Women’s football has expanded faster than ever in the last decade. Not only has the game changed for the better, but the quality of coaching has also increased as more women are taking the step up to managing football teams, as well as becoming club owners or club directors.
As seen at the last Women’s World Cup in 2019, many leading nations such as the Netherlands, Italy and eventual winners the United States were all managed by women.
But in Italy, the race for equality is still going on. As best seen in the Calcio Femminile, in Italy’s top female football division there are only three teams managed by women, including Roma Women’s Betty Bavagnoli, Pink Bari’s Cristina Mitola, and Juventus’ Rita Guarino – who has won the women’s Scudetto in the past three seasons.
Despite the large number of male-managed clubs in the division, things appear to be changing following Milena Bertolini’s successes with the Azzurre, who made it to the Quarter-Finals in the World Cup in France last year.
To explain more about the women’s game in Italy, we must to take a look at the career of Carolina Morace, who not only has made a difference as a coach, but also knows how it is like to play on the field, having represented the likes of Milan, Lazio, Reggiana, and Verona in the 1980s and 1990s.
During that time, the words “football” and “women” were considered too incompatible in many countries around the world where the men’s game had a clear priority, such as England and Brazil.
Yet, after retiring as a player, Morace’s post-playing goal was always becoming a manager, with the former striker saying in a TV program dedicated to women in football named Le Signore del Calcio: “I made all my training as a coach at the time we started to have more players in the Italian National Team. I began with the Serie C side of Lazio Women, and then I moved to their Serie A squad.”
The road to becoming a coach was hard for Morace, who now holds a UEFA Pro License, with the former Italy women’s national team manager adding: “I have always found myself in courses with men. I was used to be the only woman in these environments.”
“For example, when I did the UEFA Pro, everyone [there] had heard about me. But, in reality, no one had seen me play because, in that age, TVs were not broadcasting any women’s game. I remember that, during the first two days in the UEFA Pro nobody was talking to me, not even the former players. However, when we went to the pitch, everything changed.”
Fighting for more respect as a woman can be hard when it comes to football (hitherto nowadays), yet Morace’s eagerness paid off as she became the first woman to manage a professional men’s football team in Italy.
When she took the hot seat of Serie C side Viterbese in 1999, Morace’s appointment was seen as a change for the game. Yet, it was not to be a perfect story as she resigned from her position after only two matches following a conflict with the club chairman.
But that didn’t stop her in her search for improvement as the next year she was appointed as the head coach for the Italian women’s national team, a position she held for five years during which she won back-to-back qualifications to the European Championships.
Following her successful stint with Italy, Morace was appointed as the manager of Canada women’s side in 2007. Under her guidance, the North American side enjoyed a healthy run of international silverware, winning a CONCACAF trophy, two Cyprus Cups, as well as one Four Nations Tournament.
Despite a successful run of form with Canada that saw the Canucks win trophy after trophy and climb from the 11th to the 6th placed in the FIFA Women’s Ranking, Morace formally announced her resignation on the July 22, 2011 due to a budget dispute with the Canadian Soccer Association.
After departing from Canada, Morace’s career as a manager seemed to be put on hold as the now-established coach opened her own footballing academy in Perth, Australia. Then, after more than seven years of running an academy and a short failed stint as the manager of Trinidad and Tobago’s women’s national team, the pioneer of women’s football in Italy returned home in 2018.
It happened when Milan relaunched their women’s team, four years after the original club dissolved. In their maiden season, Carolina Morace took the reins of the club she once played with during her years as one of the top players in the country.
Although Milan would finish just one point off a Champions League spot, that would be the only season Morace would manage the Rossonere, with the Italian legend seemingly calling time on her managerial career to take up a punditry role on Sky Sports Italia – becoming the first woman to hold such a position on the Italian TV.
Whilst the gap in attention and equal treatment between men’s and women’s football in Italy remains as large as in most of countries around the world, the influence of Carolina Morace is a story of inspiration for many girls in the country who one day dream of both playing the game professionally and managing it from the bench.