Becky Sauerbrunn Quotes

It wasn't until 1999 when my idols Mia Hamm and Kristine Lilly took home the women's World Cup trophy at the Rose Bowl in front of 40 million TV viewers that I remember thinking how rare it was to see women play sports on TV.

Women's tennis has been around for a very long time - we're talking about the 1800s. But women's soccer hasn't had such a long history, so now they're right at the beginning of really trying to make things equal. We need to continue not only to advocate for women but to have men advocating for women.

Coming onto the Jordan Brand absolutely gives more attention to women's basketball and basketball in general.

The amount of TV exposure we have had and the attention women's football has got has been brilliant.

I've proved I'm in love with the women's game, and I think the quality is unbelievable.

I grew up watching Mia Hamm, Brandi Chastain, watching them achieve.

When I was playing, they said soccer was a man's world and women should remain on the sidelines, all I can say is I'm glad I never had to go up against Mia Hamm

The growth of women's soccer and women's sports all around the world has been slow.

The Women's Sports Foundation holds a unique position in developing opportunities for girls and women of all abilities to be active whether recreationally or competitively, and I'm excited to help lead the organization to impact even more lives. It is an honor to continue to build the legacy created by Billie Jean King and all of our leaders.

Women's sports is still in its infancy. The beginning of women's sports in the United States started in 1972, with the passage of Title 9 for girls to finally get athletic scholarships.

When I was growing up, you didn't know there was a women's national team. Now girls grow up dreaming of playing for Canada.

In the seventies we had to make it acceptable for people to accept girls and women as athletes. We had to make it okay for them to be active. Those were much scarier times for females in sports.

When the Olympics and World Cups come around, that's when you see the real outpouring of support that there really is for female football.

And of course in America you've got American football and baseball and all those other ball games, soccer has become a little niche that the women have kind of filled.

In recent generations, women's sports have been a blessing. Some of us can remember the bad old days in the '50s, when we would discover in casual schoolyard play that a girl could outrun most of us or hold her own in basketball or hit a softball - but there were no teams, no coaches, for girls.

Someone like Billie Jean King is completely my idol.

The Women's Sports Foundation has empowered so many young girls and women across the U.S. I benefitted from WSF with a travel and training grant when I was 12 years old. It really helped my family financially.

For women's football in this country, it's important we do play in the best stadiums, and for me, Wembley is the best in this country.

How many women's football matches are selling out week in, week out, 20,000 plus? They're not.

The women's national team is a very successful team, and that success has given us a platform to speak on gender equity issues. Millions of young women play soccer in this country, and it's empowering for them to see that our contribution to the game is valued.

You look at the sports pages and you'd often be forgiven for thinking women didn't do sport.

Sometimes women's soccer can be political.

It's not so long ago I was paying £250 a season to play. I don't think in my lifetime it will ever get to wage parity with the men, but we have made so many great strides already.

It's a dream that we, as women footballers, get to play in the same stadium as the men.

What is best to hope for and what everyone is working towards is to elevate the quality of women's sport and to bring it to a level where it is seen as something that is very entertaining, something to be admired, to be looked up to, to put it in that level playing field as a product to be sold equal to the men.