Helen Ward: Wales striker welcomes Nations League introduction
- Published
Helen Ward (left) is Wales women's all-time leading goalscorer
Wales striker Helen Ward says the introduction of a Women's Nations League is an "exciting" development.
Uefa announced the new competition will begin in Autumn 2023 in the lead-up to the 2025 Women's European Championship.
The competition will link into qualification for both the 2025 European Championship and the 2027 World Cup
"It's great that Uefa have decided that the time's right that we can be elevated to that level," Ward said.
"It will be really exciting and another good opportunity to play against nations that are in and around you.
"At the moment you get your friendlies, and don't get too many of them, and you get your qualifiers which you get to play your different ranked teams.
"So to play against nations that are ranked in and around you will be really good for sides like Wales in particular, as we don't often get that chance."
The men's Nations League was introduced in 2018 to replace international friendlies with more competitive games.
Wales' men started off in Nations League B but secured promotion into the top tier League A, facing Belgium, the Netherlands and Belgium.
'A lot of fun'
Rob Page's side were relegated from the top tier in October following a campaign which came in the middle of Wales' delayed World Cup play-off win over Ukraine.
"I still only got my head around the men's one and I'm still not entirely sure how that works," Ward told BBC Radio Wales Sport.
"Obviously Wales have had a lot of fun in it in the last couple of years.
"This last campaign perhaps didn't go quite to plan but we had other things to look forward to in terms of World Cup qualification.
"A lot of issues surrounding it in the men's game is the number of games that's added to a fixtur- heavy schedule in terms of domestic and European football.
"But in the women's game we have a lot fewer domestic fixtures, so if we can ramp up those friendly games and replace them with a more competitive set of fixtures and another route of qualifying for tournaments, then I think it's a good thing."
Whether Ward will be involved for Wales when the Nations League begins remains to be seen but the Watford player has been included in Gemma Grainger's squad for a friendly against Finland in Spain on 12 November.
There have been doubts over the 36-year-old's international future after Wales's dreams of qualifying for the 2023 World Cup finals were ended by Switzerland in a play-off in October.
"It's an ongoing process for me and taking each camp and each game as it comes and seeing how Gemma and her staff feel about the squad and how it's going to shape up," Ward added.
"Obviously come January there's going to be a new focus for the group when we find out the groups for the European qualifiers.
"At this point I've not made a decisions and I'm obviously delighted to be involved in Spain next week - it's not the worst place to be going at this time of year.
"I've always said that as long as I'm playing football I will always be available for Wales.
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