Nick and I have been genuinely blown away by how much Hammyend has grown. When I sat in his Stockholm flat in the summer of 2003 preparing to launch our little website for the Fulham fans, I’d didn’t think we’d still be going nearly twenty years later. I certainly didn’t imagine that we’d have become the place that so many of you visit for new news, writing and – now listening material – about Fulham Football Club. It’s been brilliant, though, and I’m personally ever so grateful for the new friends that writing about our special club has brought me and the superb support over the years.
The domestic hiatus caused by the World Cup was always going to present a problem for sites such as ours. What to do when the thing you write about so regularly won’t happen for age? We took the decision to shut down entirely for much of the lockdown, because there was very little Fulham content that could be produced without access to the game we loved – and, frankly, life was tough enough. We’ve proudly covered all the club’s teams, including the academy and what were Fulham Ladies, from our inception – and will continue to do so for as long as possible.
Women’s football has always been special to me. The best footballer I saw and played with during my school days was a woman who was lost to the game because of a shameful lack of post-16 playing opportunities. It was the women’s game that gave me an opportunity to complete my coaching badges during my time at university. I had the time of life coaching in Devon with a ladies’ side for a few months and helped out with the University of Exeter’s women’s team, which was close to folding, which happened to bring me into closer contact with Adam Stansfield, father of our young centre forward Jay. For that, I’ll be forever grateful.
The women’s game has a shameful history in this country – being banned by the authorities for half a century for the heinous crime of being popular – which is only just being repaired. Fulham’s own history is instructive. Friends of Fulham were incredibly successful in the 1980s, famously winning the FA Cup in 1985, and reaching the final in 1989 and 1990. When the team became what is now AFC Wimbledon Women, Fulham set up their own side in 1993 and, after Mohamed Al-Fayed was inspired by the wonderful Women’s World Cup staged in America in 1999, the then-chairman poured huge money into the side, allowing them to turn professional at the turn of millennium.
Professionalism was meant to a precursor to a fully professional domestic top flight – which the FA unforgivably dragged their feet on. Fulham flew up the pyramid and dominated the English game between 2000 and 2003. A squad, including England’s first professional player – the trailblazing Rachel Yankey – and the technically gifted midfielder Katie Chapman, was supplemented by international stars such as Olympic gold medallist Marianne Pettersen and coached by Gaute Haugenes. The Whites won trophy after trophy, four of them in 2001-02, scoring 342 goals and conceding just 15. A treble followed the very next season and, even after Al-Fayed pulled most of his funding after the FA announced another delay to their plan for professionalism, they finished second as semi-professionals in the Premier League in 2004.
The inevitable consequence of reverting back to part-time was the break up of an incredible team that I watched regularly as a teenager. The club pulled their association in 2006, which led to formal separation of the side from the men’s team and a change of name. It was only in 2014, under a Fulham Foundation initiative that the team became associated with the club again, something that was formalised when an improving side came back into the official Fulham Football Club set up four years later.
Fulham Women, coached by Steve Jaye and captained by lifelong fan Mary Southgate, are an inspirational group of young role models. They remain amateur and so their playing commitments have to sit alongside full-time jobs, family commitments and lives, but each of these women gives so much to the game and their local community. The Whites deserve more support and appreciation. That’s one of the reasons why we have decided today to launch our own women’s football month – to tell a few more stories and give prominence to female football whilst the men’s game has made the disgraceful decision to stage its showcase tournament in a country that doesn’t respect workers or human rights.
The second motivation is to amplify the work of ten fantastic female Fulham fans who set up the Fulham Lillies this summer. Women within football still face discrimination, which regularly manifests itself when they are attending matches themselves. That’s why Her Game Too launched during lockdown, with the explicit aim of eradicating sexism from the beautiful game, and the awesome Amelia Armstrong became Fulham’s Her Game Too Ambassador back in the spring. Her brilliant interview with Tim Ream is well worth a watch. One of the Lillies co-founders is our very own Lydia Campbell, who outlined the group’s plans earlier this year.
Over the next month, you’ll read and hear more about these fabulous Fulham women as well as figures who are doing so much to promote the women’s game nationally and internationally. Sexism has no play in society – never mind football – and we make no apologies for striving for equality of opportunity and expression here at Hammyend. It’s always been the way we do things. You might never have watched a game of women’s football before Chloe Kelly, who grew up a bus ride from me, scored the winner for the Lionesses at Wembley in July. We hope to ensure that you know a little more about the women’s game by the time our month of promotion comes to a close.
