Lebanon’s women ready for season

April is the month when most football players start to look forward to a well-earned summer break. For Lebanon’s female footballers, however, the season is only just beginning. This weekend sees the opening round of the 2012 Lebanese Women’s League, an eight-team round-robin tournament that will run parallel to a knockout cup competition. Women’s football hardly enjoys a high profile in Lebanon, with many girls still struggling to find acceptance in a traditionally male-dominated sport. You don’t have to search very hard to find those who continue to hold to the view that girls and football just don’t mix. Yet there are signs that things might just be changing. Earlier this month, the Lebanon Women’s Futsal team surprised many with its strong showing at the West Asian Women’s Futsal Championships in Bahrain, finishing fourth after a narrow 4-3 defeat to eventual winners Iran in the semifinal. In the 11-a-side game, meanwhile, a national team that didn’t play a competitive match until 2006 has slowly begun to climb the rankings, giving talented players like Hiba Jafal and Nadia Assaf the chance to shine on the international stage. An even greater cause for optimism is the women’s league itself. Until 2010 there were only five officially recognized girls’ football clubs. Now that number has swelled to eight, with the 2012 season seeing the debuts of the much-talked-about Girls’ Football Academy and the Sidon-based Phoenicia, bringing a welcome southern presence to a competition traditionally dominated by clubs from the capital. Assaf, captain and star midfielder for the GFA as well as its co-founder, is convinced that the expansion of the league to eight-teams will only help improve the quality of the competition. “The league has improved because more teams have been joining from year to year,” she told The Daily Star’s Sports Weekly. “So long as there are more clubs, there will be more competition out there. And the more competition that’s out there, the more our performance will improve.” The benefits of having an organized league are difficult to overstate. For one, it gives talented female players the opportunity to improve their skills in a competitive environment. Intensive training and friendly matches are all well and good, yet neither can match the experience of playing in a game where there’s more than pride at stake. Saad Jradi, coach at FC Beirut, the youngest side in the competition, emphasized how important the league is to his players when he spoke to The Daily Star earlier this week. “The championship, the competition, the competitive games ... these are what we work for and prepare the whole year for, so we’re all really looking forward to the start of the new season,” he said. In addition to that, the league plays a vital role in showing that girls’ football is a serious competitive sport. When The Daily Star spoke to Assaf earlier this year, she talked about her desire to prove to Lebanese girls that football is more than just an after-school activity, a task made easier by the existence of a competitive league now in its fifth season. Jradi agrees that the league has done much to boost the status of girls’ football in Lebanon, though he believes that more can be done to draw attention to the women’s game. “The competition has helped to raise the profile of the sport,” he said. “Some sponsoring, a push from the federation, a greater understanding of the teams’ conditions, and better publicity and media coverage would help all the teams and the league in general.” Assaf agrees that the media in particular could do a better job of covering women’s football. “Get the matches on TV for a start,” she said, responding to a question about how the profile of the women’s game could be improved. “There should be announcements of games so that fans could come down and watch. Also, we need to have more dedicated sports journalists communicating with teams and players.” Given their constant struggle for recognition, it’s tempting to suggest that the eight clubs competing for the 2012 title have succeeded just by fielding a team in this year’s competition. Yet speak to any of the girls and coaches involved and it’s clear that none of them are content just to make up the numbers. The ambitious Assaf has high expectations for her side. “Our main objective for the senior GFA girls is to finish in the top three at least this season,” she said. It won’t be an easy task. Last year’s champions and perennial winners Sadaka, whom Jradi is tipping for the title again this season, are likely to be just as strong this time around. Also in the reckoning are Al-Shabab, a well-organized side containing several Lebanese internationals, including national team captain Hiba Jafar. If you’re after a tip for this year’s dark horses, meanwhile, you could do worse than Atletico, one of the most experienced teams in the competition. Their game against the GFA this Sunday, where they’ll come up against former players Assaf and Karen Haddad, is the highlight of the opening round. Whoever eventually wins, the 2012 season promises to be the most competitive yet. It’s time the Women’s League was recognized as a major sporting event.