When football was born, it was not for everyone. For many decades, football was seen as a strictly male sport, leaving no room for women to make their mark on the pitch.

All of that has been gradually changing, and the best expression of that change are the numbers from the last Women's World Cup, held in Australia and New Zealand in 2023. According to FIFA, 2 billion people followed the tournament on TV or through digital platforms, and nearly 2 million attended matches in person.

Origins of Women's Football

Despite the recent growth of women's football worldwide — as we mentioned in the introduction — it is not easy to find records of women's involvement in the sport, given the long period of ostracism they faced.

Outside what is considered the "home of Football," the first records of women playing football in countries such as France and Russia only appear in 1910 and 1911 respectively, while in Italy and Germany it only happened after the First World War.

In Brazil, the earliest available evidence of a women's football match dates back to 1921, referring to a match between a team from the state of Santa Catarina and one from the state of São Paulo.

World Cups, European Championships and the UEFA Women's Champions League

In the years that followed, other countries — including Portugal — followed in the footsteps of these pioneers, but it was not until 1971 that a first prototype of a Women's World Cup became a reality. This tournament, in a "Mundialito" format held in Mexico under the umbrella of the Federation of Independent European Female Football (FIEFF), brought together six national teams (Mexico, Argentina, France, Italy, Denmark and England) and ended with Denmark defeating Mexico 3-0.

This type of mini-tournament and occasional international competitions were the best the football world had to offer women's national teams throughout the 1970s and 1980s. It was in 1991, after years of pressure on FIFA to truly invest in women's football, that the aspirations of thousands of players around the world were finally heard with the organisation of the first FIFA Women's World Cup. The tournament was held in China and ended with the United States defeating Norway 2-1.

While the World Cup only arrived in 1991 and had not, until then, featured the Portuguese women's national team, the European Championships have not only a slightly longer history but have also seen the Portuguese side among the finalists.

Born in 1984, the Women's European Championships have now seen 12 editions, including the 2017 edition in the Netherlands, which marked the debut of the women's national team kit at a major international competition.

The growth of women's football in Europe has also been driven at club level. Alongside the emergence of professional women's leagues in countries such as Sweden, Germany, Spain, France and England, and the development of competitions such as the Portuguese league, the UEFA Women's Champions League was launched in 2009 — replacing the old UEFA Women's Cup — and has gradually become more and more professional over its twelve-plus years of existence.

History of Women's Football in Portugal

It is difficult to trace the origins of women's football in Portugal, as there are few records of women's participation in the sport. However, there are reports of matches played in March 1935, between women's teams from Paços de Brandão and C.D. Feirense. Various matches were played between 1935 and 1936, but no records of those encounters have survived.

In 1985, the Portuguese Football Federation created the "mother" of national women's club competitions. Known as the Women's National Football Cup, it was contested in a similar way to the defunct men's Campeonato de Portugal and was responsible for determining the national champion through to the 1992/93 season.

With eight consecutive titles, Boavista's women's team was the dominant force in this National Cup and in the early editions of the National Championship that followed, winning three of the first four truly national women's championships held in Portugal.

After Boavista's dominance and a brief interlude by Gatões FC, the 2000s saw União 1º Dezembro take control of women's football in Portugal, winning 12 national championship titles up to 2012, eleven of them consecutively. Over the next four years, the National Women's Football Championship was won twice each by Atlético Ouriense and Benfica, a period that preceded the arrival of Sporting, Braga and Benfica, which would ultimately lead to greater professionalisation of the competition and increased media coverage (matches are currently broadcast on Canal 11), corporate sponsorship (the Portuguese league now has an official sponsor) and wider public interest.

It is among these three major Portuguese clubs that not only the last four national titles have been contested, but also the respective editions of the Women's Cup. A word on this competition, which began in the 2003-2004 season with a 6-0 victory for 1º Dezembro over Sport Marítimo Murtoense. With the exception of the 2019-2020 season, all Women's Cup finals are held, as in men's football, at the Estádio Nacional.

A historic milestone: on 23 February 2024, the Estádio do Dragão set a new attendance record for women's football in Portugal, with 40,189 spectators watching Portugal vs Czech Republic. This figure surpassed the previous record of 31,093 — also at the Dragão — set during FC Porto women's team presentation match on 1 September 2023.

The Women's National Football Team: a story of overcoming

Although still far from the fame and rewards enjoyed by their male counterparts, the women's national team has been making steady strides forward.

The first match played by a women's national eleven took place in 1981 against France and ended 0-0. Three years later, the Portuguese team entered qualifying for the first women's European Championship in history, a campaign that would end with two draws and four defeats. The next four European Championships would also pass without the Portuguese side, this time due to not even entering qualifying. Regular participation would only begin from the Euro 95 qualifiers onwards, culminating in Portugal's spectacular qualification for Euro 2017 in the Netherlands.

This historic achievement — not only for the Portuguese women's team but above all for all Portuguese women, whether sportswomen or not — began with a 2-0 defeat against Spain followed by a superb 2-1 victory over Scotland. The hope of going further was ended by England, one of the best national teams in the world, in the final group stage match, with a narrow 2-1 defeat.

However, and to the pride of all Portuguese people, the women's senior team competed in the 2022 Women's European Championship.

At World Cup level, the story is different. Present in every women's World Cup qualifying campaign, the best Portugal managed were two third-place finishes in their respective qualifying groups for the 2011 and 2019 editions. Proof of the evolution of the Portuguese women's team was their second-place finish in the qualifying group for the 2023 Australia/New Zealand World Cup, in a group that also included Germany, Serbia, Turkey, Israel and Bulgaria.

A mention in this brief history of the women's national team for the prestigious Algarve Cup — a competition that has brought the world's best women's national teams together in the Algarve every year since 1994. Particularly noteworthy was the women's national team's fantastic performance at the 2018 edition, where, after beating China, Norway and Australia, they went on to claim the bronze medal.

On an individual level, the all-time top scorer for the women's national team is Edite Fernandes with 39 goals, while Carla Couto's 145 appearances in the national team shirt place her at the top of the list of most-capped players of all time.

Confirming the positive momentum of women's football in Portugal, the Portuguese women's team recently rose to 22nd place in the FIFA rankings — the highest position in the team's entire history.