Brazilian play-maker Marta won a record fourth-straight FIFA Women’s World Player of the Year on Monday in Zurich, to the surprise of nobody. What was surprising is the way she won it, which was an absolute landslide victory.
Set Piece Analysts hosted a podcast with special guest Shek Borkowski, head coach of Zvezda-2005 Perm in Russia and former FC Indiana head coach. It addressed this issue of the uneven voting and nomination process for the award, and we have since heard some interesting responses to the criticism of this decision.
It should be made clear that nobody is against Marta winning FIFA Women’s World Player of the Year. In all reality, Marta is the best player in the world. She is a rare case of marketing brilliance with the skills to match a persona that has undoubtedly guided her to her fourth-straight award.
What is troubling is the lack of knowledge of the women’s game that shines through with this massive victory. Voters chose Marta by an overwhelming amount. More accurately, they chose her by an unjustified amount.
Here is how the final voting went: Marta (833 points), Germany’s Birgit Prinz (290), England’s Kelly Smith (252), Brazil’s Cristiane (239) and Germany’s Inka Grings (216).
In defense of women’s national team captains and coaches (who are the voters), it is tough to justify choosing anyone other than Marta (maybe Inka Grings) on this list.
However, it is the shortlist that creates the problem. Borkowski points out three players missing from the ballot that he thinks deserve mentioning: Christie Rampone, Linda Bresonik and Genoveva Anonman.
Like many, I have very little knowledge of Bresonik or Anonman. But is it not the job of FIFA and those involved in nominating players for the organization’s highest honors to bring players like these – ones that the average person does not even know exist – to the general public’s attention?
This is what the true problem is. It isn’t that Marta won an award that she probably deserves anyway. What is wrong is that the five players that were in Zurich on Monday were finalists because of their names more than anything else. They are safe bets.
“People vote for whoever they are most comfortable with or more safe with,” Borkowski said on the SPA podcast released Tuesday.
That really hits the nail on the head. The lack of information on women’s football around the world is a problem that is a revolving circle. FIFA and the media are clearly uninformed and uninformative. Take a look at the gala, where there are only a few questions asked. No surprise, they are all directed at Marta and they are almost all related to the men’s game.
Marta was repeatedly asked if she preferred Lionel Messi or Cristiano Ronaldo. Who cares? That might be a nice add-on to a story, but not the only question to be asked. How can soccer journalists sit in front of finalists for FIFA Women’s World Player of the Year and not have a question? It’s purely irresponsible.
The players do not help the situation by voting safely, either. Most of the more remote countries have no means of watching any players on the ballot in person (or even on tape), meaning that votes are given according to prowess. But if they are not given the necessary information, can they be blamed?
Somewhere, somehow (and soon), this cycle needs to be broken. Unfortunately, it may take a miracle run by an unknown team (with a leading lady) in the 2011 Women’s World Cup to bring this about.
Check out all of my exclusive women’s soccer coverage on The Equalizer (www.equalizersoccer.com) and at Twitter.com/JeffKassouf.
It was a pretty good podcast, but I feel compelled to clarify one thing. Your statement that Brazil didn’t play a single match this year isn’t accurate at all. In addition to well-publicized friendlies against Germany and Sweden, a tournament with the presence of China, Mexico and Chile happened a few days ago. Talk about uninformed media, right?
Marcelo:
That was my fault. Jeff told me about that slip shortly after we got done with the show. It might be less from pure ignorance and more of a broadcasting “whoops,” which might not be any more excusable.
I told Jeff we should just wait until our next podcast to correct the error, which … maybe we should have done something yesterday to correct it, like post a disclaimer.
But yes – I think the lack of media of Brazil’s internationals is a symptom of the things Jeff, Shek and I discussed.
Thank you for listening, and thanks for the correction.
Anonman’s story is fascinating to me. She’s only 20, but seemed like the best player in the African Nations Cup by a wide margin, and led Equatorial Guinea (population 660,000) to the title. I had reservations about them expanding the World Cup, but if it allows me to see players like Anonman, I’m all for it. I think she’ll be heard from in a big way in the near future. I just hope people are paying attention.
As for the US, Rampone was certainly a huge story in the way everything went down, but Hope Solo was the best American player this year (and in WPS).
Indeed, the comment was something that we corrected ourselves on shortly after the podcast but by error we decided not to go addressing it until the next pod. It is good to see somebody on top of that though. The spring friendlies are what we knew we slipped up on, but the recent tournament truly is news to us (and some that I spoke with inside of WPS). Perhaps it is another example of the lack of coverage that we get, as it is tough to find anything at all on this recent tournament in Brazil. It was a “whoops” moment that is not indicative of the overall show or site.
Marcelo, are you based out of Brazil? I see that WPS Talk has some coverage of this tournament you spoke of, which is great. What was the turnout and publicity like? How was the level of play?
No, I’m writing from Brazil. Well, the first three matches were affected by rainy weather and the crowds were between 3,000 and 5,000. The final, however, had an attendance of 25,000. We’re in the male soccer off-season, so the tournament was reasonably publicized and all the matches were on tv (network and cable).
The lack of international coverage is understandable, it’s not like WPS made the headlines in the mainstream US media. If you had checked the Women’s International forum at Big Soccer, you would find more details and would even be able to watch it (the last couple of games were officially streamed).
Regarding the level of play, I guess you can say it was alright. China confirmed its decline and presented a really poor game. Mexico was better than expected and Chile was there to gain experience. As for Brazil, the collective aspect was lacking and, as usual, the individualities made the difference.
Ah yes, Big Soccer is a great source sometimes. I haven’t been able to frequent it as much, although I have been more lately. I did just take a look at the highlights, and the crowd looked great. Some nice goals as well. Marcelo, what is your email? I would love to chat more about all of this.
You can contact me at togmar(at)bol(dot)com(dot)br