Instagram story viewer> @stefmic> Posts

Stef McLoughlin

@stefmic

784

followers

703

following

⚽️ Growing the women’s game - brand + commercial lead
🗣️ Feminism + equality in football
🐶 Boss forever

POSTS STORIES REELS TAGGED

One of my hobbies is getting into taxis in Glasgow and talking about football as though we’re obviously both talking about the women’s game.

I’ll ask who they support, talk about the weekend’s match and see how long it takes before we realise we’re having two different conversations. It’s led to some lovely chats, but I particularly enjoy the moment when we work out what each of us had assumed 😂

When you spend so much of your life in women’s football, it feels completely normal that “the match” would mean ours. Then you step outside that world and remember how often women still have to be specified, while men get to be assumed.

I think there’s something useful in gently interrupting that assumption, whether that’s calling it men’s football, asking which World Cup record someone means or expecting to find kit that was actually designed to fit us.

We spend plenty of time being told what the women’s game doesn’t have yet, so I quite enjoy moving through the world with the expectation that we belong in these conversations and that our football deserves space.

What are your micro acts of feminism in football?

Please share, because I’d love to add to my repertoire.

#womensfootball #feminism #microactsoffeminism by @stefmic

117

27

2 days ago

Been talking about Ted Lasso again 😂⚽️

This time with Alison McConnell for Nutmeg about why so much of the new season feels VERY familiar if you work in women’s football.

The constant pressure to grow. Fighting for investment and resources. Having to prove why something matters. And why, for women, there really is no such thing as “just a friendly”.

We also talked about why seeing all of this play out in such a huge mainstream show matters so much for the women’s game.

Really enjoyed this one. Full article is now online at @nutmegscottishfootball 💜

Ps wearing my fave tee by @glasgowcityfc made by @wearefoudys and sponsored by fabulous people who care so much about the women’s game @thinkaltagency 🧡⚽️ by @stefmic

82

2

2 months ago

It’s a wrap!

Not the result we hoped for but still so much to celebrate.

We loved our little World Cup hub at Lewes FC ❤️

Thank you @lionesses for an incredible few weeks!

#womensworldcup #womeninfootball by @stefmic

82

15

3 years ago

For those of us who work in women’s football, follow it or spend a lot of time thinking about it, much of this history can feel like basic knowledge, although I still remember exactly how I felt learning about every one of these stories.

Last week a friend messaged me and said, “How have I only just learned about the ban on women’s football?”

It reminded me that so many people were never told this story, things we should have learned at school. And once you begin to see how women have been pushed out of sports and as a result sporting history, you start to notice the same thing everywhere else, you also start to recognise how much of the inequality we face in sport today has been built into the systems around us.

Women’s football was ours, women were playing it, organising it and drawing enormous crowds. Then they were pushed out of the places and structures that would have allowed the game to grow, and still, they found ways to keep it going.

I have so much admiration for the women who built their own teams, associations and competitions while the football establishment was trying to shut them out. Creating something under those conditions must have taken extraordinary courage.

There is still so much we face today, and so many systems that were never built with us in mind. But look at what women created then, and look at what we’re creating now.

We stand on the shoulders of the giants who came before us 💫☀️⭐️

#herstory #genderequality #feminism by @stefmic

73

18

20 days ago

Ted Lasso wants more female presidents and, honestly, same👩‍💼

But if we want more women leading countries, companies, football clubs and everything in between, we need to think about the pipeline long before they get there.

⚽️ More girls on pitches
⚽️ More opportunities to lead
⚽️ More confidence to use their voices and take up space.
⚽️ More women in sport for them to look at and think, maybe I could do that too.

Sport is where girls learn that leadership belongs to them too.

Anyway, while Ted is sorting out the future female Presidents, I have another pressing concern…

WHAT IS KEELEY DOING?! 😂

I need attendance figures, sponsorship updates, I want to know how the finances are looking.

And most importantly, somebody show me AFC Richmond Women’s commercial pipeline immediately. 📈😂

Priorities.

#TedLasso #WomensFootball #WomenInSport #womeninleadership taken in Richmond, London by @stefmic

24

5

23 days ago

Women don’t need another person telling us to be more confident. We need people who see our potential before we necessarily see it ourselves.

I’ve been thinking about while watching Coach Chilton find her feet as a manager in Ted Lasso.

Women are so often told to apply for the job, speak up, back ourselves, push the door open.

But there has to be someone on the other side of that door too.

Someone who notices you, tells you to go for something before you think you’re ready. Someone who lets you ask the stupid questions, make mistakes and work out what kind of leader you actually want to be without treating that uncertainty as proof that you shouldn’t be there.

I’ve been incredibly lucky in football because there have been so many women who have done exactly that for me. Women who have given me advice, shared what they know, made introductions, answered my endless questions, encouraged me and, at various points, seen things in me that I probably couldn’t see myself.

It has made a massive difference to my journey.

Which is probably why I’ve found myself wanting Rebecca and Keeley to reach back for Alice this season. Not because it is women’s responsibility to fix the structures that exclude us, but because once you know how difficult it can be to find your place in a space that wasn’t built with you in mind, there is something incredibly powerful about helping another woman find hers.

So yes, push doors when you have to. But if you’ve already made it through one, hold it open for the woman coming behind you. ❤️

And if a woman has ever done that for you, tag her. She probably deserves to know.

#womensfootball #tedlasso #womeninsport taken in Richmond by @stefmic

36

20

a month ago

I met this woman at the weekend and I absolutely love her.

I want to brunch with her, have work meetings with her, champion her and generally just hang out with her 💙

She is Lady in Blue, the new Fourth Plinth sculpture in Trafalgar Square by Tschabalala Self.

Self describes her as an “everywoman”, a young metropolitan woman of colour representing the people who actually inhabit London today.

She’s an everyday woman.

And I think that’s why I love her so much.

Women so often have to be exceptional before we decide they’re worthy of space. Exceptional athlete, exceptional leader, exceptional artist, exceptional founder. We have to achieve something, win something, change something, prove something.

Meanwhile, an audit of London’s public monuments found that only 4% are dedicated to named women. There are roughly twice as many sculptures featuring animals as there are sculptures dedicated to named women.

And then there’s her.

Nearly 17 feet tall, bright blue, walking through the middle of Trafalgar Square like she owns it.

Even the location feels perfect. Behind her is the National Gallery, whose collection spans hundreds of years of art, but of more than 2,300 paintings, just 28 are by women.

So there’s something quite wonderful about a Black woman, created by a Black woman artist, taking up this much space right outside it.

And obviously, people are complaining.

She’s too big. Too bright. Too dominant. She doesn’t suit Trafalgar Square.

Which made me laugh because apparently they expect us to conform even in statue form.

Don’t be so loud. Don’t take up so much space. You should know your place.

And your place definitely shouldn’t be up there.

Except she is.

An everyday woman taking up an absolutely ridiculous amount of space in one of the most famous public spaces.

I hope the rest of us remember that we don’t actually have to be exceptional before we’re allowed to take up space.

Anyway, I love her 💙 taken in Trafalgar Square London by @stefmic

22

8

a month ago

The internet probably doesn’t need another Sydney Sweeney post, but I wanted to try to turn some of the anger around this campaign into something useful.

Because if it made you angry, frustrated or just completely exhausted at seeing women’s bodies used in this way again, there are things we can actually do with that frustration 👇

🏃‍♀️ Follow five female athletes you don’t already follow, and engage with their posts. Attention has value, so let’s give more of it to women for the things they’re actually doing.

🎟️ Buy a ticket to a women’s sporting event and take some friends. It doesn’t really matter which sport, just turn up, spend some money and help build the audience.

💰 Ask your company about partnering with a female athlete or a women’s sports club. Make them the face of the company, invest in creative that helps change how the world sees women.

👕 Buy women’s sports merch. Wear it, gift it, put women’s teams and athletes on people’s backs and into everyday culture.

Changing patriarchal systems that have been built over generations is obviously much harder than buying a football shirt, and there are huge structural changes that need to happen too. But attention, audiences, ticket sales, sponsorship and merch all have value, and the more of that value we deliberately move towards women, the more powerful women’s sport becomes.

And that feels like a much better place to put our energy.

💗 Dismantling the patriarchy is hard, so in the meantime, let’s get on with building the matriarchy. by @stefmic

80

15

a month ago

Daphne Caruana Galizia was murdered because it was the only way the absolute worst of the patriarchy could silence her forever. They succeeded in killing her, but they didn’t succeed in silencing who she was and what she stood for.

It’s hard to describe the significance of Daphne to someone who didn’t grow up in Malta. She was, is, the country’s moral compass. Even after years of not living there I checked her blog daily, and for months after her death I’d still sometimes subconsciously go onto it, before remembering she was no longer there.

Daphne is still my North Star, she’s who I think about when I need resilience, when I need to speak up or remind myself why using your voice matters.

Her assassination in 2017 was strategic and connected to the corruption she was investigating, but what happened to Daphne didn’t start with a bomb. She had spent years being stalked, harassed and threatened, her family and home were targeted, her dogs were killed and national hate campaigns were built around her.

And underneath all of this was horrific misogyny and the very worst of the patriarchy.

Calling her a witch (the irony), attacking her appearance, trying to humiliate and frighten her, making the consequences of speaking so unbearable that eventually she might stop. It is the sort of hatred reserved for women who become inconvenient to powerful men.

Of course, Daphne never stopped.

Almost nine years later, following the acquittal of Yorgen Fenech, who admitted involvement but was still left to go free, there is still no justice for who commissioned her assassination.

Malta is mourning, but Daphne is still being read, still influencing people and still making us understand the importance of using our voices.

For so many of us she remains our North Star.

My thoughts are, as always, with her family and everyone who loved her.

Photos from this morning’s gathering in London. #daphnecaruanagalizia taken in High Commission of Malta in the United Kingdom by @stefmic

69

3

a month ago

“What would happen if you put your hearts where your fake allyship is?”

Zelda Southport with possibly my favourite line of Ted Lasso so far.

But episode four also made me think about something I probably don’t talk about enough: how much friendship makes women’s football a better place to work.

This industry can be hard. There’s not enough money, not enough resource and far too much pressure on women’s teams to constantly prove their value.

But there’s also this brilliant network of women who recommend each other, introduce each other, share contacts, send the “have you seen this?” Whatsapps , celebrate each other’s wins and occasionally provide the emergency voice note when everything has gone completely wrong.

Some of the best friends I’ve made as an adult have come through women’s football.

And I don’t think that’s incidental to the growth of the game. I think it’s part of what makes it special.

We talk a lot about investing money into women’s football - rightly.

But there’s another kind of investment happening all the time: women putting their hearts where their allyship is.

Episode 4💜⚽️ featuring a special cameo from THE @char_moves and filmed at Women’s Football HQ @crossbarbrighton taken in Brighton by @stefmic

35

14

2 months ago

“Women don’t get friendlies. We either succeed or we fail.”

Keeley Jones casually delivering one of the best lines of Ted Lasso so far.

The bit we don’t talk about enough.

When something built around men doesn’t work, we change the manager, the strategy, the investment.

When the women’s version doesn’t work, too often the conclusion is that women’s sport doesn’t work.

Episode 3 of watching Ted Lasso through the eyes of someone working in women’s football ⚽️

A few other things I noticed this week:

⚽ the pressure of having to prove the entire concept
⚽ what happens when women aren’t given room to fail
⚽ the difference between equality and simply being invited in
⚽ and why Keeley might understand the problem better than anyone

“Women don’t get friendlies.”

She’s right.

#TedLasso #WomensFootball #WomensSport #womeninsport taken in Brighton and Hove by @stefmic

34

8

2 months ago

Ted walked into a press conference as the new manager of Richmond Women.

And got asked question after question about… the men.

That tiny moment said A LOT.

It’s already hard enough for women’s football to command attention from the outside world. If the momentum, investment and belief aren’t coming from inside the club either, how are women supposed to thrive?

⚠️ SPOILER ALERT ⚠️

Episode 2 of my Ted Lasso series and I’m talking about:

⚽ Why I once told the owner of a standalone men’s club NOT to start a women’s team
🚿 “We’re just happy to be here” and the things women in football have been conditioned to accept
🎤 Ted recognising when to give Coach Chilton the microphone
😠 Why Roy Kent gets to be grumpy, but will we let a woman behave the same way?
💰 What happens when we expect women’s teams to succeed without properly investing in them
👩 Rebecca’s feminism crisis, and why I actually love it

There is SO much packed into this episode.

And my biggest takeaway?

You can’t just give women a team. You have to build an environment in which they can succeed.

Book recommendation in video Why Men Win at Work by @gillwhittycollins

#TedLasso #WomensFootball #WomensSports #WomenInSport #WomenInLeadership

@tedlassoislife taken in Brighton by @stefmic

31

17

2 months ago