Hopes women's World Cup will inspire young girls on Yorkshire Coast to play football
The Lionesses take on Haiti tomorrow
With the women's World Cup well underway, it could inspire some young girls on the Yorkshire Coast to start playing football.
The Lionesses are set to play Haiti tomorrow.
Matt Hewison, the sports development manager for Scarborough, Whitby and Filey at North Yorkshire Council, said: "Even before last year's Euro's, and we all know what came from that, I think there was a big sort of up-turn in female participation because there were campaigns with 'this girl can' and campaigns within schools. I think female participation has been steadily growing and in certainly in football, it took a massive upturn with the success.
"It was great to see young girls walking around with England shirts on, not with Harry Kane on, but with people like Beth Mead. It's always the same; success brings more awareness and more people want to get involved, so luckily we have definitely seen a big upturn in female participation.
"The whole thing with Beth and the other Lionesses is that they've now got role models that they can sort of look to. I know Beth's said this herself, but the fact that when she was in primary and secondary school, being a professional footballer wasn't an option and now it is so the whole aspiration levels have just gone up.
"It's just great for us in our area that we've got someone who used to live in our district who still comes back every now and again and still engages with us. She's a household name. Everyone knows who Beth is. I think in terms of aspiration, I think it's great that young girls playing football have got role models and if it's somebody who's local is just a huge postiive.
Matt added that there is lots going on for football development for girls: "They never had those five or six years ago. The FA have two programmes; one for primary-aged groups called Wildcats and we do have those in Whitby and Scarborough, where young girls come along and just learn the fundamentals of football and then there's one for secondary-aged groups called Squad Girls, which they do down at the Sports Village which Scarborough Athletic run."