Women’s football is in fashion. But even if sometimes some people think they have invented something, there are few truly new things on the face of the earth, and football, even if it is a women’s version, is not one of them either. more. Madrid’s first women’s match took place more than 50 years ago: on December 8, 1970. It took place at the Boetticher stadium, in Villaverde, and pitted the players of Mercacredit – which became the Olympic team of Villaverde – against those of Sizam Paloma Madrid. The latter won 5-1.
With more than 8,000 people in the stands, it was an important match in the history of this women’s sport. It was organized by Rafael Muga, a former football coach, who made history as the first director of the “underground national team” of women’s football. On December 8, Muga found himself at the Villaverde Civil Guard barracks, escorted by the two agents who attended the match. “The post commander asked me how I could consider organizing a match with women,” Murga explained.
But the good taste that the encounter left in his mouth made him forget the shock. That and the memory of these five goals scored by the same player, a 13-year-old girl named Conchi Amaro, nicknamed “la Amancio”, who played in the street and for whom her father bought her first matches in the afternoon. Before. football shoes; They excited him so much that he slept with them.
This group of women was ahead of its time: society did not understand it and, above all, the authorities did not see it favorably. With today’s mentality, it is not easy to understand that only 60 years ago this old saying about a woman at home with a broken leg was still in effect. The president of the Football Federation, José Luis Pérez Payá, told the press: “I am not against women’s football, but I don’t like it either. “The woman in a T-shirt and pants is not very favored.” The ABC published an interview with Alicia Lage, central director of physical education of the women’s section, for whom “there are many other sports that are more advisable for them”, because “due to their constitution, in which we must also look for aesthetics, (football) does not suit our physical condition.
To explore this idea further and normalize the entry of women into football, a match was even organized at that time between “folkloricas” and “finolis”, in which different singers took part, such as Rocío Jurado, Marujita Díaz or Lola Flores. , with full fields; but they were nothing more than a parody of the authentic sport of ball.
Above, footballers greet each other in the presence of the referee at the start of the match. Below, two moments from the confrontation between Sizam and Mercacredit players, in 1970
But there was no joke in the commitment of the footballers, and they proved it. Conchi Amaro signed, at the age of 15, for an Italian team. Muga and his daughters organized the first Spanish women’s football team, which, as previously mentioned, was known as “clandestine” because the Federation did not recognize it, and its first match, in Murcia, had to be played without shield and without anthem. And without allowing the referee to go out onto the field dressed as such. It was swimming against the tide.
On October 21, 1980, ABC headlined: “Women’s football, admitted to the Spanish Federation”. And in the next line, he underlines: “Even if in the subcommittee created and which will govern their destinies, there is not a single woman”. Real Madrid had a women’s football team since July 1, 2020, although it had a precedent, the Tacón sports club, founded in 2014. The Atlético de Madrid women’s football team has its origins in 1980, although it eventually disappeared due to loss of financial support. Many of its players then moved to Oroquieta Villaverde in the 90s. Rayo Vallecano has had a women’s section since 2000.
