In Brazil, in the World Cup, there is one football player with a contract for every 27 men

Over two decades, the of female football players with signed contracts in Brazil has increased eightfold, but the gap with men remains huge. Brazil, which will host the Women World Cup in 202, had 362 contracted players at the end of 2022. In 2003, there were 45. In these 20 years, Brazilian women have won two silver medals in the Olympicsin Athens, 2004, and Beijing, 2008), as well as a runner-up in the 2007 World Cup – during the same period, the men did not advance beyond the quarterfinals in the World Cup. Additionally, for the first time, a Brazilian was chosen as the best player in the world by FIFA: Marta. And it happened five times. Despite the achievements and major clubs now having women’s teams, the number of women playing football and with signed contracts is very small compared to men. At the end of 2022, the most recent data showed that there were 9,829 men playing football and formalized, according to Rais (a database that tracks the movement of wage-earning and statutory professionals).

This means that for one female football player with a contract, there are 27 men in the same situation. Most of these players (144 or 40%) are in Sao Paulo. Following are Rio de Janeiro (53), Minas Gerais (51), Rio Grande do Sul (32), and Ceara (27). In terms of age, 75% of them are between 18 and 29 years old. In the age group of 30 years and older, 20% of the players were formalized at the end of 2022. This scenario only takes into account athletes who had an active contract on December 31, 2022. If contracts that ended before that date are also considered, there were 733 contracts of female football players with a contract in that year – and 22,818 in the case of men.

A FIFA survey shows that, despite being the largest country in South America and historically the main force in women’s football in the region, Brazil does not lead in the number of registered players on the continent. This title belongs to Colombia, with 15,793 registered players over 20 years old. Brazil is in second place (3,354), behind Uruguay (4,939). In comparison with the main powers, the gap is even wider. The US has 1.72 million registered players over 20 years old, Germany has 100.6 thousand, Sweden has 78 thousand, the Netherlands has 50.4 thousand, and Japan has 43.6 thousand. Unlike Brazil, all these teams advanced beyond the group stage in last year’s World Cup in Australia, won by Spain.