Serie A Femminile will officially become a professional league in 2022. That is the official announcement of the FIGC, who made the declaration earlier today.
During the federation’s meeting, the council declared that it will begin the process of professionalizing the league during the 2022-23 season.
In their words, they will launch a “gradual project aimed at recognizing professionalism” for the women during that year. The goal of the project is to have the women eventually become full-fledged professionals.
Allowing the Serie A Femminile players to become professionals also means that for the first time in their history, Italy will have professional athletes that are women.
At the moment, none of Italy’s female athletes are professionals. The reasons for this are based on Law 91/81. The law states that only the athletes of four sports are considered professionals, due to the amount of revenue they generate. The four sports are football, basketball, cycling, and golf. But Italy’s women athletes are excluded from this due to how they generate less revenue than the men.
Once Serie A Femminile professionalises, however, this will change. It will also be a historic and momentous occasion that will allow other women to become professional athletes in the future.
This will also mean that for the first time in their history, the AC Milan Women will play as a team of professionals, just like their male counterparts are.
Other things worth noting
Juventus has been assigned the Serie A Femminile Scudetto. They had the most points (44) when the league was prematurely shut down. Therefore, they have been crowned the season’s champions.
Fiorentina will still be in the Champions League. Milan finished third due to the FIGC’s algorithm. They’ll have to try to qualify for Europe again next season.
Napoli and San Marino have both been promoted to Serie A. Orobica and Tavagnacco have been relegated. Serie A Femminile will remain a 12-team championship.
The league’s next season will begin on August 22nd. The championship will also start earlier than it did last season.
The reason for this is due to the fact that Italy will play their remaining Euro 2022 qualifiers in the fall. The league will start early in order to allow the players to get in shape so that they can be better prepared for their crucial qualifying matches.
Allowing the league to start early will also redress the criticism of Milena Bertolini (Italy’s head coach). Bertolini was worried that not allowing the league’s players to train for five months would affect their physical fitness and affect Italy’s qualifying campaign.
There will be a Final Four playoff for the Supercoppa Femminile. The four in question are the current top four in the Serie A table. The teams are Juventus, Fiorentina, AC Milan, and AS Roma, and they will be competing for the next edition of the Supercoppa.
The next Women’s World Cup will be in Australia and New Zealand in 2023. Allowing Serie A Femminile to professionalize before then will enhance Italy’s chances of making a deep run in the tournament. Professionalizing the league will allow it to attract better players, and that will only benefit the players who play in it. More specifically, the women of Italy will benefit from playing against higher quality opposition, and they’ll reap the benefits of it on the international stage.
Another summer of shake-ups
The Rossonere are currently experiencing another revolution this summer. Eleven players will leave the squad this summer, including fan favourites Nora Heroum and Stine Hovland.
However, as painful as their departures are, this is being done to enhance the overall quality of the squad. The short term pain will lead to gains in the long run.
For now, the squad is being turned inside out in hopes of allowing the team to reach their two objectives, which is to qualify for the Champions League and to make a run for the Scudetto.
Professionalism for Serie A Femminile is two years away. Before then, the team has to focus on its present objectives. Once the league professionalizes, however, then we can dream of signing high-quality players that will allow the women to do something that their male counterparts have done seven times: lift the Champions League trophy.
The future is just beginning for these women. And it’s also sure to be quite an exciting one as well.
