In July of 2015, the country rejoiced as the U.S. women’s soccer team became world champions, winning the 2015 FIFA Women’s World Cup. The team is currently celebrating on a World Cup victory tour. However, this past Sunday’s game was cancelled due to poor field conditions, a move that the team says is sexist.
The next game in the Victory Tour was set to be in Hawaii against Trinidad and Tobago. In The Players Tribune, the U.S. women’s soccer team wrote that the stadium, which utilized artificial turf, was not in a safe condition for playing. The team writes that there “were sharp rocks ingrained all over the field” and that the “artificial turf was actually pulling up out of the ground, and the turf itself was both low-grade and aging.” The team ended the piece by stating that the decision to not play on an unsafe field takes a stance to protect all women’s soccer players. It’s important to note that the men’s World Cup is played on grass, not artificial turf.
The news of this injustice opens the conversation up for gender equality in sports. Hopefully, as the women’s soccer team wrote, women will “be treated equally as our male counterparts.”
Cover image courtesy of Shutterstock.
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