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Is The Golden Age of Women's Football Over?
- Amelie Kirk
- 14 hours ago
- 3 min read
Someday, I’m going to tell my grandkids about this exact time in football. I’ll talk to them about the days when you could head to Borehamwood for an Arsenal game or trek out to Kingsmeadow for Chelsea, snag a ticket for £7.50 and be close enough to the pitch to hear the players calling for the ball. I can still see it so clearly, Beth Mead curling in absolute bangers in front of a couple hundred people who were just as obsessed as I was. It felt like our own private club, a little community where we were all in on a secret together.
Looking at the game right now, I feel like I have a little lump in my throat. Watching legends like Beth Mead or Alexia Putellas reach this stage of their careers feels like watching the closing credits of the most important movie I’ve ever seen. It’s bittersweet because while I’m ready to embrace the new stars and the shiny, professional future of the sport, a part of me is still mourning the scrappy, underdog magic that defined the best decade of our lives.
When we talk about the greats of the past, the Maradonas and the Beckhams, we’re usually talking about people who felt bigger than the sport itself, legends who belonged to the fans as much as they belonged to their clubs. In twenty years, I know that’s exactly how we’ll speak about someone like Katie McCabe at Arsenal. She didn't just play for the badge, she really lived in it. Whether she was charging down the wing or firing up the crowd, she gave us that same feeling of belonging. She was one of us and that’s a connection that doesn't just fade away when a player moves on, it becomes part of the club’s DNA.
It’s a massive, rapid-fire changing of the guard and it’s hitting all of us hard. We are seeing a complete turnover of the backbone of the game, Millie Bright is officially hanging up her boots, Mary Earps has stepped back from the international stage and global icons like Sam Kerr and Katrina Gorry are moving towards their new chapters. It is a reality check that the landscape of the sport is fundamentally different now. And these weren't just players, they were the architects who built this movement from the ground up and we had the privilege of watching their grit and hunger transform the game into what it is today.
But even with the grief of seeing these icons move on, there’s a massive, electric excitement in the air. All that new investment, the prime-time TV slots and the crowds that fill the stadiums, it’s not necessarily a ‘corporate takeover’, it’s more of a reward. It’s the sport I love finally getting the oxygen it’s been starved of for decades. It means more girls get to train in world-class facilities, more players get to make a real living doing what they love and the game is finally getting the funding it deserves. By 2026, global revenues in women’s elite sports are projected to hit over $3 billion, a massive leap that proves the market is finally catching up to the talent on the pitch. These players have successfully transitioned the game from a grassroots passion project into a global, self-sustaining industry.
I know I’ll be telling my grandkids about this generation. I’ll tell them about the ones who were there before the sold-out stadiums were guaranteed. I’ll talk about the grit and the personality that made us obsessed with this game when it was still the underdog, and I’ll tell them we were lucky enough to see the foundation being laid in real-time. I’m genuinely excited for what comes next, too. The rising stars entering the game right now get to skip the hardest parts. They get to just show up and be athletes. They don't have to spend their careers fighting for the right to be taken seriously, they can just focus on the ball, the tactics and the glory.
The pioneer era is ending and that feels heavy, but it’s a good kind of heavy. We’re moving into a new chapter and while it won’t be the same as those scrappy, unforgettable days at the start, it’s exactly what this game was always supposed to become. We got to witness the transformation and that’s a legacy that isn't going anywhere.
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