Qatar 2022: Stéphanie Frappart to make history as the first woman to referee a men’s World Cup match
French referee Stéphanie Frappart will become the first woman to take charge of a men’s World Cup game when she handles Germany vs Costa Rica on Thursday in Qatar.
The historic moment comes in a huge match for both sides, with Germany needing a victory to keep their World Cup hopes alive.
She will be joined by assistant referees, Brazil’s Neuza Back and Mexican Karen Diaz Medina, at Al Bayt Stadium on Thursday.
Asked if she ever has comments from players, managers or fans due to being a woman, Frappart said: “Since I started I was always supported by teams, clubs and players. I was always welcome in the stadium so I feel like another referee inside the pitch. I was always welcome, so I think I will be welcome as before.”
She became the first woman to referee a men’s Champions League game in 2020. The 38-year-old was also the first woman to take charge of a match in a major men’s Uefa competition when Liverpool and Chelsea met in the 2019 European Super Cup.
When Frappart first began playing football at ten years old in 1993, women’s football barely registered as a significant landmark on the sporting landscape.
The inaugural edition of the women’s World Cup had been held just two years previously, with great success in China, but there was neither a women’s Champions League in Europe nor a National Women’s Soccer League (NWSL) in the USA and professional female referees were non-existent.
It was only in 2017 when Bibiana Steinhaus took charge of a Bundesliga match that a woman officiated a top-level men’s league match.
Frappart’s appointment as a referee at a men’s World Cup is another step forward in a “very sexist sport,” Costa Rica manager Luis Fernando said, according to Reuters.
“It’s very difficult to reach the point that she has reached, I think it’s good for football and a positive step for football, to show that it’s opening up for everyone,” he added.
Similarly, in Rwanda, Mukansanga recalls never seeing a female referee to use as a role model for her own aspirations.
“I worked hard and followed the men’s dreams because they were the people surrounding me,”
“They’re all men. We had one World Cup referee here in Rwanda who went to the World Cup twice so he inspired me a lot and I kept working hard to be like him.”
With women refereeing and the matches at the Qatar World Cup broadcast to huge audiences worldwide, Frappart hopes that it will encourage more women to pick up a whistle.
Already this change is beginning to take place – in the UK alone, there was a 72% increase in qualified women referees between 2016 and 2020, according to the FA.
“So if you have more referees on the TV perhaps it might make it easier for women to say, okay, this is possible. Because if you don’t know if it’s possible for us, you cannot say: ‘Okay, I want to be a referee.”
Three women – Frappart, Rwanda’s Salima Mukansanga and Japan’s Yoshimi Yamashita – are among the 36 officials selected to take charge of games in Qatar.
