​Safe­guard­ing in sport can be detri­men­tal and dan­ger­ous if its ac­tions are nar­row­ly de­fined or con­fined, par­tic­u­lar­ly con­cern­ing women and girls. True safe­guard­ing must ur­gent­ly ad­dress the spe­cif­ic is­sues that con­tin­ue to make sport un­safe for their men­tal, phys­i­cal, and emo­tion­al health.

​The phys­i­cal re­al­i­ties of fe­male ath­letes, such as Ex­er­cise-In­duced Breast Pain (EIPD), ill-fit­ting bras, and man­ag­ing men­stru­al health, are crit­i­cal fac­tors that im­pact per­for­mance, com­fort, and par­tic­i­pa­tion. These are not mi­nor in­con­ve­niences; they are sig­nif­i­cant pri­or­i­ties that sport or­gan­i­sa­tions must ad­dress.

​Sport was not orig­i­nal­ly de­vel­oped with women and girls in mind, lead­ing to deep-seat­ed cul­tur­al bar­ri­ers. The pre­vail­ing mind­set of­ten pro­motes at­trib­ut­es deemed “man­ly”—re­silience, tough­ness, and an un­re­lent­ing pur­suit of suc­cess—as the on­ly path to cham­pi­onship sta­tus.

Sport is bru­tal and not al­ways fair. In the world of sports, noth­ing is as com­pelling as re­silience against over­whelm­ing odds. Out­side of ded­i­ca­tion, it takes a strong mind to get through an in­jury and climb back to the pin­na­cle. To stay pos­i­tive and re­lent­less in pur­suit of your dreams.

Main­tain­ing a pos­i­tive men­tal at­ti­tude is non-ne­go­tiable. The pain, the mind­set to not ac­cept “no” as an an­swer.. If some­one says you can’t do some­thing, prove them wrong and do bet­ter than ever. De­fy­ing the odds as a tes­ta­ment to re­silience and de­ter­mi­na­tion. It’s a man’s world with at­trib­ut­es deemed “man­ly”. Women and girls dis­play­ing the at­ti­tude and heart of a cham­pi­on aren’t fem­i­nine. Old think­ing needs to be re­moved from de­ci­sion-mak­ing. They are im­ped­i­ments to im­ple­ment­ing nec­es­sary change. There are al­so women in lead­er­ship who them­selves are “old thinkers”.

For ath­letes striv­ing to be an Olympic, World or any cham­pi­on, de­pres­sion and pain are their con­stant com­pan­ions. It’s a bit­ter pill to swal­low when they re­alise that those they en­trust­ed with their well-be­ing are com­plic­it in cre­at­ing and or main­tain­ing an en­vi­ron­ment that can com­plete­ly strip you of your hu­man­i­ty and lead to sig­nif­i­cant body im­age and men­tal health is­sues, which dri­ve women and girls away from sport.

Ac­cord­ing to a Women In Sport re­port: Gen­der stereo­typ­ing is alive and kick­ing. Girls as young as five years old feel they don’t be­long in sport. On­ly 30% of par­ents be­lieve play­ing sport is very im­por­tant for their daugh­ter, com­pared with 41% of par­ents for their sons.

There’s a men­tal health cri­sis in teenage girls. Anx­i­ety is spi­ralling up­wards, along with self-harm and eat­ing dis­or­ders. By the time they reach pu­ber­ty, girls who once loved sport are dis­en­gag­ing.

How­ev­er, there are sports or­gan­i­sa­tions mak­ing progress.

World Rug­by, as an ex­am­ple, has a “Women’s Health” We­bi­nar Se­ries, a quar­ter­ly ini­tia­tive aimed at shar­ing vi­tal knowl­edge on women’s health top­ics with­in rug­by. It of­fers prac­ti­cal tools to nav­i­gate sen­si­tive con­ver­sa­tions. With top­ics that in­clude breast and men­stru­al health, these we­bi­na­rs are de­signed for every­one in­volved in women’s rug­by world­wide: play­ers, coach­es, con­di­tion­ing and med­ical staff, and broad­er team man­age­ment.

In No­vem­ber 2020, FI­FA an­nounced that all fe­male play­ers world­wide were en­ti­tled to at least 14 weeks of ma­ter­ni­ty leave paid at two-thirds their nor­mal salary.

The Unit­ed States women’s na­tion­al team CBA (Col­lec­tive Bar­gain­ing Agree­ment) re­quires US Soc­cer to pro­vide flights, lodg­ing and meals to care­givers and chil­dren un­til the age of six. Team nu­tri­tion­ists and ad­min­is­tra­tors are “al­ways check­ing in”, mak­ing sure that breast­feed­ing play­ers and their ba­bies have every­thing they need.

​The vi­sion of the “Fu­ture is Fe­male” must be more than a slo­gan; it is the trans­for­ma­tion of sport for the wel­fare and ben­e­fit of every woman and girl.