High School with 16, Football and Business Math Sport is belonging to Lena’s life, always. She started playing football when she was 8 but parallel she was also into tennis and acrobatics. She is also in the squad of the German Football National Team and right now she is playing professionally for TSG Hoffenheim, here she has matured as a woman and a player . Lena finished with the age of 16 her High School and studied Business Math. Kicking it in Borrowed Shoes Ago, her father didn’t want her to play soccer — nonetheless she did it secretly. Lena kicked a lot with boys. Her father wanted her to stay in athletics, but she decided to continue playing soccer. However, she always had to borrow shoes from a friend. What she loves about soccer? While playing soccer you can live different sides of your character, you can be a team player and live out the aggressiveness of a fighter, too. And you can share all your emotions with the team, you are not standing alone. About soccer as a concept Lena likes especially that the tension is splitting on the whole team — in tennis you are carrying it all alone. All eyes are on you only. And also, you can be very emotional in soccer, that motivates her a lot! You are sharing feelings of happiness and disappointment […] Read More
“Hard Frame, soft Core” Nicole Billa, born 1996 in Kufstein, Austria, is steady constant in her country: she plays for the Austrian women’s national soccer team and is a three-time European Junior and World Champion in Kickboxing. With both sports she started at the age of five. Today she focuses on soccer only: “In kickboxing I have achieved everything, there was nothing I felt I could conquer anymore”, 24-year-old Nicole Billa is explaining. “But there is still a lot I want to achieve in football” she is explaining her former decision. The ex-junior world and European champion in kickboxing has remained down-to-earth. She shares a flat with her teammates Katharina Naschenweng and the Swiss Luana Bühler. Beside her soccer engagements at TSG Hoffenheim and the Austrian National Team she works as a kindergarten teacher. “I am loving children so much, I always did”, the ambitious sportswoman is lovely enthusing about her choice of education. “Her sports career began with 5 years, mostly among men” Her father was a football coach and her brother were playing too. As a young child she felt herself in an equal game and of the same value among her male teammates within the ring and […] Read More
… Maryam! A women’s rights activist campaigning for equality in women’s football in Iran. She’s a sports photographer and journalist, who stands up for women to be allowed to enter a football stadium. It was forbidden. Why? Because women could face verbal abuse or violence when watching a football game 🙄 Maryam’s pictures of female athletes were usually censored in the official media. Sportswomen in Iran are required to cover themselves from head to toe. Despite all the restrictions they have been active in international competitions. However, international games are not broadcasted on the state television because they feature foreign women players, who are not covered. Iran has barred female spectators from football for around 40 years, with clerics arguing they must be shielded from the masculine atmosphere and sight of semi-clad men. In October 2019 they were allowed to buy tickets for a qualifying match in men’s football for the first time. Only a few thousands of women were allowed to enter a stadium and watch a male game ⚽️ Once inside, the women were segregated from men by both empty stretches of seats and metal fencing erected around the sections reserved for women… Maryam and her work represent […] Read More
“When you grow up in a country like Libya, you need something to help you stay strong. And that was football for me,” said Fadwa El Bahi Fadwa lives in Tripoli. She comes from a family of four girls and one boy. She is the youngest. Her brother not only played football with but coached her too. Every day after she did her homework, she went out to kick. Fadwa grew up in a liberal family and she didn’t have to fight resistance within her family. She has been kicking on the streets of her hometown since she was a girl, but when she got older she was forbidden to do so. Women and football – that was strictly forbidden in Libya. After the overthrow of the dictator Muammar al-Gaddafi in 2011, female players were allowed to appear in public for the first time, and shortly afterwards they were threatened by Islamists. We met Fadwa in Lebanon 2015, for the first time. The Libyan women’s football team has finally been able to participate in our DISCOVER FOOTBALL Festival. Two years before, their participation in our summer festival in Berlin was prohibited at short notice. I met a woman hidden behind […] Read More
Making a Connection! Many know my passion for football and photography. Many also know that for years I support NGOs which advocate for a world in which girls and women can do sports without being discriminated against for any reason. But why is it not enough for me to portray simply kicking women? Why do I want to hear their story and understand how football influenced them? Their origin draw a picture that goes much deeper than what they show on the football pitch. It shows their strength, their passion with which they fought their way out of their difficult environment. It shows their inner self and they power they have to give. Kosovo’s war, where women suffered. The Kosovo war was an armed conflict that started in February 1998 and lasted until June 1999. 11,000 Albanians and 2,000 Serbs and other non-Albanians were killed or went missing during the war. Many women were victims of sexual violence during the entire Balkan War. Still, that issue is widely a taboo. Slowly it changes. Girls and women start to raise their voices. It’s understandable that women are afraid of being excluded of their families, when it officially comes out that they were victims of an act of sexual violence. The female artist […] Read More
“I am quite sure, that even our first word was ‘ball’!” Double kick: Studying economical Education and playing Football professionally Fabienne Dongus is coming from the Black Forest. Her identical twin sister Tamar and she are playing soccer since they are 5. She is the older one — 2 minutes! Football is the only sport that they have ever practiced. Their parents were very good in volleyball, but when they were little, that was way to difficult for them. Somehow, they started with soccer — and it turned out to be their big passion. They have a strong connection to the ball, even the first word they spoke was ‘ball’ if Fabi remembers correctly. So she is professionally kicking, and also studying economical education. That is already her second academic study, before that she finished a dual one in the banking sector.” Fabienne and Tamar — like an old married Couple They are very close, Tamar and Fabienne. 24 years long, they nearly did everything together. And it was possible — because in female soccer things are still going quite familiar ways. Their coach was aware of their talent and therefore he didn’t want them to stay in a lower league. He called a talent […] Read More
Gulafsha Ansari | Defender & Coach from Mumbai’s Because of football Gulafsha’s life has changed. It takes courage to challenge long-standing traditions and beliefs in India, but Gulafsha was determined to open doors for girls who dream of a different life. She now works with around sixty girls in India, teaching football and helping them to grow into strong, independent women who are ready to pursue their dreams. “We want to change perceptions,” says Gulafsha. “Girls should have the same opportunities to play growing up as boys. Football is a different direction, through football you can see the world in another way and make a positive change in your life.” From 170 square meter to an independent Life Gulafsha grew up in Dharavi, Mumbai largest slum. Her family 6 used to live in a 170 square meter feet room and she learned to manage with limited resources. Growing up as a Muslim girl in a conservative family, football was a difficult choice she took. Because the society in Dharavi teaches young girls to follow by the rules, get married early, help with household work and serve others. Like her sisters did. But Gulafsha didn’t see herself in that role. And her […] Read More
In June 2017 I was the last one who arrived in Arusha to join the highest altitude game of football with Equal Playing Field. Actually I was assigned to another group but Laura Youngson approached me and pulled me into the Warthogs. A colorful mix of one co-founder, former international players, female FIFA representative from Australia, my backpack-buddy and filmmaker, a lovely French piper, our wise doctor and these two young chicks from Jordan. I thought: wow really? Haneen and Yasmeen, Ying and Yang. Young and yet so mature in mind. On the way to their challenge of their life. There were enough reasons to give up, but many more to go on. And within a year I experienced a wonderful development of both. And these to youngsters became co-organizers of Equal Playing Field Jordan. Yasmeen M. Shabsough or Shabsi as we call her lovingly. She was 5 years old when she first started to play football. Most of her time with her brothers and cousins, but today only she is playing still. It was hard to play football as a girl but her family was her backbone always. Their support helped Shabsi to continue going. Besides all obstacles her mum made […] Read More
KICKING AGAINST ALL ODDS In July 2015 the first women’s football festival took place in Lebanon, organised by DISCOVER FOOTBALL together with our network partner Girls Football Academy from Beirut. It was about networking of female footballers from the Middle East – and about an exchange on eye level. Teams from Egypt, Germany, Jordan, Lebanon, Libya and Palestine participated in this tournament and outreach work throughout Lebanon for girls’ living in refugee camps – mainly Syrian and Palestinian. In many countries female footballers are still struggling against resistance. There is often no support for women’s football from the state, public institutions or civil society. The football festival in Lebanon offered a contrast. The young generation want to help their country in other ways. Nadia Assaf and Walid Arakji founded the Girls Football Academy in 2011, the first organization in the Middle East dedicated exclusively to promoting girls. Nadia grew up in Australia, Walid in France. Their dream to pave the way for girls and women to participate in society. Whether the league can be maintained in Lebanon is questionable: Of the ten clubs that played in the league in 2006, only five are left. The clubs are burdened by high fees […] Read More
Countdown towards FIFA Women‘s World Cup France 2019 The 2018 World Cup in Russia is over, but we don’t have to wait four more years for top-tier international football to return. In 2019 the Women’s World Cup will kick off in France. In the meantime, there’s plenty of soccer to fill the thirst in your soul. And I joined as a photographer the Toulouse International Ladies Cup (TILC), when 4 of Europe’s best women’s football teams competed against each other. With this event, the founders – all former football players – want to promote football in the region and sensitize for the 2019 FIFA Women’s World Cup in France. For the professional footballers, the tournament was a unique opportunity to compete with teams playing on top level. A perfect opportunity to prepare for the season and to present themselves on international soil. Diversity-Talk: Variety is the spice of life One of the co-founder of TILC is Tara Mac Mahon, former captain of the Irish National Team and a former player for Toulouse. Responsible for international affairs she aimed to bring together Europe’s best women’s football clubs and provide local and visiting fans with an unforgettable experience. But she also wanted an […] Read More