Simon Barnes

Girl power: give women’s sport the credit it deserves

England won the cricket World Cup for the fourth time. Huzzah! England reached the semi-finals of the European football championship. Huzzah again! Or you can, as some have preferred, say well, it’s not really England, is it? It’s England women — and that’s not the same thing at all.

Ten points for observation, eh? I remember when I first noticed.

But there’s less power, less speed and it’s altogether less thrilling a spectacle than the men’s versions, they say. Anya Shrubsole, the demon fast bowler who secured the win for England by taking six wickets in the final, only bowls at 70 mph; she’d be cannon fodder in a men’s game. And the soi–disant Lionesses would be mauled to bits by a fourth division football club…

On the other hand, Shrubsole isn’t going to bowl in a men’s Test match and women’s footballers are not going to take on men’s professional teams. That’s on account of the fact that men and women are different.

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