Why Jayne Ludlow’s successor must include Welsh Premier Women’s League in their vision

In Jayne Ludlow’s six-year spell as Wales manager she helped put Welsh women’s football on the map, but her successor must include the Welsh Premier Women’s League as part of their vision.

On November 20th 2020, Ludlow named, what turned out to be the final squad of players that she would manage for Wales ahead of their final Euro 2022 qualifier against Belarus.

Within that squad Claire Skinner, who has since made a move from Cardiff City Women to WPWL champions Swansea City Ladies, was the only representative from the welsh top-flight.

And this is something that needs to change in order for the Welsh domestic league to take larger strides in the right direction.

Why the lack of Welsh Premier Women’s League representation?

The majority of the attention around Women’s football in the United Kingdom is immediately drawn across to Wales’ neighbours in England.

There is no denying that this isn’t a shock as a result of the massive names that the Super League inhabits with the likes of Balon D’or winner Lucy Bronze attracting interest.

So it seems that Ludlow’s reign was solely built around players from the top leagues in England with no suspicion of giving any proven players from the domestic leagues even a sniff.

There are many players within the WPWL that have represented Wales at youth level including, Swansea City’s Katy Hosford, Ellie Lake and Shaunna Jenkins, Cyncoed’s Rhianne Oakley and Cardiff City’s Sophie Norman.

Northern Ireland, who ultimately qualified for Euro 2022 in second place at Wales’ expense, did so with the majority of their side playing in the domestic leagues.

14 out of the 23 players that Kenny Shiels selected for Northern Ireland’s final qualifiers against Belarus and Faroe Islands played their club football in the country.

New Under-19 Development League

In line with the FAW’s major restructure of the women’s game in Wales is a new initiative of an Under-19s Development League.

This is a major factor that whoever is next to come in as the new Wales boss must consider for the sake of the future development of the national side.

Speaking to the FAW, Lowri Roberts, the FAW’s Head of Womens’ and Girls’ Football, said: “it will provide a stronger platform for clubs to prepare for the step into the Tier 1 and therefore create a more sustainable domestic pyramid and a more competitive national league.

“During the consultation period, it became very clear that there was a need to introduce a transitional step between U16s girls’ football and senior women’s football as the current structure was not supporting player retention.”

A system like this has to be utilised in the right way, and if so it could have a dramatic impact on the national side’s future success.

(Featured Image: Jayne Ludlow)