The president of the World's football governing body FIFA, Gianni Infantino has lavished praise on Australia and New Zealand for co-hosting "simply the best, biggest and greatest ever" Women's football bonanza.
Gianni Infantino was speaking at the FIFA Women’s Football Convention in Sydney Gadigal.
"What we have seen so far – and the best is still to come – is simply the best and greatest and biggest FIFA Women’s World Cup ever," Gianni Infantino affirmed.
"We have to hank and congratulate every single citizen of Australia and New Zealand!
Because without all of them, this World Cup would not have been so magical. They brought the magic to it:
the volunteers, the people in the hotels, in the stadiums, in the streets, in the shops – everywhere. Everywhere, the participation was incredible."
The second FIFA Women's football convention after the maiden edition in Paris 2019, provided an avenue for FIFA's supremo to highlight the significant contributions made towards thriving women's football.
"We invested one billion US dollars in developing the game all over the world, the women's game specifically targeted."
"We decided to increase the number of participating teams to the World Cup from 24 in France to 32 now. By increasing the number of teams, we had eight debutants."
"And from the 134 countries
who entered the qualification for the 2015 Women's World Cup, before I became FIFA president, we have now 188 countries in the FIFA ranking. Because everyone believes now that there is a chance to shine on the global stage."
The tournament co-hosted by Australia and New Zealand has showed that standards are rising and on the financial side, it has generated USD 570 million, allowing it to break even.
"This World Cup
generated over 570 million US dollars. In revenues. And so, we broke even. We didn’t lose any money, and we generated the second-highest income of any sport, of course, besides the Men’s World Cup at global stage. More than half a billion. There are not many competitions, even in men’s football, that generate more
than half a billion" Infantino mentioned.
The 2023 Women's World Cup will draw its curtains on Sunday with Spain taking on England in a highly anticipated final. The major upsets witnessed during the tournament are telling of a drastic change in the growth of the game.
"Now it’s easier. Jamaica eliminated Brazil. South Africa eliminated Italy and Argentina.
Morocco and South Korea eliminated Germany. Who would have thought that would be possible before the
World Cup? Well, it happened. It happened because people, women, in these countries work"
"We need to create more competitions for women. We are planning a [FIFA Women’s] Club World
Cup for women but we need to have more local competitions. We need to have more continental
competitions, international competitions"
" I say to all the women that you have the power to change. Pick the right battles, pick the right fights. You have the power to change. You have the power to convince us, men, what we have to do and what we don’t have to do. With me, with FIFA, you will find open
doors. Just push the doors, they are open." the FIFA president concluded.
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