Fuente: © UEFA (English)
http://www.uefa.com/

CHAMPIONS LEAGUE: Chances for women coaches

/noticias.info/ by Paul Saffer
from Nyon

The existence of a 'glass ceiling' for the top potential female trainers and ways to encourage the growth of women's football in nations where the game is not so developed were discussed at Wednesday's UEFA Elite Women's Coaches Forum at UEFA headquarters in Nyon, Switzerland.

Coaching courses
UEFA technical director Andy Roxburgh chaired the round table discussion with 23 leading trainers from European national senior and youth teams and club football, plus UEFA Women's Football Committee Chairwomen Karen Espelund, and several participants raised concerns that while many women were taking the UEFA B coaching license, in some countries several of them do not rise any higher, facing the problem of being a small minority in male-dominated courses. Whether separate female-only courses would be an idea was discussed, as well as the English Football Association's mentoring system for potential coaches. The German delegates also promoted their long-standing scheme of encouraging the top national team players undertake coaching courses - current national coach Sylvia Neid and Under-19 trainer Maren Meinert both took that route.

Assistance
Meanwhile, in countries where women's football is still in the early stages of development - notably the 16 nations that fell in the UEFA European Women's Championship preliminary round - the coaches were encouraged to give assistance in providing expertise to help those associations improve, especially as they will have no competitive game for two years while UEFA WOMEN'S EURO 2009™ qualifying takes place. Roxburgh told uefa.com: "It is about competition on the field, and cooperation off it."

Regional academies
At the elite level, France coach Elisabeth Loisel described their attempt to branch out from the national academy at Clairefontaine, which already produces top-class female as well as male players, to introduce a regional structure similar to that in the men's game there. It was also noted that support from the leading men's clubs - with AC Sparta Praha in the Czech Republic being one example - has been helpful in the development of female talent.

Grassroots Charter
Roxburgh took the chance to promote UEFA's Grassroots Charter, where one of the five available star marks can only be gained by having a set number of female players, which participation as important here as in any area for development. He added of the gathering itself: "It gives the coaches a voice, and gives us the opportunity to get a lot of information and feedback. This is an invaluable exercise."

In attendance
Those attending the event were Silvia Neid (Germany), Thomas Dennerby (Sweden), Marika Domanski-Lyfors (Sweden), Bjarne Berntsen (Norway), Kenneth Heiner-Møller (Denmark), Peter Bonde (Denmark), Hope Powell (England), Elisabeth Loisel (France), Yury Bystritskiy (Russia), Pietro Ghedin (Italy), Carolina Morace (Italy), Dušan Žovinec (Czech Republic), Michael Käld (Finland), Bernd Schröder (1. FFC Turbine Potsdam), Jürgen Tritschoks (1. FFC Frankfurt), Andrée Jeglertz (Umeå IK), Maren Meinert (Germany), Alexander Shagov (Russia), Valentin Grishin (Russia), Ignacio Quareda (Spain), Vera Pauw (Netherlands/UEFA Technical Study Group), Anna Signeul (Scotland/UEFA Technical Study Group), Béatrice von Siebenthal (Switzerland) and Karen Espelund (UEFA Women's Football Committee Chairwomen). notas_de_prensa_archivo