Is gender a sustainability balance driver in football?

Abstract

The paper focuses on the possibility that differences between men's and female's football (not only considering players' physical attributes and technical performances, economic aspects as ticketing, sponsorships, tv rights, merchandising, but also behavioral insights) could lead clubs to enrich their CSR goals. Literature underlines how women's football shows behavioral and psychological characteristics that make it unique and requires focus and tactics more tailored to the female interpretation of this sport. This could attract the segments of the market which care about cooperation, trust and inclusion without forgetting profitability: investing in females' soccer could constitute, therefore, a way for football clubs to signal how much they care about inclusion and to improve their overall image. Moreover, educating girls to cope with a traditional "old boy game" like football could train them to better face situations of real world unfair competition. Results from an "ad hoc" built questionnaire handled to a sample of nonprofessional (male and female) football players hopefully will contribute to build up a "new model" of CSR in football.