Colombia’s dauntless new universe hailed a success

• Santa Fe are a champions of a initial Liga Aguila Femenina in Colombia
• FIFA’s support in environment adult this veteran women’s joining was crucial
• “It’s a dream come true,” pronounced star midfielder Leicy Santos

When Leicy Santos accompanied her Santa Fe team-mates onto a representation in late Jun to tighten horns with Atletico Huila in a second leg of a grand final of Colombia’s new Liga Aguila Femenina, she could not trust her eyes. Before her, she saw 33,327 fans packaged into a Estadio Nemesio Camacho to declare story in a making. “It was too most to take in,” she told FIFA.com. “There are no difference to report how we feel when we see so many people there to support you.”

The 21-year-old Colombian international, who would go on to measure a idea that saw her bar crowned inhabitant champions, added: “It’s usually serve explanation of how renouned women’s football has become.” Indeed, a conspicuous assemblage in Bogota was a second tip in a story of women’s bar football, after a 35,271 throng that attended a FA Cup final during Wembley Stadium in May.

Asistencia histórica para un partido de #LigaFemeninaAguila, 33.327 espectadores vieron la Final entre @SantaFe y @AHuilaFemenino #FFP pic.twitter.com/8GNwVxM8Wo

— DIMAYOR (@Dimayor) June 25, 2017

Santos and a rest of Las Cafeteras had prolonged requested and hoped for a veteran domestic set-up, a joining that would capacitate them to play during a tip turn within their possess nation and boost a ubiquitous turn of competition. 

The altogether objectives were to settle Colombian women’s football among a best in a world, and urge a formula of a inhabitant group that has taken partial in any critical contest – FIFA Women’s World Cup, Olympic Games and Copa America Femenina – given 2010.

Due to a efforts of DIMAYOR, a physique that runs Colombia’s veteran competitions, and a financial and constructional support supposing by FIFA’s Forward Programme, a joining saw a light of day in Feb 2017. At a finish of a lass season, DIMAYOR President Jorge Fernando Perdomo reflected on a pursuit good done.

“We are really pleased,” he said. “Everyone concerned lived adult to expectations. From a football indicate of view, a clubs’ squads were tip quality, and in organisational terms, we really acted like a veteran league. The philharmonic we laid on supposing football lovers in a nation with something a bit different, and they responded by attending matches and examination them on TV. And with a media willingly covering any turn of games, women’s football was means to scrupulously position itself.”

Liga Aguila Femenina in figures

• No fewer than 18 teams took partial in a initial book of a championship, a series that will sojourn unvaried for subsequent season, that starts in January. A third deteriorate is scheduled to start in Oct 2018, this time with 36 competing teams divided into a initial and second division.
• Colombian radio broadcasts one compare per round, and during a final a equitable assembly rating of 7.3 was recorded. Next season, an agreement with informal channels will capacitate 7 some-more matches to be televised per round.
• Games were scheduled on a same day as men’s matches in sequence to attract a limit series of fans, who could watch both encounters with one ticket.
• Santa Fe prisoner a joining pretension though losing a singular match, induction 15 wins and one pull during their campaign. In a two-legged final opposite Atletico Huila, they cumulative a 2-1 divided feat before winning 1-0 during home pleasantness of Santos’ aforementioned goal.
• As inhabitant champions, Santa Fe, nicknamed Las Cardenales, will paint Colombia during a Copa Libertadores Femenina in November.

FIFA’s financial subsidy has been critical in terms of equipping all a teams with football kits and training gear, as good as providing accommodation for players and staff on divided trips and ancillary DIMAYOR in promotional events associated to a league.

Additional financial assistance from within Colombia has also lonesome a cost of atmosphere ride and university grant prizes for a champions.

For Santos, who comes from a family of medium means, and who incited her life upside down during a age of 13 to take a possibility on football, a joining is a realization of a long-held aspiration. “My relatives gave me their umbrella support, even yet a destiny was uncertain,” she explained. “And they were usually during a final, ancillary Santa Fe, and now they’re a proudest relatives in a world. This joining is a dream come loyal and an open doorway that we wish will never close.”

La fiesta de nuevo es cardenal #PrimerosParaLaEternidad somos #ElÚnicoPrimerCampeón ⭐ pic.twitter.com/7bpg3oHhg7

— Ind. Santa Fe (@SantaFe) June 25, 2017

(It’s celebration time for Las Cardenales again – initial for eternity. We’ll always be a first-ever champions!)

The midfielder knows that most stays to be done, though that things are relocating in a right direction. “At ubiquitous level, women’s football has finished a large impact, interjection to FIFA, a people compelling it, and a media. There’s a prolonged highway ahead, though we’re building it section by brick.”

Perdomo shares a view that this is usually a beginning. “We’re really wakeful that we have to keep operative tough and improving several aspects, though what we’ve finished is sown a seeds of a veteran women’s joining in a country,” he said. 

“It will turn one of a best leagues in South America and one of a tip 5 in a universe – I’ve no doubt about that. We’ve got such gifted players, and we will, if we can pronounce on interest of a executive side of things, yield all a guarantees we can that this will happen.”

The doorway has positively non-stop for women’s football in Colombia, and it is set to stay that approach too.

Article source: http://www.fifa.com/development/news/y=2017/m=7/news=colombia-s-brave-new-world-hailed-a-success-2901492.html