'Women's football needs more attention' - Martina Cilia

by Ayrton Galea - 3rd March 2015

Midfielder Martina Cilia believes that Women's Football deserves more attention, and has room for improvement in various aspects. She said this when we talked with the ambitious nineteen-year old about the current situation of Women's football.

As the Women's domestic season is approaching its final stage, the Malta Football Association is going to organize a seminar this Saturday for all the participating Clubs to discuss the situation of Women's football locally. In this background, we asked Martina for her views, before discussing our Women's Team.

About the current situation of Women's Football, Martina said “Simple. Women's football needs more attention and not just media-wise. I believe that women's football has made a quantum leap this past decade. Nonetheless, there is definitely room for improvement in various aspects. To begin with, media coverage is extremely poor and when done, done in an apathetic way which is quite offensive to us. In addition, I strongly disagree with the lion's share of women's games being refereed by inexperienced young chaps. It invariably sets back our pace of game. At least, a compromise should be attained in allotting referees with a wide spectrum of experiences.”

This year's league format has given the opportunity to small teams to have their chance to play against the top sides but unfortunately this resulted in big scores. We asked Martina to share her views about this year's league format. She told us, “I think that there were too many games per round since all the teams were put in one division. I believe that the format of last year's league was much better than this year's.”

We asked her what she wishes to see in in the future, and she told us, “An improvement in league-game grounds and heightened media coverage.”

Shifting our focus to the team's present form, we asked Martina to share her thoughts about the last match, in which Birkirkara won with a late-goal against Kirkop United. She said, “Last match was quite peculiar. We passed, ran and opened for the ball very effectively but we lost a multitude of chances. In fact, it is my firm conviction that the result did not reflect our potential at all.”

She added, “Numerous people thought that we won by sheer luck. I completely disagree. Luck only comes to those who work hard and fight to achieve their goals. That's what we did in our last match. We fought to score the winning goal till the very last second. Till every part of our body ached. Does that mean we won the game just because we were lucky? I don't think so. It goes beyond that.”

With the Stripes involved in the Women's Knockout match this evening, Martina went on by saying, “We, as a team, have a firmness of purpose. Our target is to win the league and go to the Champion's League. We will not give up the fight. We will continue till the very end. Every game is a final, a battle. We, as a team, are showing unquestionable resilience to win every single one of these battles. Therefore, we will go to tomorrow's match with the same positive attitude we have been carrying with us since the beginning of this season. “

Martina concluded the interview with the following inspirational message, “During this journey of ours we have encountered obstacles, doubts, mistakes and even fears. We will not cease coming across these things but with hard work and perseverance there are no limits. I believe in every single one of my team mates and I know that they believe in me.”

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