On Whom does it Depend that the Colombian Women’s League is Carried out?

After the Colombian Women's Professional League was canceled due to lack of teams and it was confirmed that this second semester will not take place, the Government authorities made it official that the tournament will have a sponsor for 2023 and that it can be carried out.

Specifically, it was the new Minister of Sports, María Isabel Urrutia, who broke the news, telling the Colombian media outlet Semana that she met “with more or less 12 teams and they are willing to work together. We cannot regulate everything in the Federation. For me, the important thing is not the league, but to guarantee women 11 months of work and that the private company joins. Find out how many girls we have and how many teams we can put together, the same with sports initiation schools”.

Along these lines, Urrutia indicated that the competition already has an international sponsor, and that this should be announced in the coming days, guaranteeing that the tournament would take place next year.

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This is part of the commitment of the Government of President Gustavo Petro, where they seek to promote gender equality, precisely guaranteeing that the highest women's competition in Colombian soccer can take place.

However, the minister told El Universal that the above should not be discussed with the Colombian Football Federation or with the Major Division of Colombian Football, but should be discussed with the Ministry of Labor. “It is not with them, it is with the Minister of Labor, because they have a labor issue. If the professional league lasts a month, the teams have to pay for the full year,” Urrutia pointed out.

Colombia needs to resume the league

Of course, being able to guarantee that the league resumes could be an important turning point, especially since at the club level, Colombia will participate in the Women's Copa Libertadores in October of this year, which will take place in Ecuador, and América de Cali and Deportivo Cali need to get to the top women's club tournament in South America with games already played.

But not only the clubs would benefit from this measure, but also the Colombian National Team in all its categories. The current team was recently crowned runner-up in the Women's America Cup, in which it was the host, confirming its qualification for the next World Cup Australia/New Zealand 2023 and for the Olympic Games Paris 2024, so they need to have the minimum conditions to be able to offer a good paper.

With soccer players like Catalina Pérez, Catalina Usme, Leicy Santos, Manuela Vanegas and the young promise Linda Caicedo, Colombia has a good chance of being a competitive team in both tournaments if it has an optimal preparation prior to the competitions and having a current local league is an aspect to consider.

This is added to the fact that Colombia qualified for the U20 World Cups in Costa Rica and the U17 World Cup in India, in fact, in the U20 category it reached the quarterfinals, leading a group that included Mexico, Germany and New Zealand, and staying on the road after falling by the minimum difference against Brazil.

Therefore, with all the previous antecedents, it seems unheard of that Colombia does not currently have a professional league, since this increases the level of the national teams and allows them to compete better against the great powers of the world, such as currently England, France, Germany, Sweden, the United States and Canada.

Likewise, having a professional league can produce more and better players, who can then emigrate to higher-level soccer and transform Colombia into a country that believes in and is committed to women's soccer and where the level is high.

The development, improvement and training of soccer players is key, and if Latin American women's soccer wants to continue progressing to reduce the gaps that exist worldwide, Colombia must begin by confirming that in 2023 a competition that is necessary will be resumed .