Charlton Women's Team Disbanded
Failure of the Premier League Side Brings an End to Ladies' Football
Charlton Athletic have announced that their successful women's football teams have been disbanded in financial cuts required following relegation from the Premier League.
Charlton Athletic Women’s Football team has been disbanded at all levels. Charlton Athletic Women’s team, one of the most successful women’s teams in England lost in the Final of the Women’s FA Cup to Arsenal Women’s team who won an unprecedented ‘quadruple’ of trophies. That match in front of a record breaking crowd of almost 25,000 people at Nottingham Forest’s ground will now be the final game for Charlton Athletic Women’s team.
Following the relegation of Charlton Athletic from the Premier League to the Championship at the end of the season, major cost-cutting decisions had to be taken and one of those decisions has brought about the demise of the women’s football team.
Charlton Women’s team is one of the strongest teams in England, providing a challenge to the Arsenal team and, in fact, are the last team to beat Arsenal who went through the past season undefeated. They defeated Arsenal in the Final of the Premier League Cup in April, 2006.
In England, women’s football does not have the high profile that it receives in the United States where their league is highly successful but the Women’s FA Cup Final has been televised live for the past number of years and the England’s Women’s football team now receives greater recognition. The Women’s European Championships which were played in England was well supported and had good coverage in the media.
The Women’s FA Premier League will now face a season with only eleven teams competing for the title. With the demise of one of the top teams in the league, Arsenal’s dominance looks set to continue and it must raise questions about the future of some of the other clubs. If the club with the backing of a top football club in England can not survive, what hope is there for some of the lesser clubs?
All of the Charlton senior players will be looking to find new clubs and with the success they had at The Valley behind them, it shouldn’t be too difficult for them to attract new clubs. However, many of the younger girls who played for the junior and academy teams will be hoping that they can sign for some of the other teams in London but for those resident in south London, it might not be so easy or as convenient to travel across the city for training and matches.
It was fifteen years ago that Charlton Athletic Football Club took the highly successful Croydon Ladies team under their wing as part of their outreach work in the community. At that time there was little recognition for women’s football but the women’s team has grown from strength to strength so it is a great disappointment that their downfall has come about because of something out of their control. The failure of the Charlton Athletic team to retain its position in the Premier League has resulted in the scrapping of the successful women’s team who finished third in the FA Women’s Premier League in the season past.
Earlier in the month Bristol City announced they were disbanding their Women’s teams and that their Centre of Excellence would merge with the Bristol Academy Centre of Excellence. The lack of funding from the FA for two centres of excellence in Bristol was blamed for this decision.
