England captain Steph Houghton has told talkSPORT she hopes their World Cup displays can help the Women’s Super League develop into the best across the globe.
The Lionesses, despite a disappointing opening defeat to France, put in several heroic performances over in Canada as they defeated Mexico, Colombia and the tournament hosts, before an agonising 2-1 loss to Japan in the semi-finals.
But with millions tuned in to watch England, even with late kick-off times, Houghton believes they can use the current interest in the women’s game to help develop the FAWSL and encourage a new generation of girls to take up the sport at a young age.
Asked what she felt the ramifications of their exploits could be, she told Kick Off: “It wasn’t meant to be but in reflection I’m sure it will sink in over the next few months what we’ve done for women’s football and I think we should all be proud of the journey we’ve been on to try and inspire young girls to play football.
“We want to try and enable a lot more girls to be able to class football as their job and be professionals, and concentrate fully on football.
“I think the growth of our league in England has been great over the last few years [but] we have to look at our league and see how we can make it better and how can compete with the likes of the German, American and Swedish leagues.
“We want to be the best and the way you do that is by trying to develop players at a younger age so they’re playing football every day.
“We have to look at ways we can improve our game but we’re in a good place right now.”