A new women’s FIFA esports competitive calendar has been announced for 2022, which will feature some of the best female players and aspiring esports athletes from Europe and North America.
Organisers say that the as the current FIFA FGS (FIFA Global Series) competitive events have a distinct lack of female participants, ECL (Esports Championship Leagues) hopes to ‘even the playing ground, be a driving force in supporting female players and help close the skill gap to their male counterparts’.
The ECL events will kick off in February 2022 and each FIFA 22 event will have a prize pool of more than £4,500.
The aim is to help orgs decide which female players they could sign and support, to highlight more women players and to push towards ending sexism in esports and gaming.
ECL – which has worked with a variety of top women FIFA players and content creators for almost three years – has partnered with esports platform provider Rush.gg for the female esports cups.
“Working alongside females in the gaming and esports space has given an appreciation of just how hard the girls have to work to get the same amount of support that their male counterparts often receive.”
Naz, ECL
ECL talent will also be running monthly community cups on the Rush.gg platform. These are open to everyone to join – the aim is to allow women within FIFA 22 to create their own FIFA tournaments and give them industry experience around the operational aspect of gaming and esports.
Rush.gg and ECL will also be holding a talent competition to run alongside the events to help uncover women FIFA content creators and streamers, creating more pathways for girls in the esports and gaming space.
Her Game Too, an organisation run by female football fans to fight against sexism in traditional football, is also on board with the initiative. It aims to create awareness around the subject and appoint gaming ambassadors.
Caz May, a founder of Her Game Too, commented: “It’s an honour to have formed an official partnership with ECL – we are working hard to tackle sexism and misogyny in the traditional footballing world, so it makes sense to branch out to gaming where the problem unfortunately also exists. We look forward to working together with ECL to promote equality and champion women in gaming.”
Björn Rüssel, COO of Rush.gg, added: “We are proud to have partnered up with ECL and Her Game Too. We are driven by our belief, that all gamers are equal and that there is no place for any form of sexism, racist or hatred, neither in real life and nor in gaming and esports.”
ECL founder Naz commented: “Working alongside females in the gaming and esports space has given an appreciation of just how hard the girls have to work to get the same amount of support that their male counterparts often receive.
“The loud minority of people that choose sexism and hate to make women feel uncomfortable within gaming and esports is not ok.
“We have worked alongside women that have achieved some amazing things and have signed with the likes of Portland Timbers/Thorns, Futwiz, SAF, Chicago Fire and JLingz Esports. These girls are true trailblazers in the scene. The next logical step is to create more pathways for others to follow, which is the main objective of the events we have planned.
“We thank all of our partners for supporting us and cannot wait to showcase the female talent in the FIFA 22 gaming and esports space.”
ZGame Energy Drinks – a gamer focus and wellness blend – is sponsoring the first ECL/Rush.gg community cup. Paul and Tracy McConkey from ZGame said in a joint statement: “The opportunity to sponsor these events to help level up females in the gaming and esports industry is something that we fully wanted to get behind. We hope that many benefit from these events and look forward to seeing the next talent break through in the FIFA 22 space due to the pathways we are creating.
“ZGame is a company focused on doing good and we’ve long known the challenges female gamers face. At ZGame we’re totally opposed to any form of bullying or discrimination, so we love what ECL are doing and are incredibly proud to be part of their journey.”
Others have highlighted the lack of women talent in FIFA in recent years, including the ShEsports Cup, and UK FIFA streamer ShaunaGames has encouraged more women to get involved in FIFA esports.
Craig Winfield from UK esports organisation SAF (Serious About FIFA) is leading up commercial and press enquiries for the new ECL initiative. Interested parties can contact Craig at [email protected] to find out more about the event.
Dom is an award-winning writer and finalist of the Esports Journalist of the Year 2023 award. He graduated from Bournemouth University with a 2:1 degree in Multi-Media Journalism in 2007.
As a long-time gamer having first picked up the NES controller in the late ’80s, he has written for a range of publications including GamesTM, Nintendo Official Magazine, industry publication MCV and others. He worked as head of content for the British Esports Federation up until February 2021, when he stepped back to work full-time on Esports News UK and offer esports consultancy and freelance services. Note: Dom still produces the British Esports newsletter on a freelance basis, so our coverage of British Esports is always kept simple – usually just covering the occasional press release – because of this conflict of interest.
