Women's association football, more commonly known as women's football or women's soccer, is the team sport of association football played by women. It is played at the professional level in multiple countries, and 187 national teams participate internationally. The same rules, known as the Laws of the Game, are used for both women's and men's football.
The participation of women and girls in sports, physical fitness, and exercise has been recorded to have existed throughout history. However, participation rates and activities vary in accordance with nation, era, geography, and stage of economic development. While initially occurring informally, the modern era of organized sports did not begin to emerge either for women or men until the late industrial age.
Football, also known as Soccer, is the most popular sport in Israel. Football as an organised sport, first developed in the United Kingdom, who controlled Mandatory Palestine during the days of the British Mandate.
The Russian Football Union is the official governing body of association football in the Russian Federation. With headquarters in Moscow, it organizes Russian amateur and professional football, including the men's, women's, youth, beach soccer, futsal and Paralympic national teams. The RFS sanctions referees and football tournaments for the Russian Premier League and other football leagues in Russia. RFS is headed by Aleksandr Dyukov, the CEO of Gazprom Neft.
Association football is the most popular sport in France. The French Football Federation is the national governing body and is responsible for overseeing all aspects of association football in the country, both professional and amateur. The federation organizes the Coupe de France and is responsible for appointing the management of the men's, women's, and youth national football teams in France. The federation gives responsibility of Ligue 1 and Ligue 2 to the Ligue de Football Professionnel (LFP) who oversee, organize, and manage the country's top two leagues. The LFP is also responsible for organizing the Coupe de la Ligue, the country's league cup competition. The French Football Federation also supervises the overseas departments and territories leagues and hosts football club AS Monaco, a club based in the independent sovereign state of Monaco. In 2022, the FFF had 2.1 million licensees, 1.8 million players and 14,000 registered clubs, the second highest number of registered players in Europe after Germany.
Association football – commonly known as football, – is a popular sport in Andorra. Prior to political developments in 1994, most football in the landlocked principality had been amateur with the notable exception of FC Andorra which has played in the Spanish football league system since 1948.
In sporting terminology, a youth system is a youth investment program within a particular team or league, which develops and nurtures young talent in farm teams, with the vision of using them in the first team in the future if they show enough promise and potential, and to fill up squad numbers in some teams with small budgets. In contrast to most professional sports in the United States where the high school and collegiate system is responsible for developing young sports people, most football and basketball clubs, especially in Europe and Latin America, take responsibility for developing their own players of the future.
Soccer, also known as football, is the most played outdoor club sport in Australia, and ranked in the top ten for television audience as of 2015. The national governing body of the sport is Football Australia (FA), which until 2019, organised the A-League Men, A-League Women, and still organises the Australia Cup, as well as the men's and women's national teams. The FA comprises nine state and territory member federations, which oversee the sport within their respective region.
Sport in Israel plays an important role in Israeli culture and is supported by the Ministry of Culture and Sport. The most popular sports in Israel have traditionally been Association football (mainly) and basketball (secondly) – with the first being considered the national sport – in both of which Israeli professional teams have been competitive internationally. Israel is an international center for Jewish sport around the world and since 1932 the Maccabiah Games, an Olympic-style event for Jewish athletes, is held in the country. Despite Israel's location in the Asian continent, the Israeli sports associations in various sports belong to the European associations due to the refusal of many Arab Asian countries to compete with Israeli athletes.
Football is one of the most popular sports in Georgia. It is governed by the Georgian Football Federation (GFF). The GFF organises the men's, women's, and futsal national teams. Modern football was introduced by English sailors playing in Poti, at the beginning of the 20th century.
Itay Menachem Shechter is an Israeli professional footballer who plays as a forward for Hapoel Petah Tikva.
Football is the most popular sport in Hungary. The Hungarian Football Federation is the highest body of professional football in Hungary and was founded in 1901. The Hungary national team has played in numerous international tournaments, including the inaugural football tournament in the Olympic Games, nine World Cups, and two European Championships. Their greatest achievements are the three gold medals in the 1952, 1964 and 1968 Olympic Games, and the runner-up in the 1938 and 1954 World Cups. The team known as the Mighty Magyars was also the first non-British team to defeat England, 6–3 at Wembley in 1953. Months later, they defeated the English by a convincing 7–1 in Budapest in 1954, the worst defeat in the history of the English team.
One of the most popular sports in Liechtenstein is football. In Liechtenstein there is no national association football league however there are seven clubs in Liechtenstein which play in the Swiss football league system.
Football is the most popular sport in Costa Rica. Costa Rica has long been considered an exporter of footballers within Central America, with 19 players in European professional football leagues during 2006. The newspaper, La Nación, has prepared an annual census of these "Legionnaires" since 1994.
Women's football in Germany is quickly becoming very popular in Germany largely due to the success of the women's national team.
Football is a widely practiced and popular sport in Venezuela, although the sport has lagged behind baseball in popularity. The country has proven one of the biggest underachievers in CONMEBOL and was formerly known as the Cenicienta of the region.
Association football is the most popular sport in Bolivia, where the first modern set of rules for the sport were established in 1923, which were a major influence on the development of the modern laws of the game. Bolivia has over 2,000 football clubs.
The sport of football in the country of Iraq is run by the Iraq Football Association. The association administers the national football team as well as the Iraq Stars League. Football is the most popular sport in Iraq.
Women's soccer in the United States has developed quite differently from men's soccer. Until the 1970s, organized women's soccer matches in the U.S. existed only on a limited basis. The U.S. is now regarded as one of the top countries in the world for women's soccer, and FIFA ranked its national team #1 in the world after its back-to-back Women's World Cup victory in 2015 and 2019.
Women's football in India is growing in popularity under All India Football Federation, despite the earlier long-term governing body's inability to provide sufficient funds for the game.
