FA’s plan for women’s futsal national team will be a ‘game changer’

The Football Association is to create a women’s futsal national team for the first time as it tries to grow female participation and capitalise on the football team’s historic Euro 2022 success, the Guardian has learned.

An under-19s team will be set up, with the prospect of a full senior team coming later, and the men’s equivalent-age team will be relaunched to compete in the under-19s futsal European Championship qualifiers in January.

The move, described as a “game changer” for the women’s game in England, comes two and a half years after the FA axed nearly all funding for the Fifa-sanctioned five-a-side sport and was fined by Uefa for pulling the senior men’s team out of the Euro 22 qualifiers.

An FA spokesperson told the Guardian: “We are in the process of finalising exciting plans for futsal … which involve working with the sport’s wider stakeholders and include England representative teams at under-19s level. Full details will be announced in due course.”

Leanne Skarratt, a women’s and girls’ coach at Manchester Futsal Club, said: “This is a game changer for women’s futsal in England. Having a national team to aspire to will pave the the way for a new generation of female players, inspiring girls who want an alternative to football and who will be able to represent their country in a different format of the game. One that makes them even better as players.”

Manchester’s women’s team compete in tier 1 of the FA-backed National Futsal Series. BT Sport screens women’s and men’s games live as part of a three-year deal agreed last year.

At youth level, futsal’s growth in England is sustained by a sponsorship deal signed with Pokemon in 2019. Thousands of girls and boys compete in the national youth cup, which has been