According to historian Jean Williams, speaking on the HistoryExtra podcast, the answer isn’t about innate talent or superior tactics: it’s about small details within US federal law.

“It’s because of a law called Title IX, enacted in 1972,” says Williams.

Title IX: the game-changing law

Passed in 1972 as part of President Richard Nixon’s civil rights Education Amendments (the that the Watergate scandal would break, toppling the infamous president two years later), Title IX was designed to prohibit sex-based discrimination in any education programme receiving federal funding. Though not originally intended to transform access to sport, its impact on American athletics – particularly women’s sport – was profound.

“It was an education law that stated: if federal funds had been used in any educational facility for male students, an exactly comparable amount had to be used for female activities,” Williams explains.

Across the country, in the wake of Nixon’s changes, schools and universities were compelled to provide equal funding for opportunities to girls and women. Crucially, that meant not only equal access to teams, but also to facilities, coaching and financial investment.

And Williams says it had “unintended consequences” for sport.

A path to female scholarships – and soccer success

With colleges keen to bolster their reputations through sporting success, the Title IX changes to the law meant that women’s sport now became a viable avenue for a college to stake a claim to athletic greatness.

In particular, this opened the door to sporting scholarships aimed at women – and soccer.

“Soccer was perceived to be less hyper-masculine than American football, and it enabled comparable amounts to be spent on female athletes within colleges. So soccer became a way for the colleges to develop a reputation as a winning college within women’s soccer.”

With American colleges spending more on their women’s soccer teams, a greater emphasis was placed on the sport, leading to more competitiveness.

So, says Williams, a winning women’s soccer team “reflected very well upon a college”, and it was all down to what she calls the “unintended consequences” of Title IX. “Now there were scholarships open that allowed young women to want to go to colleges for their sporting reputations.”

American soccer legend Julie Foudy, two-time FIFA Women’s World Cup champion and twice an Olympic gold medallist, is Williams’ prime example of the impact.

“Julie Foudy, who was one of the winners of the 1999 World Cup in California, could either go to Stanford to study a medical career or she could go on a soccer scholarship.”

Williams says that Foudy, and US women’s soccer team who won the World Cup in 1991, “were the daughters of Title IX.”

But while America was building up its female athletes, the story in football’s traditional strongholds was very different.

In England in 1921, the Football Association (FA) banned women from playing on official pitches – a ban that lasted until 1971. In many other parts of Europe, the stigma around women’s football persisted into the 1980s and beyond.

“The 1971 unofficial Women’s World Cup in Mexico signalled that women’s football could go one way or another,” says Williams. As it turned out, even though “the Mexican FA did not want to get involved in women’s football,” the hype around the event was real, and organic.

But that tournament – which drew crowds of over 100,000 people in Mexico City – was not officially recognised. Instead of national sides, countries often had to send club teams to represent them. Even these faced obstacles: local associations restricted access to pitches, refused to endorse fixtures, or placed limits on travel and funding.

This fragmented system stunted the growth of elite women’s football in Europe for decades – a sharp contrast with the structured, publicly funded development pipeline in the US.

But the story of women’s football predates Nixon and predates Mexico.

Decades before Title IX, and before the Women’s World Cups of the latter half of the 20th century, a boom in women’s football emerged from the First World War.

“With the First World War conscription efforts, the men go to fight on the frontline, but the country still needs munitions made. And young working-class women in their droves went to the factories for two reasons,” explains Williams.

“One is because they earned more money in the factories, although it is exactly half the wages of what the male workers were paid. And the second is that by working outside the home, it gave women a right to leisure outside the home. And so instead of being isolated in somebody else’s house, you’ve got friends who you could start to have a kick about with at breaks.

“And from there the women’s football teams emerged.”

However, these women faced almost immediate pushback from England’s official sporting institutions, not least of all the FA, who worked to implement an effective ban.

“The FA said that they thought the game of football was unsuitable for women, that women were too delicate.”

“In 1921,” Williams continues, “the FA issued a ban on women playing on any pitch affiliated to the football association. And that included the big stadium, but it also included your little local club sites.”

How did these women react? First, they tried to play on other grounds – but the FA still wasn’t content to leave them be. Williams says, “When women then went on to try and play in cricket grounds and rugby grounds, the FA used its influence with other sports to prevent women from playing on any sports ground, which effectively pushed it underground.”

Now, however, women’s football is once again firmly on the rise across the world, with the increasing backing of football’s biggest institutions. And after the success of England’s Women’s team in the 2022 Euros, Williams says there’s no looking back.

“The victories in 2022 were huge. It was seismic.”

She concludes, “It was a huge moment where it proved that women’s football could sell out major stadiums, it could get the whole country behind the women’s national team.”

This article is based on an interview with Jean Williams, speaking to Spencer Mizen on the HistoryExtra podcast. Listen to the full conversation.