Women's football in mid-twentieth century Brazil and France: three team managers from prohibition to profit

This article uses a review of the literature to present the path of three women’s soccer team managers in Brazil and France, in periods that can be considered to involve (re)constructions of the sport towards professionalization. The time frame chosen ranges from the 1940s to the 1980s. In Brazil, this period saw the prohibition and regulation of women’s soccer and the emergence of two important figures from the Rio de Janeiro soccer universe: Carlota Rezende, director of Primavera Futebol Clube, and Eurico Lyra Filho, of Esporte Clube Radar. Government repression of female soccer in France was much shorter than in Brazil. The third person highlighted, journalist Pierre Geoffroy – creator of the Stade de Reims women’s team – appeared in the late 1960s.