The Women’s Soccer World Cup Final 2023: gender equity and alcohol promotion

The Women’s Soccer World Cup would appear to showcase a dramatic example of success for women’s sports that should offer dividends of greater equity across all sports. Only a minor part of this relates to the evolving storm over a blatantly inappropriate kiss by the Spanish Soccer Federation Manager, Luis Rubiales, which may foster further support for the international #MeToo movement, ¹ and even engender a new social movement under the Spanish soccer players’ latest hashtag ‘Se acabó’, meaning ‘it’s over’. ² Perhaps more importantly, recent years have seen a dramatic increase in the profile of women’s professional sports.^3,4 Participation by women in sports and athletics has similarly increased dramatically, ⁵ particularly in soccer, rugby and tag rugby.^6,7 It is estimated that viewership for this World Cup was approximately two billion, double that of the previous Women’s World Cup in 2019. ⁸ Across the two finalists, the UK and Spain, there was, unsurprisingly, particularly widespread support for their respective teams. ⁹

It is hoped that such high-profile involvement will help to end the cliff-like drop-off in young women’s sports participation which has often marked their leaving school.^10,11 This phenomenon is significantly marked in men, but even more so among women. Participation in sport is known to confer a range of positive outcomes including fitness, stress reduction, confidence, as well as a sense of purpose, belonging and social support.^12,13 The high-profile Women’s World Cup may help respond to concerns over significant levels of gender inequity in sports coverage on television, ¹⁴ and to concerns that ‘If she cannot see it she cannot be it’.^15–17

The movement towards increased gender equity may also be bolstered by moves such as England’s Football Association’s decision to pay both women’s and men’s teams the same match fees and match bonuses. ¹⁸ A small but growing number of countries have adopted this measure including Brazil, New Zealand, Norway and Australia. Encouragingly, Wales has also recently adopted this equitable stance for its national team. ¹⁹ Symbolic steps such as these may be important in challenging wider gender inequalities. Gender equality is crucial to promoting women’s health, as well as the health of children.^20–23 Across a wide range of medical interventions and research, women are systematically disadvantaged and underserved. This inequality can be seen from male crash test dummies to the Coronavirus disease 2019 vaccine. ^{24 – 28}

Despite the positive outline above, the thorny issue of alcohol remains. No doubt alcohol marketing researchers will perform more in-depth examinations of the exact quantity of alcohol advertising visible on the electronic hoardings and other advertising sites. This type of analysis has been conducted in the past, examining soccer, rugby and a variety of other sports.^29–32 No doubt both the Budweiser (beer) and Jacob’s Creek (wine) adverts, which could be seen periodically in the cup final, will feature in this type of analysis in the near future.

However, an additional and important focus has to be the ongoing efforts to copper fasten the link between alcohol and sport. This is evident in both Government circles and within the media. Examining the media first, examinations of alcohol advertising visible in televised sports coverage referred to above are undoubtedly important.^29–32 However, it may be fair to say that they are background ‘wallpaper’ to the main focus. As Oscar Wilde famously noted in his last words, ‘either the wallpaper goes, or I do’, viewers’ overt attention will not be as focused on this background imagery as on the target of the camera. With this in mind, one particular incident in the media coverage of the Women’s Soccer World Cup final match stands out. Approximately 30 minutes into the match, and shortly after Spain had scored, the camera turned to focus specifically on a young female Spanish fan holding what very clearly appears to be a plastic beaker of beer and shouting in delight (see Figure 1).

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Figure 1.

Close-up coverage of a fan drinking alcohol.

This kind of image is highly problematic for a number of reasons. It highlights, normalises and glamourises alcohol consumption, as well as showing positives rather than negative consequences. It also has connotations such as: fans drink alcohol, fans drink while watching sport and drinking alcohol can make you the centre of attention. One aspect of particular concern is the substantial youth audience that were undoubtedly watching this Cup Final match, particularly young girls. This clip was displayed across live coverage of the match in both the UK and Ireland, and no doubt in many other countries as well. As the tournament was played in New Zealand and Australia, the kick-off time for the final was 11:00 am in the UK/Ireland and noon in Spain. Similarly problematic imagery was observed during the Rugby World Cup, ³³ and at a number of other sporting events. ³⁴

As can be observed with the careful and targeted marketing of various products from tobacco to razor blades, industry is keen to ensnare the female market into purchasing products that were traditionally only bought by men.^35–38 Alcohol is no exception.^39,40 Female alcohol consumption rates are lower than those of men, something that is in the alcohol industry’s interests to change. ⁴¹ However, alcohol is an important negative commercial determinant of health for both men and women, with alcohol noted as a significant predictor of breast cancer in women in particular.^42–45 The UK and Ireland have an established problem with alcohol and as such this form of de facto alcohol promotion is highly problematic.^44,45

Turning now to the British Government, the populist calling for pubs to be able to serve alcohol earlier to facilitate alcohol consumption among fans is intensely disappointing. It is no surprise that the alcohol industry group, the British Beer and Pub Association called for longer opening hours, but for Members of Parliament and the levelling-up Minister, Michael Gove, to do the same is inappropriate.^46,47 It promotes alcohol consumption, reinforces the link between alcohol and sport and undermines public health initiatives to curtail alcohol consumption.

It is obvious that an alcohol-oriented equivalent of the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC) is required if the threat of alcohol is to be substantively combatted globally. The FCTC is the World Health Organization’s (WHO) first international health treaty and has proven to be a significant factor in promoting tobacco control measures. ⁴⁸ However, even the media and advertising controls in agreements such as the FCTC are weak in relation to media coverage which is not a paid advertisement. Prominent clips of alcohol consumption, even when watched by tens of millions of viewers on daytime television would fall through the cracks of such international agreements. However, an undertaking to avoid a focus on alcohol in crowd shots could easily be included in contractual agreements between broadcasters and those agencies filming sports events and would quickly solve this issue, particularly if financial penalties for non-adherence were included. The implementation of such a contractual rule in negotiations for State-funded television channels should be relatively easy, although more extended work by Public Health advocates may be required with for-profit broadcasters.