Munich’s soccer players usually cheer on Bayern’s campus grounds, as they did last Friday when they defeated Frankfurt.
Photo: imago images/Heike Feiner
When looking at FC Bayern’s digital offerings, the omnipresence of its female footballers is striking these days. On the club’s website alone there are various texts and videos about their first leg in the quarter-finals of the Champions League against Paris Saint-Germain this Tuesday. Among them is a clip in which three famous footballers of the club advertise for the previously less noticed colleagues: “Support our women’s team,” says world footballer Robert Lewandowski. “Off to the arena!” Joshua Kimmich and Leroy Sané ask the fans.
FC Bayern is promoting the game so massively because it will be the first of its female soccer players in the large Munich arena, where women were previously only allowed to wear the German national jersey. According to the club, more than 10,000 tickets have already been sold. Media interest is also great. With the five-digit number of spectators, FC Bayern will clearly surpass its club record for games by its women’s team on March 23, 2017. At that time, 7,300 spectators came to the stadium on Grünwalder Straße, also for a quarter-final against PSG.
Now the Munich soccer players will have access to the big stage for the first time. The anticipation is correspondingly euphoric – at least at first glance. Defender Hanna Glas speaks of a “great sign”, midfield colleague Giulia Gwinn describes the premiere as “really cool thing” and President Herbert Hainer is looking forward to “a very special evening”.
If you listen deeper into the scene, it is clear from many insiders that such an opportunity for so much attention was long overdue and that many would like more support, especially from FC Bayern. That was already apparent when Oliver Kahn recognized the first arena game of his own women’s team as a deserved “milestone” and the former national player Verena Schweers reacted to the CEO with a teasing tweet. “Yes Oliver Kahn! Another nice statement from an official – but I’ve never seen you in the stadium 😉 Let’s go … pack it up!” wrote the 32-year-old, who once worked for FC Bayern, VfL Wolfsburg and SC Freiburg played.
The tweet did not go unnoticed. When asked, Schweers explains: »He was given a wink and meant it. After that, the topic was made bigger than it was.« But of course she would like Kahn to be in the audience. Above all, however, female soccer players in this country should be promoted even more and above all “sustainably,” she emphasizes. “The game in the arena must not be a flash in the pan.” It was a “good start, I would think it would be great if FC Bayern were also pioneers in women’s football”.
The international competition has long been playing its big games in its largest stadiums. Five-digit audience numbers are the rule. The women of PSG kicked in front of almost 20,000 people in Paris’s Prinzenpark in 2017. Between 30,000 and 60,000 spectators attended the top games at Atlético Madrid, Olympique Lyon, Juventus Turin and Tottenham Hotspur. And for the quarter-final second leg in the Champions League between FC Barcelona and Real Madrid on March 30 at the Camp Nou, all 85,000 tickets were sold out in just a few days. This sets a new world record in women’s club football. An even higher number of spectators was only recorded at the 1999 World Cup final between the USA and China, when around 90,000 people came to the Rose Bowl Stadium in Pasadena near Los Angeles.
Bayern and all other German teams are a long way from such numbers, especially in the Bundesliga. The Munich women otherwise play in a small stadium on the youth campus, which offers space for 2,500 spectators. Last Friday around 1000 came to the duel against Eintracht Frankfurt. Many clubs struggle even more to attract a sizeable audience. FC Bayern’s game in the big arena should therefore also help to attract more attention overall. National coach Martina Voss-Tecklenburg would also like to see more “highlight games” in the big stadiums. “It must be self-evident for teams that have this infrastructure,” she told the “Tagesspiegel”. It’s “a question of appreciation.” Herbert Hainer calls the game an »important stopover«. Conversely, this means that you have not yet reached your goal.
