Researchers, journalists and the Football Museum rescue the history of the women’s national team – 07/11/2023 – Sport

A group of Brazilian athletes was an attraction in China, in 1988. But the greatest curiosity of the locals was not for what they played.

“The Chinese knew our football and asked to take pictures. But ‘Escrava Isaura’ was on TV and I was approached several times because they wanted to know the end of the soap opera. I didn’t tell.”

Journalist Claudia Jacobs was one of the few witnesses to the first experimental tournament for women’s teams held by Fifa (International Football Federation), 35 years ago. It was the embryo of what would be the World Cup, which will have a new edition from the next 20th.

In that competition, the base of the Brazilian team was Radar, from Rio de Janeiro. An improvised trip, in which the shirts were old models, used by the men’s team, and the shorts could have the names of the men who had already worn them.

Videos of the games are rare, and written records were made only by Claudia in texts for the extinct Jornal dos Sports, where she was an intern. This reveals a difficulty for researchers and those interested in the trajectory of the modality. The history of women’s football in the country is often oral. An almost archaeological work.

“Getting records of the selection in the first World Cups is a CSI job. It’s archeology. It’s a huge job to discover name, number, position. We also depend on private collections”, defines Marília Bonas, technical director of the Football Museum.

The space holds, until September, the exhibition Queens of Cups, about the Brazilian participation in World Cups. With images, videos, files, audios and an interactive section, it wants to honor the players who defended the national team in the past. Information that was not always easy to obtain.

The country’s first goal in the history of the World Cups, in 1991, against Japan, had to be recreated in a model, based on the story of who scored it: midfielder Elane. There are no videos or photos of the play.

“Elane’s goal is her memory. We know that in research it is not possible to tell the story through memory alone. It fails. We seek through reporting and confirmation. to take care of it and watch over this history”, says Juliana Cabral, researcher at the Football Museum and former player of the Brazilian national team.

Defenders Lauren and Antonia, called up by Pia Sundhage for this year’s Cup, which will be hosted by Australia and New Zealand, visited the exhibition. The same did Formiga, historic midfielder of the national team and the only athlete (including men) to participate in seven World Cups.

The exhibition is temporary and complements another, permanent one. In this one, Marta and Sissi were already included in images of baroque angels. The idea is to update the exhibition with data from the tournament that starts this month.

“In the first championships there was no money. There was no payment. They played because they liked to play”, says Marília.

Therefore, the tone of the exhibition is one of celebration, despite all the difficulties faced by the athletes. The idea is to commemorate the participation of women in Brazilian football and highlight those that made the selection world runner-up in 2007 and a silver medal at the 2004 and 2008 Olympics.

“The dream we have is to stop saying that women’s football is resistance”, says Marília.

“The Football Museum has been a great partner in the process of telling this story, this process of delving into what happened in the past, a time when players washed their own uniforms and played with the men’s national team shirt. You acquire knowledge that before it wasn’t listed anywhere”, emphasizes Juliana Cabral.

It was knowledge that until recently was restricted to pioneers in personal conversations or WhatsApp groups. Like the memories of the 1988 tournament, when Claudia Jacobs had to go to the hotel kitchen to show her how to prepare fried eggs in the same way they are eaten in Brazil and how to cook pasta. In Western markets, the search was for crackers.

“Everything that exists today is the responsibility of that generation. Because they had the ability to go there, to China, and find out what it was”, says Claudia.

In the delegation of more than three decades ago, in addition to those summoned, there were seven people, including former referee Romualdo Arppi Filho, who traveled as an observer. The difference between the Australian and Norwegian women, who had a nutritionist, physiotherapists and a cook, was huge. There were Brazilians with less than ideal weight, some felt sick, and the colic medication was provided by the athletes from Norway.

Despite all the problems, the team ended the 1988 tournament in third place.

“They played like crazy because they were so good. The quality of their football was impressive. International journalists noticed that. It was Brazilian football in essence, playing for fun. They shouldn’t even be there, but they were all laughing, singing, thinking positive. We owe a debt of gratitude to this first selection because they were very warrior”, observes Claudia Jacobs.