Women and Professional Football: Taking sports to a new level

                                                                     (Carley Pesente)

Most people never hear about women playing professional football. I personally have never heard about professional football teams for women. If asked I probably would have given the typical answer when it comes to women and football, they don’t mix well. A few years ago, I heard about a girl who was playing football and after she walked off the field she collapsed and died because she wasn’t built for taking hits that they do in football.

            Carley Pesente, owner of the Northeastern Nitro Women’s Professional Football Team in the Women’s Football Alliance and also a linebacker for the same team has been playing women’s tackle football for 13 years (Hill, 2011).  When asked, “Have you been passionate about sports your entire life and if so, how did you zero in on what sports you wanted to take to the professional level?”

Carley replies,” Sports is my life. I have been playing some kind of sport for most of my life…”(Hill, 2011)

Carley also says that she is fueled to excel as a woman athlete because women have always been told that competition is for boys and until 1972 the opportunities for women in sports was limited, but now she has the chance to show little girls that they can do and be anything they want (Hill, 2011).

This touches my heart because even though now women have better opportunities we still aren’t anywhere near to the point where we should be satisfied.

Little girls are the future for women and professional sports and if women in professional sports now want to show the women of the future that anything is possible, then the future can only get better for them.

Hill, M.(2011, March 10) Women’s Professional Football: Interview with team owner Carley Pesente. Sports Networker. Retrieved March 13, 2011 from http://www.sportsnetworker.com/2011/03/10/womens-professional-football-interview-with-team-owner-carley-pesente/