Ditching white shorts is striking but periods’ link to injury is bigger issue

Until very recently female footballers rarely talked about periods in public. Most fans were unaware that some leading internationals detested playing in white shorts during menstruation.

“I’ve experienced it as an England player and you just sort of got on with it,” said the former Lionesses defender Anita Asante, who retired from playing last spring and is now Bristol City’s first-team coach. “It wasn’t something that was discussed and it wasn’t something you felt you could change.”

Things finally began to alter last summer when, with England newly crowned as European champions, the team’s kit manufacturer, Nike, acted on players’ concerns about potential leakage. As the Arsenal striker Beth Mead, the Lionesses’ spokeswoman on the issue, put it: “An all-white kit isn’t practical when it’s that time of the month.”

On Thursday night Sarina Wiegman’s side duly unveiled their new blue shorts as they beat Brazil on penalties at Wembley. With the WSL club Manchester City among the domestic teams to have also ditched white and New Zealand announcing they are following suit before this summer’s World Cup, it is becoming quite a trend.

It all leaves the Republic of Ireland as something of an outlier as Vera Pauw’s squad prepare for Australia and New Zealand 2023 but senior players decided to stick with tradition and declined to demand that their kit maker, Castore, initiate a change. “With a supply of protective underwear the players felt staying with white shorts was the preferred option,” said the Football Association of Ireland.

Wales have also scheduled talks regarding a possible switch to coloured shorts but their captain, Sophie Ingle, is unsure as to the likely outcome. “I don’t know how everyone will feel about it,” the