Women's football: FA announces new plans for girls' football in England
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'We want to be the future Lionesses!'
The Football Association has announced new plans to ensure that young female footballers have access to high quality coaching in England.
The changes will see Emerging Talent Centres set up across the country to help develop players between the ages of eight and 16.
There will also be new football academies established in partnership with Women's Super League clubs for older girls.
It's hoped that the new structure will help the girls' game become more inclusive and make it easier for talented young players to play football professionally at club and country level.
What's been announced?
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The new announcement sees the reorganisation of how the girl's game is run and comes after a three year review by the FA into the girl's and women's games.
The organisation says that the new structure has been established to make sure it can provide a wide and diverse pool of players ready for senior football.
As a result, the FA have announced 70 Emerging Talent Centres (ETCs) which will be established across England for girls aged between eight and sixteen who show footballing potential.
The new ETCs will replace the FA's existing Regional Talent Centres and Advanced Coaching Centres.
Some players such as Alessia Russo have previously had to move abroad to develop their football skills
Funding from the Premier League will go to recruiting more football coaches in the women's game and the FA hopes that the new Centres will see the number of girls on their talent programmes more than double.
The FA have also announced new Pro Game Academies (PGAs) which will replace current WSL academies for developing older players aged between 14 and 20.
Kay Cossington, the FA women's technical director said that the changes were part of plans to try and develop players in the UK so that they not have to go abroad to fulfil their potential.
Ms Cossington added: "We have a responsibility to ensure that every young girl who wants to have a career in football has a clear pathway to doing so.
"With more opportunities and a better geographic spread, we're incredibly confident that this will inspire a new generation of Lionesses to flourish and evolve our game for the future."