When people think of French league football they usually think about Ligue 1 and are usually gravitate towards teams like PSG, Monaco, Lyon or Marseille. But next season a lot more eyes will be on Ligue 2 and in particular at Clermont Foot.

Why?

Well they have just announced that they are going to have a woman coach the Clermont mens first team. In football this is quite big news. Again it brings down another wall.

Helena Costa has done a lot of work to earn her chance at Clermont. She has been scouting for sides including Leixoes and Celtic. She also has various coaching badges and taken part in numerous UEFA/FIFA seminars. She has managed Benfica’s male under seventeens team and has also coached the Iran and Qatari international women’s sides.

Her career path isn’t wildly different from the way Andre Vilas Boas got into football and progressed. You could also say she has better coaching credentials than Tim Sherwood had before he took over at Spurs!

I think she has made a good decision in accepting the Clermont job. Clermont is a city more known for its rugby team than for its football. That should give Helena time to have a look and shouldn’t be under too much pressure from the board. The decision to hire her shows that the club are progressive and could be ready for a new rebuilding job. That gives the thirty-six a chance to put her on stamp on things from the very start.

Obviously we will have cynics out there who will state that this is just a big publicity stunt. But I really hope it’s not. Helena will no doubt be under immense pressure to begin with from the media, again I hope they disappear after the first few weeks and only come back if she is doing a good job and Clermont are improving. We don’t need this to turn into a media circus! Plus if it were all about publicity wouldn’t they just hire a model?

I see no reason why Helena can’t succeed as a coach/manager in the mens game. I once spoke to a well admired coach in the female game and I asked could the girls make it in the guys game? And I was told ‘No’ simply because of the strength and pace that is needed in the mens game. Technically though they had it all.

So why can a female not make it as a coach? They can be just as smart as any male coach and have a footballing brain. All the skills needed to be a fine manager like people skills, motivational chats, determination, tactical awareness and the like, have very little (if anything) to do with what sex you are.

I am glad this is another stumbling block removed from our game and hope that more follow Helena Costa into the game and that they enrich it!

Posted on May 7th, 2014 by scott
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