Former player, coach (also of men), parliamentarian: “Brave the blue, but I would not like silence again as in 2019. There is a few steps forward, homophobia has been overcome”
Carolina Morace is a legend of Italian women’s football and above all the type she doesn’t send them to say. It has always been so, as a girl on the Venice camps to when she broke all the barriers, including that of a woman coaching a team of males (La Viterbo). It has been elected European parliamentary with the Five Star Movement, football is always a passion and the defense of women’s football a must, but the horizons are others. “In a group of eight MEPs each has chosen the most similar issues. I deal with women’s sport and women’s rights, but I always have the college of central Italy in which I have been elected”.
Carolina, but she is the Goleador of the women’s national team, we cannot fail to talk about the European Championship of the Azzurre …
“Brave the girls, amazing result, but I would not want the regret of 2019 to recur, when after the beautiful world he fell silent. Someone says that I create controversy, but controversy of what?”.
“I think certain moments create an advertisement for the movement and they should be exploited. If you don’t realize a step back.”
Many Italians are going abroad in prestige championships: is this not a good sign?
“Excuse me, how many British go to play abroad? Then if the girls have possibilities to exploit it is fine, but the championship is impoverished. Italian football is not well and I don’t only speak of the women’s sector.
Why is it so difficult to play football in Italy for a woman?
“It is not only difficult for a woman. In any case, in my time when we participated in the European championships we were the only ones not followed by the state TV and we got excellent results, now the TV follows but the sponsors must be sought and attracted: the audience of the England-Italy semifinal was the same as Psg-Chelsea at the Club World Cup”.
Isn’t it that in this aversion to women’s football in Italy you play some role homophobia? That it is a cultural question in short.
“No, it is an overcome problem. Since I came out with my wife I have not received any harassment or offense via social media. It has to do more. The problem is that many are fine: professionalism is not sustainable, we know it, and the clubs must be helped with a project. We cannot only count on the generosity of the most important companies. We need virtuous examples, if the thing interests. And then it is all the football system to grow. Stadi is fundamental, it is an important source of profit.
Now he has a new life as a European parliamentarian: do you like it?
“I like the opportunity to affect, to act decisively on sports, women’s rights and protection of third states. It is not just about giving a vote: I’m in Brussels from Monday to Friday, then I take a day free to study, I am following a very demanding geopolitics course. And I think of the citizens who elected me and their territories: the European Parliament is not a parking lot”.
What leads to his sporting life in this new phase?
“The ability to team up. Everyone recognizes me, and then there is my way of doing direct that is highly appreciated. Not least the sense of responsibility inherent in my character”.
Let’s go back to football. Do you have a regret? Would you like to play in this less pioneering era?
“Perhaps in another historical moment I would have finished his career in England instead of in Italy, but I don’t take much much any reason. Considering everything that happened to me in my career is fine with this and I consider myself a lucky person”.
Now. After the result of the European Championship and the renewed interest in women’s football, the problem is not putting the flame off. Suggestions?
“Look, as I told them now I take care of other things. I just think that a project is needed. If we are not able to formulate it … the sponsors are needed, a thinking head is needed that really wants to carry on the growth of a healthy movement: it is a problem that concerns female sport and the establishment in general. If Silvia Salis is said to be not yet the time to play a decisive role in the government of the sport and then becomes the mayor of Genoa … Mah, there is something wrong.
A message of hope for the girls who did the company to qualify for the semifinal?
“They know that they are good and they know they have done an excellent job with all the staff. But if they do not take steps forward, even with the AIC, it will be difficult to progress and improve again. Professionalism must not remain a dead letter and the clubs must be helped, because in these years they have taken on many costs”.
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