If not now then when? (nd-aktuell.de)

In the large parking lot in front of the Frankfurt Arena, people in dirndls, lederhosen and jackets are streaming around every day to enjoy themselves at the Frankfurt Oktoberfest. Party people and football fans inevitably meet on the paths when the opening game of the women’s Bundesliga between Eintracht Frankfurt and Bayern Munich is scheduled for this Friday. The Hessian hosts almost spread a feeling of elation as if from an atmospheric beer tent with Bavarian brass music.

“Each of us is happy to be able to play in this stadium under floodlights. It’s going to be a mega experience,” says Frankfurt captain Tanja Pawollek. The 23-year-old has good arguments when it comes to promoting women’s football. “We have honest football. No frills. We play football for the love of the sport, there isn’t that much money involved.« Unlike the men, the women didn’t need acting either, explains Pawollek: »You fall on the ground and get up again.«

With the starting shot, the hype sparked by the German soccer players at the European Championships in England is to be transported into everyday league life. No one expects 18 million viewers on TV like at the European Championship final and also not 80,000 like at Wembley Stadium, but Eintracht Frankfurt announces a “historic backdrop” that should be more than 20,000 fans. Even if there are ten European runners-up champions on both sides: those responsible dismissed a figure of 30,000 or 40,000 visitors as illusory from the outset.

hope for a larger audience

The old record in the Bundesliga is 12,464 spectators who watched VfL Wolfsburg in the Elsterweg stadium against 1. FFC Frankfurt on the last day of the 2013/2014 season as Alexandra Popp decided the championship with a last-minute header. The captain of the national team hopes »that many more spectators will come, especially the people we have newly inspired. And to be honest: If not now, then when?” The declared goal is to increase the audience base and to combat the stagnation in viewer numbers. On average, 811 eyewitnesses were lost per game last season. Just as little as 13 years ago. Siegfried Dietrich, Eintracht sports director and spokesman for the women’s national leagues, firmly believes in a “new age of perception”.

But not everyone is so euphoric. Felix Seidel, advisor to the German internationals Giulia Gwinn and Sydney Lohmann from FC Bayern, notes that the salaries of the top players in particular have continued to rise, but that the structural conditions in the women’s Bundesliga have hardly changed after the European Championship. The stadium infrastructure is also the same, which means that a provincial ambience is sometimes still possible for TV broadcasts.

unequal conditions

Seidel misses concepts. From the 41-year-old’s point of view, the impetus from the first highlight games with the game of the second matchday on September 24 between TSG Hoffenheim and VfL Wolfsburg, which was also broadcast live on ARD, could quickly fizzle out, “if we don’t have any ideas like we do pick up these viewers in the coming weeks and months.”

So is some measure just a marketing gimmick? »Many clubs communicate a great desire to professionalize, but this is not visible enough in the implementation. Sustainable change only works if the decision-makers of the clubs and also the German Football Association join forces and push together with a really lived strategy. Too many are still on the brakes.« The cardinal problem from Seidel’s point of view: »There is no competition in the league.«

The Gwinn he oversees, the social media star of the league with almost 500,000 Instagram followers, lists only three clubs with Bayern, VfL Wolfsburg and Eintracht Frankfurt, “that do a lot for women’s football and in which it really professionally«. The 23-year-old knows: “Many players work 40 hours a week in another job in addition to football, and the support from the club is not the same everywhere.” Equal play is therefore much more important to her than equal pay. “First fair conditions have to be created. After that, you can also talk about adjusting salaries.« However, no one is demanding millions of dollars. Where is the money supposed to come from?

On average, each Bundesliga club earned just 1.16 million euros in the 2020/2021 season, but spent 2.46 million euros. The sum of the salaries alone exceeds the income – and increases disproportionately. The best-known national players usually collect five-digit monthly salaries, EM star Popp will earn around 15,000 euros after her contract extension as the top earner. The gap to those who study or work on the side and only receive a few hundred euros in compensation continues to grow.

So again only the double winner VfL Wolfsburg and the permanent rival FC Bayern are eligible for the championship. Eintracht Frankfurt and TSG Hoffenheim, perhaps also SC Freiburg, 1. FC Köln and Bayer Leverkusen, are likely to battle for the important third place, which entitles them to qualify for the Champions League. A lot is happening on the Rhine, in Cologne and Leverkusen. The rest, however, are playing against relegation, although in addition to Werder Bremen, the promoted MSV Duisburg and SV Meppen should traditionally have a very difficult time. The SGS Essen and Turbine Potsdam have a right to exist as talent factories, but for the pure women’s clubs a struggle for survival is announced, which can hardly be won in the long run.

Top players stay in Germany

After all, contrary to expectations, the perfectly marketed English professional league Women‹s Super League is not the “last stop longing” for the 23 European Championship heroines, 20 of whom continue to play in Germany. Not a single top player moved to the island this summer, but midfielder Georgia Stanway, a European champion, moved to Munich. “This league suits my style of play, the team inspires me,” explains the 23-year-old. “I’ve enjoyed every second of the last five weeks.” The Englishwoman wasn’t even at the real Oktoberfest, which doesn’t start until Saturday in Munich.