. Erica Jarrell-Searcy plays for sale Sharks.
Efforts have been made to professionalize the game here in the United States that start completely in 2009. The last efforts started two years ago to bring organization and capital together to start a competition.
If you had never heard of the Bay Breakers, you will feel the Boston Banshees, Chicago Tempest, Denver Onyx, New York Exiles or the Twin Cities Gemini not bad. The roll -out of women’s elite rugby has been underwhelming compared to, for example, the Lacrosse League of Maybelline Women. The product is hidden on the streaming service Dazn instead of having a license on various sports networks.
Stunningly you have not heard squeaking about the elite rugby of women from the place where you would think it would come: Fox. When Fox Sports World existed in the US, there was a big urge to rugby, to the point where there was a weekly highlights that was filmed on a set that looked like a pub. You got to see a grainy video tape (this was in the years before HD) of different amateur branches in the US and the show got the same kind of urgency as every sports show.
Fox used to be the home base of the American Men’s League, Major League rugby, but that competition moved to ESPN this year. The men’s competition recently passed a number of financial challenges, with the loss of teams in New Orleans, Miami and Dallas. There has also been a merger of two teams in South California in one club.
Now, in the coming years, various major world rugby events will come to the United States. After the Sevens matches in the Los Angeles 2028 Olympic Games, the men’s World Cup comes to the US in 2031 and the Women’s World Cup will be played in the United States in 2033.
The result should be a call for action yesterday to improve the sport here in the US. There is no replacement for a sustainable competition structure; Something that the people running football are starting to realize.
#August #Legacy