Tribune. The decade 2010 marked a major turning point in the development of women’s sport. But while the development of feminization is based on sports practice and its media coverage, women’s sport has been heavily affected by the context of the pandemic over the past year. Deprived of competitions, absent from broadcasts and reflections on the future of sport, sportswomen found themselves immersed in almost total anonymity, which some had just left.
Nevertheless, the fragility of the economic model of women’s sport played, at least initially, a paradoxically protective role. In fact, in most team sports, women’s clubs today remain largely dependent on subsidies from local authorities (between 25 and 60% of budgets, depending on the discipline), federal aid or even support from men’s clubs, to which Women’s teams are sometimes affiliated (particularly in football, and, to a lesser extent, in rugby). While this keeps these clubs in a form of fragility, the weakening of their resources has not been on the same level as that of their male counterparts.
However, this dependence recalls the difficulty of these clubs in generating income. With almost non-existent TV rights and transfer allowances, the economy of women’s sport is also characterized more problematically by low revenues from ticketing and sponsorship. There is great concern about the willingness of private partners to maintain their commitment in this time of crisis.
On the expenditure side, women’s sport was initially relatively protected from the effects of the crisis. The aid measures put in place by the State (partial unemployment, guaranteed loans, etc.) made it possible to limit the damage, at least as long as the competition was at a standstill as regards partial unemployment.
Left behind
Beyond these economic considerations, it is more generally the place given to women’s sport that has emerged more prominently during this crisis. Thus, political and media positions on the future of sport have focused on professional men’s sport, in particular on its most popular disciplines.
Rare, not to say non-existent, are the conferences or articles to think about the “sport according to” which relate, if only in part, to women’s sport. However, challenges and questions abound: status, economic model, communication strategies, etc.
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