Her Game Too ambassadors tell us how important the deal equal pay for the national teams is in Wales and look to the year ahead.

History was made earlier this month as the Football Association of Wales agreed a deal that will see the Men’s and Women’s football teams receive equal pay when repressing their country for the first time. 

This news is the first of its kind for Welsh football and shows a huge step in the right direction. Brittany Teague, a proud Wales supporter and member of the ‘Her Game Too’ campaign commented,

“It's fantastic to see that the women's game continues to grow in Wales, in both participation and attendances. The men's team unanimously agreed to a pay cut to enable this to progress which collectively shows their support of the historic change. I hope that this message encourages more young girls and women in Wales to continue in the sport and that other organisations take this positive approach too.“

The talks of pay parity with the Wales women’s team have been underway since November 2021 and the Red Dragon will now join countries such as Australia, England, Norway, England and Brazil in paying the same international match fee to both Men’s and Women’s teams. 

Brittany’s fellow Her Game Too member, Roopa Vyas said,

“For me, as a Her Game Too director and a proud Welsh woman, I am elated. The support for the women’s team has grown significantly, especially over the last year, and will only continue as they are treated as equals by the FAW and are put in the spotlight just as much as the men.

"If you didn’t already know, the FAW have several projects in place to support and encourage women and girls in football such as a BE football mentoring programme and I have seen first-hand the opportunities available for women in all capacities. It truly is amazing to see. Football as a whole is heading in the right direction, but decisions like these with Wales leading the way mean I couldn’t be more proud to be Welsh”

Both Brittany and Roopa are part of Her Game Too, a campaign set up in 2021 to combat sexist abuse within football and ensure it really is everyone’s game. The campaign won the prestigious Best organisation in Women’s Football at the Football Content Awards (FCA’s) last year, which Roopa described as “the icing on the cake”.

Of course, the campaign will be around for the long haul, with the aim of inspiring the next generation of girls to want to grow up to play and watch sport without the threat of sexist abuse. Speaking on her targets for the year, Roopa said,

“2022 set the bar quite high, but I just know we can go bigger and better in 2023! We are branching out in so many directions, there is a lot in the pipeline at the moment which I can’t reveal too much on yet but all I will say is that you will see us EVERYWHERE! I would also like to quickly thank people for their support throughout this journey.

"The campaign is under 2 years old but we are growing exponentially and that can be quite overwhelming on top of a full-time job. But the support gets us all through it and really is the motivation to carry on fighting to make football a game where all are accepted and welcomed”. 

With 2022 being a landmark year for HGT and 2023 starting off in the historical way that it has for FAW, Brittany ends by saying, “every partnership from grassroot teams to Premier League teams means so much to the team and we continue to work hard together to raise awareness and offer support to those who reach out to us.

"We know collectively that there are still many challenges ahead for the campaign however we are driven to create a positive change in football.“