Jacqui Oatley: Attitudes need to change around girls in sport
Teachers and coaches have a responsibility to ensure girls are given the same access to sport as boys from a young age, Jacqui Oatley has said.
The presenter, who is originally from Codsall, near Wolverhampton, spoke out after being left appalled when her seven-year-old daughter Phoebe was told to play with hula-hoops when boys would not pass to her in a football class.
Oatley, who fronted matches at the World Cup for ITV last summer, said the incident proved "ingrained gender bias" still exists in Britain and fears potential female stars could be being put off the game at an early age by entrenched attitudes and stereotypes.
The 44-year-old, who was the first female commentator on Match of the Day, said while progress had been made over recent years in the women's game, there was still work to do to change attitudes around females in football, as well as other sports.
Bosses at the health club in Wimbledon, south west London, apologised after the broadcaster lodged a complaint. She posted about the incident to her 147,000 Twitter followers and was inundated with messages from people outraged at what had happened.
Ms Oatley told the Express & Star: "Having a daughter who is seven and is mad on football, it makes it even more frustrating when you see ingrained gender bias. There is no inherent reason why girls know less or play worse than boys.
"I grew up in Codsall where there were no opportunities to play football. It wasn't even on the radar for girls and the response I've been getting is 'in 2019?'.
"We know this has been the case for years in Britain, football has been a male-dominated domain. Equally, a lot has been done to address that but clearly not enough is being done to ensure girls are not being subjected to ingrained gender bias.
"It is a crucial age, four, five, six, seven, and it needs to be equally available for girls. We need teachers to step in because you don't always have the self-confidence at that age.
"Football is the national sport and we adore it so much. Think of how much talent we are missing out on. There is no way in the world girls are born with less talent to play football.
"Of course there are girls who don't want to and I'm not suggesting they should be made to play football if they don't want to. It's about making the environment level and making sure they are given the opportunity to play if they want to."
Oatley said it needed to be made clear to girls at school from an early age that they can play football, and other sports, and that they no different to boys.
She said: "I think it's a combination of teachers doing their qualifications and being made aware of the gender situation and not allowing football to be for boys while girls play with dollies in the corner.
"There needs to be more active progress in schools to encourage girls to play before these prejudices are allowed to become ingrained.
"You can't achieve much without confidence and if it is ingrained that you can't do something because of your gender you are not going to achieve your potential."
