Joey Barton's controversial suggestions to improve women's football
The former player spone about how the women's game could attract a bigger audience
Joey Barton, the former English footballer and current manager of Fleetwood Town, has made some comments about women's football which has created controversy.
Barton, speaking on the podcast 'Football, Feminism & Everything Between', called for changes to the women's game, saying that "we have to accept that men and women are fundamentally different."
The former Newcastle, Manchester City and Burnley midfielder, among others, said: "It’s a different sport really, in essence. Women’s football should be adjusted for women, physiologically, biologically.
"The goal sizes and the weight of the ball should be [changed]. If we’re going to make women’s football better, as a spectator sport, to stand on its own in the marketplace, if you keep playing on the same size of pitches as men with the same size of football as men and men’s rules, you’re always going to have an inferior product -- because men are bigger, stronger and faster than women.
"If you tailor it, women’s football could take a lot of strides tactically and technically -- way beyond its current limitations. Let’s be realistic about it. The size of a football for men is a size five, say we moved the size of a women’s football down to a size four, would anybody really notice the difference?
"No, but I guarantee you in terms of the physicality and the output, level of passes and the range of passes players some of the women players would then be able to do because the ball’s a bit smaller and the ball’s more suited to their physiological state."
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