The Game Changers

2023 Highlights

January 23, 2024 Sue Anstiss Season 15
The Game Changers
2023 Highlights
Show Notes Transcript Chapter Markers

Now entering its 5th year, The Game Changers continues to evolve, providing a safe space for female athletes and senior women in sport to share their stories and explore critical issues around equality and inclusion.

Ahead of series 16, which launches in February, we're sharing a special highlights episode from 2023.

Preeti Shetty, Director at Brentford Football Club, shares her shocking first experience as a spectator at a Millwall game and her challenge in raising funds in sport and tech as a woman of colour.

Paralympic legend Ellie Simmonds shares the ongoing impact of the bullying culture in Paralympic Swimming ahead of Rio 2016, and we hear from Juliet Slot, Chief Commercial Officer at Arsenal FC, about the blatant sexism and misogyny she faced as the first female director at Fulham FC in the 90s.

International Football Manager Kelly Lindsey highlights what needs to change if we're ever to see more female professional football coaches, and the Guardian's Suzanne Wrack explores what we can all learn from the brave actions of the Spanish team after last summer's FIFA Women's World Cup.

UFC Champion, Molly McCann, talks of how her tough upbringing enabled her to become the fighter she is today and finally, Jeanette Kwakye, Olympic athlete turned broadcaster, says that despite loving the tiny bikini bottoms she wore to compete, she now sees the dramatic impact inappropriate sports clothing is having on girls participation in sport.

The impact of The Game Changers podcast was also recognised by Sport England in 2023, when they awarded Fearless Women a three-year grant to create a further 9 series. We're so grateful for their ongoing support and thanks also to our fantastic Executive Producer, Sam Walker.

Thank you to Sport England who support The Game Changers Podcast with a National Lottery award.

Find out more about The Game Changers podcast here: https://www.fearlesswomen.co.uk/thegamechangers

Hosted by Sue Anstiss
Produced by Sam Walker, What Goes On Media

A Fearless Women production

Sue Anstiss:

Hello, I'm Sue Anstis and this is the Game Changers podcast, now entering its fifth year. The Game Changers continues to evolve. Once again in 2023, the podcast provided a safe space for elite female athletes and trailblazers in women's sport to share their stories and explore critical issues around equality and inclusion. The impact of the podcast was also recognised by Sport England for awarded fearless women a three-year grant to create a further nine series of the Game Changers Ahead of a new series launching next month. Here are some of our highlights from 2023. Preeti Shetty, a director at Brentford Football Club, shed her first experience as a club game.

Preeti Shetty:

I didn't have a club and so I decided I wanted to support my local club.

Preeti Shetty:

I went to Goldsmiths my local club is Millwall and I went to a game and it was really one of the most horrific experiences I have ever had in my life. Like somebody spat at me oh my god, I'd gone with like a, you know, group of people from uni and I was really uncomfortable and I felt like I didn't belong and I felt like they didn't want me. This was a long time ago, but I had just a horrible experience and I left the stadium and I said to you know, my kind of housemates, I never want to do this ever again. Like this was horrible and I don't want to go. And maybe it's not for me, you know, not that football isn't for me, but maybe club football isn't for me and that, I think, would have maybe been the end of shit. But I happened to live with one of the guys in my dorms was a Bolton Wanderers fan and he was incredibly lovely and he would invite me to go and they were in the Premier League at the time.

Preeti Shetty:

They actually finished six that season. He invited me to watch all the games with them and he was really welcoming and you know, he would explain things to me that I don't even know where Bolton was. I had just moved to London but they were doing really well and I was a really big JJ Akotcha fan and JJ was, you know, was playing for Bolton and it just it felt like and he was nice and at the end of the season he gave me a Bolton shirt with JJ Akotcha on the back and I still have it, and so I decided I was going to be a Bolton fan and I still am right. And when people ask me they're always like, why do you even know? Like, what was the connection? I mean from Bolton? No, the connection was someone made me feel welcomed and that, I think, is the real power of what football can do with me. The, you know brown girl from Dubai feel really welcome and the irony is he's Welsh. He wasn't even from Bolton either.

Sue Anstiss:

Preeti also shared the pressure she faced as a woman building a technology business in sport.

Preeti Shetty:

I think the parallels between sport and tech are absolutely fascinating, especially in that they are both treadmill dominated industries. I saw it most clearly when I was looking for money, when I needed to find the funding, and I found that I really saw the downsides I guess, for lack of a better word of being a young woman of color, because people kept asking about my track record and they and I was like, would you? I've run this business for eight years, I don't know what more you want, and they kept asking about you know a bit like my pedigree, and that was very much in question. I thought it should have been about the business. I run, a profitable business. I have no startup has that. I have 80 years worth of. I have clients.

Preeti Shetty:

But it became all about me and all of the questions were around me, the individual and like things like whether I'm married or not, so my partner owns our flat, and it was like oh, can you put the flat in both of your names? And it was all of this like weird stuff that I understand why. It's because I was asking for a lot of money. But it felt very personal, it felt very individual and a lot of people like just hung up like a lot of people wouldn't even engage and I think that was quite difficult. I don't, you know, I think anybody start buying a business, starting a business.

Preeti Shetty:

It's complicated but equally, something I struggled with, especially in that early period, was I didn't really feel that were that many people I could talk to that had a similar experience. They were, you know the sector, like the day I announced officially the upshot and the CEO of upshot, the upshot sale, I was actually already touched by quite a lot of CEOs in sport. Mostly men reached out on LinkedIn and emails, even ones I didn't know, just saying hey, well done. If you ever need to talk, I'm here and I found that lovely. My issue was there wasn't anybody that was in my position having to raise the money, being a woman, being a woman of color, in such a bizarre situation. At one point in the kind of legal negotiations with the Fappal Foundation I was employed by the Fappal Foundation negotiating a buyout with my own lawyers, like it was there wasn't anyone that I could talk to and I found that quite difficult.

Sue Anstiss:

Paralympic legend Ellie Simmonds called for us to be more open in talking about the impact of periods for female athletes.

Ellie Simmonds:

What I learnt later on in life. We're going from Rio to Tokyo and I think maybe age had a massive factor with like being a woman as well and being on your period. That really affected my training. I used to take it really really out on myself when sessions didn't go well, but then also now where, where I was older, I used to think we're not robots, are we?

Ellie Simmonds:

There's some days where sessions aren't going to go well, like our body's not going to be on it all the time. We're just going to have those sessions where you just don't swim well and there's no other reasons. But especially like when I was on my period and like again I said, mentioned my coach knew me from so, so many years and he would be like, oh, are you feeling okay? Like what's coming on? Like what time of the month is it? All that type of stuff. And we were a really great to have that open relationship and talk about those types of stuff, because I think being a woman in sport is is tough when you're on your period or coming on your period and stuff. And yeah, I think it's not really spoken about much.

Sue Anstiss:

I mean it's great to hear you're talking about it, but it is. It does feel like right now, with the work that the likes of Emma Ross and Georgie Brunviels and others are doing in this space, as we are now beginning at last to have those conversations about bodies and periods and how it impacts its madness. Isn't it that it wasn't talked about in the past?

Ellie Simmonds:

Yeah, I know it is crazy but, like you said, there's some amazing women and people that are searching and doing some research and finding out, because it does have a massive impact and so many people are different, Like for me, I always used to perform so so good after my periods, but it took me ages to figure that out. It was like running my career that I realised that maybe it should have been at the start. You know, I think women we need to be open a lot more, and not just it's not our thoughts at all, but I mean like the people just yeah, be able to talk about it in a comfortable manner.

Sue Anstiss:

Ellie also opened up about the impact of the bullying culture that existed in Paris Swimming ahead of Rio 2016. And you mentioned, obviously, your fantastic coach from Swansea. You had such a positive experience there and that's continued through. I'm obviously respected in your success in Beijing and London, but sadly there were issues with a bit of a bullying culture in Paris Swimming ahead of Rio 2016 and you'd moved to Manchester to the High Performance Centre. So I wonder how that hostile environment with that coach not the coach that you had for all those years but how did that impact you and your performance?

Ellie Simmonds:

You know what I think actually, it still impacts me sometimes now. Oh wow, I don't haven't really. Yeah, I think it's crazy when you, I think this it shouldn't be like when you're in an environment that someone is putting you down every single day and something that you think you're good at and they tell you you're not good at it. It shows words, the mannerisms and it definitely has a massive, massive impact. And especially when you're performing at a sport, it's hard, it's pressurized, it's hard, it's not easy, Like it's not something like yeah, you see us at a Paralympics or an Olympics and it's all amazing, but it's tough, like especially swimming.

Ellie Simmonds:

You're in the costume, you know, I remember I used to be. I was so skinny, like, looking back, I remember I used to weigh myself every single day. I used to have like half a bagel because I was worried about my weight and it was a very, very tough time. But also as well, I look back and I think it made me now realize that, like people like that who put people down, like now I've got more confidence to stand up for myself, but also my teammates as well, and hopefully as well.

Ellie Simmonds:

It's given a wake up call to British women, but also in sport in general. That shouldn't be. You know, it's about being when you've got a coach or when you've got your team, your team around you that they should work to better you not just as an athlete but as a person, and putting yourself down and telling you, using that old characteristic way and that old style of coaching just doesn't work, to have that over-relationship and talking and to support the person as a human and not just an athlete yeah, it's better, but you need to learn and stuff. And yeah, he's not that individualism in the sport hopefully not, but I don't know.

Sue Anstiss:

And do you think that British sport is better now in terms of finding that balance between athlete welfare and the pursuit of Olympic and Paralympic medals?

Ellie Simmonds:

Again, I can only vouch for swimming, but I think it's getting better. I think what's happened in the past, they've learned from me and again, I'm not much into that world at the moment, so I don't know but from when we had our moment and the timing in Rio and afterwards it definitely changed. But again, I hope it has and I hope it's staying in the positive way and I hope it continues and you learn from it.

Ellie Simmonds:

and I know that British gymnastics and gymnastics as a whole has had it and it's happened a few times in the sport and hopefully for future athletes and not just the youngsters, grass roots and Olympians, Paralympians, that it doesn't happen.

Sue Anstiss:

Juliet Slot, now Chief Commercial Officer at Arsenal Football Club, reflected on her experience as the first female director at Fulham Football Club. And how has the environment for women working in football changed since you were there in the 90s? So what differences have you seen?

Juliet Slot:

Well, for the first, for the point is, I arrived in Arsenal two years ago and I sit on an executive board where we're 50-50 women. I mean that change in itself is huge compared to my time at Fulham, whereas the only women on the board, there were two clubs where I wasn't allowed to go to away games. I'm not going to mention them. One club wasn't actually allowed to go to the boardroom and another club. When I went up there, I was ushered out to the director's dining room to go and eat with the wives.

Sue Anstiss:

Even though they knew you were a director.

Juliet Slot:

Yeah, and actually to the credit of my then chief executive, he said I'm not eating with the directors, I'm going to eat with you, juliet, and I never forgotten that about him because it meant so much to me and we were all rather surprised by it because it didn't exist at Fulham. So, yeah, I don't think any club would have been able to do that today, but it was something I experienced. Sexism was quite rife Just in the way you were treated like well, you're a woman, you don't understand football, or you're a marketing person, you don't understand football. So a lot of language and corridors or the way you're treated, whereas now I don't even think about whether I'm a woman. Arsenal in particular, I think I'm here because I'm hopefully doing a really good job as a chief commercial officer and I just happen to be a woman and my department. We have almost equal male, female. I'm really strong on building the diversity across the whole department. But it's so different now to where I was at Fulham, where we had a very small number of women in the club.

Sue Anstiss:

Did you ever feel like it wasn't a place that you wanted to be, because it was a sport that didn't want you or I'd sense that isn't how you are as a character.

Juliet Slot:

I think the behaviours that it developed to me were behaviours that I've had to undo, in that I had to become a battler.

Juliet Slot:

I am a battler and I was fighting to move up the greasy pole, as I say, and I don't need to be like that as much here at Arsenal at all. Actually, whereas I think I was always trying to fight and what I did was I worked harder and longer than some of my male counterparts because I felt I had to prove myself, which is tiring. I was doing that at the same time as also having three children working full time, so it's pretty exhausting and, I think, quite lonely at times, because I didn't really have anyone to talk to about how I felt, and so I sort of thought this was a norm, and actually I look back on it now thinking, gosh, if I'd known what I know now, I would have actually talked more openly to found some female mentors. I would have actually talked to the people I worked for and explained how I felt and how I'd been treated. But you didn't think you could have those conversations in those days, whereas you can now.

Sue Anstiss:

A panel episode focused on the lack of senior female coaches in sport and international coach Kelly Lindsey gave some fascinating insight into the world of professional football.

Kelly Lindsey:

Where we're at now with women's sports is we really all need to be thinking as organisational bodies and governing bodies, what does the women's game need and what do women in our game need, whether they're coaching the men, the youth, the women's side, whatever. We are not making decisions based on what the women need, because it's very rare that you sit in a room and dialogue about the experience of a woman in these sporting environments. People are not asking how we walk in our shoes. Men are not asking to walk in our shoes. They're not asking us questions. It's very, very rare when I sit with a man that he ever truly asks about my deep experience in sport, what's been harmful, what's been helpful, how I got there. Rarely it's always a talk, it's banter, it's just talking about the game, it's just talking about the game and that's where men align with other men. So if we can create more of a dialogue because you're asking us to walk in your shoes but you're not asking what it's like to walk in our shoes and when that dialogue comes across governing bodies and organisations, things will change because the men who will have that dialogue, who are great allies, suddenly go oh my gosh, yeah, I've never thought about that makes total sense. Why don't we do that? So I think that's when you know you have a true ally, people who really want to develop the women's game, because they're asking the right questions. And I think when you ask the right questions it gets very strategic and understandable and then barriers can be removed quite quickly because it's just, some of the things are so simple but if you just don't have the dialogue you're going to miss them.

Kelly Lindsey:

And I think the other side to it is we're comparing practical opportunities. Let's use England football for an example. On the women's side you have 24, only 24 clubs who might. Who might have a full-time female coach? Not even a female coach might have a full-time opportunity for a female coach 24, and I know out of the 24 they're not all full-time coaches. So in this entire country if a woman can only go coaching women's football, she probably has 22 opportunities on her CV to say she's a full-time head football coach. Men in this country have how many layers four layers of professional, how many layers into non-league to say that they are a professional? Because if a man puts it on his resume he's a professional, but if a woman puts that she's in tier four, she's not a professional. So the actual practical opportunities that come up on a CV. Which means organizationally, we need to change the way we recruit. We need to change the way we interview, we need to change the system and the process of how we go find females and how we take them on the journey and how we bring them into our club. So, future proofing and future planning I'm going to go find the best females, I'm going to bring them in at whatever level that is right for them and I'm going to plan to support them for the next 10 years because they are the future of my club.

Kelly Lindsey:

That is rarely happening in women's sports. Most clubs and most people who recruit for a women's job will say, oh no, women applied. And it's true they don't. But a big piece to go in and get women. That's caring enough to go in and getting women and having the dialogue and figuring out why they didn't apply. Most of them don't apply because they've had a horrific experience in sport at some point. They've been cut down. There's so many cuts the knives in the back but set up for failure. So have a dialogue, understand why they're not applying, meet them where they're at, take them on a development journey and future plan. But most clubs and organizations don't take the time for that. But if we really care about the women's game, then we really have to think what do those women's games need? Where is it at now and how do we plan for five or 10 years of success?

Sue Anstiss:

Guardian journalist, Suzy Wrack called up the gender inequality in sports writing. Obviously, we've seen great improvements in terms of gender equality across sport, but that's not always the case in sports journalism. It's really depressing to be at the Sports Journalists Awards last year and see those constant short lists of six white men, six white men, six white men. So I guess what's your experience been of that gender balance in sports reporting and do you think things are changing? And obviously the Guardian's leading the way there, but across the print areas, do you feel things are changing?

Suzy Wrack:

They are. I thought there would be more change after the Euro's win than there has been. I think some outlets have actually sort of stepped back a little bit rather than stepped forward in a way that I didn't expect. I just assumed it would be sort of continued growth everywhere, like it is being for us, and I very much get the impression that that's not the case and that the commitment is very much sort of based on who's in the senior roles at what time and that can make all the difference, whereas I mean I'm really really lucky at the Guardian that the commitment is just so from the top. My two main editors take their daughters, both play football. They take their daughters to games that I'm sat in the press box covering. There's a real like they enjoy it. It's not just sort of tokenistic, so that like I don't think. I think I sort of assume that everywhere was like that and everyone would be on the sort of Euro's hype train and wanting to do more after the English Euro's win, but that's not really necessarily been the case everywhere in the way that I maybe expected it would, which is disappointing but also not that surprising in some respects.

Suzy Wrack:

I mean, like I say, the awards. Just what I find really disappointing is if it had been the men's team winning the Euros or World Cup for the first time, it would be. You know, every single award would be dominated by that victory. And I get that. There were other big stories last year. You know there was Ukraine, you know big social events going on that pushed the Euro's sort of not down the pecking order, but just alongside it were some of the biggest stories of the year. I just think the idea that if that was a men's team winning, that wouldn't have been the top story and wouldn't have dominated is just unconscionable. It would have done.

Suzy Wrack:

But yet, you know you get no women's football writer nominated for sports writer, for sports right of the year or football right of the year in the year that England women have run a Euros. And you know I'm not saying that should it should be automatic. It was just the quality of the writing around. That tournament was so good, it was so high, so many did such a good job and there was so much passion poured into into the writing around it and a lot of emotion, particularly from some of the people who have covered it for a very, very, very long time and have followed the journeys of these players who you know we've seen playing whilst working full time jobs and things like that.

Suzy Wrack:

To to for that to not be recognised, for that storytelling not to be recognised just really frustrating me because I was like who's making this decision? Who is saying that there shouldn't be a women's football writer? And the year that england women have won the euros on the list of football writers of the year? Like that for me is just like mad. And obviously there's some brilliant men's football writing as well. I don't know. I just still think there's a little bit of a it's a stepping stone attitude to the industry generally and I think there's even that amongst some women's football journalist as well and the. You know I'm viewing it as A platform into the men's game, or the little sister of the men's game, and they want to do both or whatever it may be. That's never, ever been my like. My goal has never been to be a men's football journalist.

Sue Anstiss:

Suzy also shared her thoughts on the action of the Spanish players after the football World Cup.

Suzy Wrack:

What I mean by there enough is enough moment is like. For so long women have put up with A lot of women in football of the other lot and it's very much been a sort of whatever comes from the table we get and we're grateful for, and that's not rock the boat too much for more. You know, so I in the case of the Spain players. They could have stopped their fight when the manager was sacked. They could have stopped their fight when Ruby Arles finally resigned the president of the federation. You know that there's all these points at which they could have said right job done, back to work, and they've not. They've seen it as a responsibility to go further. They've recognized as well that they have the power to keep pushing the door and to make more sustained and substantive change than just the superficial right. Let's clear out this first layer of Misogynistic men just for the next wave coming in their place to our part of the same system that they have built and cultivated. And I just think it's such a key moment in that, you know they are willing to keep going beyond that and they've seen that this is the time that they can Keep demanding change and make it happen beyond, you know, just the superficial or the right quick. Now get our heads back down and let's go with the football kind of thing.

Suzy Wrack:

And I like that feels like a really important moment for me and a really important lesson for Women in society generally, that you know you win one thing and you don't have to stop there, you don't have to go right off. Thank god, few. We've won that now let's. You know we've got Equal pay for. You know, the US women's national team players. We've got. We've got people pay. Let's keep our heads down. Now they can. You can go much, much further than that. You don't have to put down the microphone and go right now let's keep quiet for a bit, because we've won that and we, you know, we've got to be good for a little bit so that they don't, you know, kind of think we're just up on a high horse or whatever.

Suzy Wrack:

And I think that's a really important thing and I think we're already seeing others take on. I mean, when you look at how outspoken england of being after the euros win on access in schools, on their bonuses, on Commercial rights, on just that, you know the future, you know not letting the government put out a statement saying, yes, we're gonna Honor all these agreements and then leaving it. You know they're chasing up there following it. They're not gonna let it just be a something that's paid lips service to and a bit of pr, yeah. So, yeah, I think people are starting to learn those lessons and that, for me, is exciting and I like really important moment, because that's when you get Like more systemic change, when you start to challenge things are much deeper level, when you're pushing beyond those like the individuals that are the problem to it. Being a more systemic thing, I think is what needs to happen.

Sue Anstiss:

UFC champion Molly 'M eatball' McCann spoke about how her upbringing in libra pool has shaped the fighter she became.

Molly McCann:

I come from a loving family, just grow up in a time in a city where there was not much to do over the A lot of crying, probably, and a lot of addiction. They were blip the gamble and drink no drugs and it was just. It was not probably walking towards you. Never imagine three kids have to live you and I just remember being very young and always having a lot of comforts, like Walking and say, being in the middle. Come downstairs thinking why aren't these people, why people still party in the house, like getting up to no good. And I come downstairs look at these people and think they just I'm talking 456, there is no way I'm ending up like this and the model compass just knew like I'm not going to do that. I'm not going to do that and You're probably really born with this.

Molly McCann:

But I was reading a book on emotional intelligence, just always trying to understand we try and and why I am the way I am and why I take deeper than most and say positions or say part of life.

Molly McCann:

I suppose, and it's because you forged with what you go through and I think the more adversity that you receive you have to go through at a young age normally means that there's nothing really that you can't Managed to wiggle your way through as you get older. So, like, sometimes I get it wrong. I get through it when I've acted incorrectly or I probably don't something negative on the way to get out when I was a lot younger, but I feel like I wouldn't change one step in the journey of me, family or myself. I'm not ashamed of anything. I don't anything that my family's done and I've had to get Be that way, to have bad as well, because they brought me up with brilliant models to be respectful to, to push the envelope, to push the barge of anything, and they always made me believe I could achieve anything that I ever wanted.

Sue Anstiss:

Former Olympian turned sports Jeanette Kwakye opened up on the issue of sports kit for young women. Really interesting, you're kind of stepping away from sport and those teenage years and we see lots of stuff about teenage girls dropping out of sport and a lot around sports clothing. We have more conversations about clothing and I just wanted from you as a track athlete, whether you ever had any issues challenges with their discussions around the kit that you competed in or whether you just accepted that because you were a kind of female track athlete.

Jeanette Kwakye:

It's really such an interesting conversation, so new it's, doesn't it? So I Love my track here. I mean, I'd wear the smallest crop top, I'd have the tiniest pants because I just I just what? Okay, I Wanted to look good and I was. I was super body confident. Now, that's a personality thing. It's a huge personality thing because there were girls that I'd compete against, but at the longest shorts possible and the biggest best to wear. You know, I mean, and it's completely down to how you feel as an individual Now I can see why it can be incredibly problematic.

Jeanette Kwakye:

I was a school sports football tournament just a couple of weeks ago and it was mixed football tournament, fiber-sized year sixes and All the girls were in PE skirts and I just did. I was like what we are in 2023? You know, I'm a school over 20 years ago, nearly 25 years ago and I am shocked that this is, this is still the norm. Like, put these girls in shorts that don't feel comfortable. We've had so many conversations around it and let them make that decision Further down the line if they then want to be able to, to wear things that are a little bit more Standardized when it comes down to kids and sport with women.

Jeanette Kwakye:

But I personally Didn't necessarily have a problem with it. But I can see massively now why you know it's problematic. And now then you look back you can see why other girls would be the hands in in fake sick peanuts and Well now all that kind of stuff, because you just you feel confident, you don't want to wear it. But you know, like I say, as I've got older and the empathy is kind of kicked in, I'm like oh gosh, yeah, that must have been really challenging, for you know I can name tens of girls you don't want to do it school. But now you really see if what is in main desk because I'm a mum or you know I've had a bit of time and I've worked so many young people you can really see why it can be problematic.

Sue Anstiss:

If you enjoyed listening to some of our highlights from 2023, you can find the full interviews and over 160 episodes on all podcast channels or at fearless women, dot co dot UK. As well as listening to all of the podcast and the website, you can also find out more about the Women's Sport Collective, a free, inclusive community for all women working in sport. Thanks once again to Sport England for backing the gamechangers through the National Lottery, and also to Sam Walker At what goes on media, who does such a great job as our executive producer. Thank you also to my brilliant colleague at Fearless Women, Kate Hannon. Do follow us now to make sure you don't miss out on that new series and if you have a moment to leave a rating or a review, it would be fantastic, as it really does help us to reach new audiences. Come and say hello on social media, where you'll find me on LinkedIn, instagram and Twitter at @Sue Anstiss. The Game Changers - Fearless Women in sport.

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