Newcastle United Women make English football history as Saudi owners PIF take landmark decision

NEWCASTLE: Women’s football is rapidly growing in popularity across the world, nowhere more so than in the UK. Following the England women’s team’s victory at the UEFA Women’s Euros last year, female participation in the beautiful game has gone through the roof in the sport’s founding nation. Until very recently, though, one area lagged behind the incredible progress made in cities like London, Liverpool and Manchester: Newcastle.

But Newcastle United’s majority shareholders, the Public Investment Fund of Saudi Arabia, are doing their best to change all of that for the women who currently represent the club and for future generations of female football-playing Geordies. History was made on Tyneside this week when it was announced that Newcastle United Women are now to be run as a full-time operation for the first time. The Lady Magpies have become the first female club in English football to become a full-time outfit while in the third tier of the football pyramid, the FA Women’s National League.

The move proves the lengths to which the PIF — along with joint minority shareholders PCP Capital Partners and RB Sports & Media Ltd. — will go to ensure the club succeeds at all levels. Full-time football has arrived just one year after the women’s team became an official part of Newcastle United Football Club.