So you want to know more about Tottenham Hotspur Women? You’ve come to the right place! Spurs Women start their fifth campaign in the Women’s Super League, England’s top flight league, later this month and are hoping to build on what was a fifth-placed finish in the league last season that included a trip to the FA Cup Final.
While Cartilage Free Captain has covered Spurs Women for years, there are a lot of new readers to the site, and new fans that are interested in watching and following Tottenham’s women’s team. There are some big changes afoot in the sport, specifically regarding coverage and streaming, and this article will hopefully serve as an introduction and primer for new fans who want to learn more about the club and how they can watch.
So thanks for reading — let’s get going!
What’s the deal with Tottenham Hotspur Women?
Tottenham Hotspur Women participate in the Women’s Super League, the top tier of women’s football in the United Kingdom. Founded as Broxbourne Ladies in the mid-1980s, the club was rebranded as Tottenham Hotspur Ladies in 1991-92. The club toiled in the lower leagues of English women’s football for years before a resurgence propelled them up the pyramid under former co-managers Karen Hills & Juan Amoros. They promoted to the top flight in 2019 (after which they were renamed Tottenham Hotspur Women) and have remained there ever since, though they have yet to finish higher than fifth in the table since promotion.
Spurs Women’s ascension to the WSL is laudable and notable, but they are still well behind the financial and footballing prowess of the so-called “Big Four” of Chelsea, Arsenal, Manchester City, and Manchester United.
Spurs Women are currently managed by Robert Vilahamn, who is entering his second season at the club after leading Swedish Damallsvenskan side BF Häcken to the Champions League.
Why should I care about Spurs Women?
I mean, if you don’t, why are you here? Stop reading this and go do something else.
Women’s soccer in England has a long and checkered history; it has been played for over a century and was quite popular in WWI, but was effectively banned in the 1920s after some asshole men determined that soccer was a sport “that threatened women’s health and morality.” It effectively disappeared entirely within England for decades, before starting to re-emerge in the early 1990s. The Women’s Super League was established by the FA in 2008.
Interest in women’s football has been increasing exponentially worldwide for the past number of years, spearheaded in part by the increase in prominence of both the Women’s World Cup and also the NWSL, the United States’ professional woso league. More and more people are watching and taking a major interest in English women’s soccer, and it has emerged as a competitive destination for some of the world’s top women’s football talent, along with the NWSL and Liga F in Spain.
OK, so who are Tottenham’s best/most exciting players?
The short and easy answer to that question is “Bethany England.” The former Chelsea striker and England international joined Tottenham two and a half seasons ago for what is still the WSL’s record transfer fee of £250k. (Yes, that’s k, not m, the money involved in women’s football is literally a fraction of a percent of what it is in the men’s game, and you can absolutely follow that path to some pretty obvious logical conclusions if you want to.) England, Spurs’ club captain, is a powerful and exciting striker, but at age 30 she’s not getting any younger and Spurs are currently attempting to build a younger, hungrier team around her with arguably varying degrees of success.
Beyond Beth England, new signing Hayley Raso recently joined from Real Madrid and is an experienced and exciting Australian winger. Jessica Naz is a wide attacker who came through Spurs’ academy and just cracked the England squad this summer. Ashleigh Neville is one of the last players who was around when Spurs first promoted to the WSL, and she’s a fan-favorite utility defender who mostly plays fullback but who also can play farther up the pitch. Molly Bartrip is a Spurs vice-captain and a lock-down experienced central defender. Becky Spencer is Spurs’ starting keeper and a Jamaica international.
The transfer window is still open, so there’s still the possibility that Spurs could add to their squad, but we should also be realistic about Spurs’ chances — this is still a team that is expected to finish well behind the Champions League positions in the table.
Who are Spurs’ biggest rivals in the league?
It won’t surprise you to learn that the rivalries pretty much mirror the main rivals of the men’s team, though those rivalries have come somewhat lately, as Tottenham have only been in the top tiers of the pyramid in the past several seasons. Arsenal are the biggest rivals, obviously, as are Chelsea, Manchester United, and West Ham. Although there’s still a sizeable gap in both money and talent between Spurs and the first three teams in that list, Tottenham did just secure their first (ever) win over Arsenal last season, so that gap is narrowing.
Where do Spurs Women play?
The sad reality of women’s soccer in the UK is that the majority of clubs don’t play their home games at their club’s home stadium, because attendance, while skyrocketing, is still well below that of men’s games. This is true even for most WSL clubs. Tottenham Women train at Hotspur Way, Spurs’ training facility, but play the majority of their home matches at Brisbane Road, Leyton Orient’s home ground, about 5 miles from the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium.
That said, Spurs Women do play at the THS, primarily for big home matches against the big teams, and will host Chelsea, Arsenal, and Manchester United there this season. The tickets are cheap too, which makes it a really great opportunity for a family-friendly match day experience if you’re local or happen to be visiting.
This sounds cool! So how can I watch Spurs Women this season?
Good news to current — and new — fans: watching Spurs Women should be both easier, and a better-produced experience than in years past. Starting this season, the WSL will be streaming non-televised matches for all teams in the league on its brand-new YouTube channel for free. In addition to full matches, the channel will also stream full match replays on demand, highlight packages and other feature content. This new channel will largely replace The FA Player, the Football Association’s proprietary content streaming service that served as the main source for WSL matches this past season.
The FA Player was an important platform for WSL fans in the past, but the production values were often sub-standard and the streaming quality was minimal. Hopefully that will change with the switch to YouTube, though the proof will be in the pudding.
But this is only for non-televised games — Sky Sports and BBC will broadcast up to 66 WSL matches, including Spurs Women matches, on TV in the UK, and those games will not be streamed, at least initially, on YouTube (it remains to be seen whether replays will be uploaded). If you live in the United States, typically matches that are televised in the UK are carried on Paramount+, or at times CBS Sports Network. And if you have a SpursPLAY subscription, women’s match replays are also available there.
It should also be noted that the YouTube agreement does NOT cover the FA and Continental Cup matches, which will continue to be streamed on the FA Player.
How will Carty Free cover Spurs Women matches?
As closely as possible! We endeavor to have live match threads posted for every televised/streamed match available so that fans can follow and post as the match goes along, just like with the men’s team. We also try and post regular match reports and analysis after games, though there may be some delays compared to men’s coverage due to writer availability. Match coverage is a lot of work, and we do our best but we’re only human!
In addition we’ll cover pressing news and transfer rumors as we become aware of them. The media and news infrastructure for English woso is way, way, way less than in the men’s game, so keep that in mind. (It’s getting better, though.)
Awesome. When does the season start?
Tottenham open their new season on Sunday, September 22 with a home match against Crystal Palace at Brisbane Road. Matches are typically weekly, though the season starts later and there are often gaps in the schedule since the WSL has fewer teams than the Premier League.
You can view Tottenham’s full match schedule on their website.
