Manchester City's Caroline Weir would welcome crowd pilots in women's football

Caroline Weir, the Manchester City and Scotland midfielder, has added her voice to the idea of crowd pilots in women’s football to help the female game get “back out there” when it returns next month.

The Football Association is seeking approval from the the Department for Digital Culture, Media and Sport to trial the return of crowds at fixtures in the upcoming Women’s Super League and Women’s Championship campaigns, it emerged last week.

Larger sports pilots that were previously scheduled - such as those at the World Snooker Championship - were cancelled last month until at least August 15 following a spike in coronavirus cases across parts of northern England, but women’s football pilots could allow for the return of fans on a much smaller scale.

“It’s an interesting idea,” Weir told Telegraph Sport. “Obviously, we’re not filling 60,000-seater stadiums like in the men’s game, our stadiums are smaller and if it puts women’s football at the forefront and gets people talking about coming to see matches - and it’s one of the first sports to let people back in - that’s a positive thing.

“If it’s safe and appropriate, players will be happy with that and it would be good for getting women’s football back out there.”

Weir arrowed in a wonder strike to secure victory for City in the first women’s Manchester derby on the opening weekend of the WSL season last year in front of a then record crowd of 31,213 at the Etihad.

City’s opening fixture against WSL newcomers Aston Villa on September 6 will be far removed from that historic occasion, although the FA has insisted there will be “a lot of promotion” to celebrate the return of women’s football after coronavirus forced the season to prematurely end last March.

“There’s definitely an opportunity to grow it [the women’s game] elsewhere,” added Weir. “Make it fit for online, make it accessible to a lot of fans. In other sports you have to pay for things like that.

“I don’t think we can even discuss the idea of women’s sport going backwards because 2019 was such a huge year and we need to keep kicking on regardless of the circumstances and the challenges.”

On City’s opening fixture against Villa, she said: “The first game of the season is always tough no matter who you play. We won’t be taking anything for granted and we’ll need to be at our best to get a result, but it will definitely be a day to look forward to.”